Page 5 of The Alpha's Cursed Queen

What do I do? Should I just go to the human pharmacy and get some bandages and something to disinfect the wound with? My head is lowered as I walk, so I don’t see the person hurrying in my direction until I bump into him.

The man is built like a tank, and while he doesn’t budge, I fall on my ass.

For a moment, I don’t know what hit me. Groaning, I curl on my side, my body wracked with pain. I couldn’t have hit a person; that had to have been a brick wall.

“Are you alright?” It’s a man’s voice.

As he leans closer, I catch his scent, and I feel a strange, unknown sensation within me. Despite what I feel for certain is a broken rib, I crack an eye open and come face to face with a dark-haired man with light green eyes. He’s looking straight at me, and I stare up at him.

“Are you real?”

He blinks. “What?”

Maybe I hit my head too hard. That would make sense. I’m seeing things. Because that’s not a man; that’s an angel. His face looks like it’s been sculpted by the Gods with painstaking care. All those sharp angles and beautiful curls.

Dazed, I continue to look at him. “You’re pretty. You’re very pretty.”

His face turns red, and he coughs, “You must have hit your head pretty hard.” He takes my hands and helps me to my feet. As he steadies me, I realize that this is not some dream. Flustered, I try to move away, but my head is spinning. He grabs me by my upper arms. “Woah, there.”

When he gets a closer look at my face, his expression changes. “What happened to you? Were you attacked?”

His question has me falling back to Earth, the haze giving way to stark reality.

A shifter.

He’s a wolf shifter, like me. But he’s not from my pack.

I push him away. “I’m fine. Sorry. I must’ve hit my head.”

I try to move past him, but he stops me. “Let me take you to a healer.”

Those green eyes are filled with concern. He’s looking at me as if I matter, as if my pain matters.

My lips start to move, and then I press them together. I don’t want to see the same disgust in his eyes as I’ve seen in the eyes of others of my kind. I don’t think I’ll be able to bear it right now.

However, he doesn’t let me go. His hand wraps around my wrist, and he frowns. “Somebody hurt you. Do you need help?” Before I can say anything, his eyes move lower. “Your hand. It’s infected. You need to see a healer immediately.” He takes a cloth from his pocket and ties it around my palm. “This will stave off the infection till we get to the healer.”

My breath is stuck in my throat as I watch him carefully wrap the cloth around my palm and tie it securely, his forehead creased in concentration. My heart is beating incredibly fast, each thump vibrating in my ribcage.

This man is handsome, but not in the rough, rugged way most shifters are. His is a kind of ethereal beauty. As his fingers graze my palm, each touch gives me a burst of euphoria. I’ve never reacted like this to any male before, and it’s overwhelming.

He looks into my eyes as he says, “You need to report this attack on you.”

I part my lips, about to say something I know I’ll regret. And then something occurs to me.

I don’t know this man, but I do know that when he finds out I don’t have a wolf spirit, the concern and worry in his beautiful eyes will be replaced by disdain and coldness.

I back away from him. “I’m fine. Really.”

Reality is crashing down around me.

He tries to stop me, but I begin hobbling away, feeling like my heart will burst.

He calls out after me, but I break into a run.

I can’t handle his kindness. I just can’t. My heart is too tired.

So very tired.

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