Page 49 of The Alpha's Chosen Fate

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes.

“Did I hurt you?”

The humorless laugh got stuck in my throat.“If you mean while sexing me up, then no, it didn’t hurt at all.Quite the opposite.”

One side of his mouth twitched and I weighed the merits of punching him while in such a vulnerable position.

“As much as I would love to continue sexing you up, as you so fittingly put it, I think it’s time I give you the full story.”

“Can you do that while, um, not inside me?”

“Even if it’s my favorite place to be?”

Rieka rolled over and showed her belly.I rolled my eyes.“Yes.”

“If you insist.”

He pressed a quick kiss to my lips before slowly withdrawing, still semi hard.It left me with an emptiness I hadn’t anticipated.

Don’t worry, he’ll give us that big dick again whenever you ask, my wolf reassured.

Goddess, Rieka.Now is not the time.

If you say so.

Briggs picked up his t-shirt and put it over my head.I let him dress me, comforted by his care and the masculine scent surrounding me.

He slipped on his jeans and sat in the chair beside the bed.When his elbows went to his knees, he went into serious Alpha mode.

“Theia came to me weeks, maybe a month or two, before the Mating Moon.”

Theia was a Seer who tended to keep to herself on the outskirts of the territory.She rarely came to communal meals or large gatherings.

Eric, Emery’s dad, had cautioned all three of us to keep our distance because sometimes wolves with certain gifts struggled with close proximity to others.

“She saw something.About me?”I guessed.

“Not exactly.”

His big hands clasped together.“What she saw,” he swallowed, “was that my mate would die birthing my first child."

I stared at Briggs."She saw me dying?"

He shook his head.“She saw the birth of my first pup, the mother was nondescript.”

“And your son?”

His eyes took on an amber glow.“She swears she saw nothing of him, had no inkling that he, too, would perish.”

The world tilted.I could practically feel his anguish as though it were my own.

“I tried every angle, asked every question.What if I got fixed?What if you had your tubes tied?What if I didn’t take a mate?What if I took my own life?What if—what if—what if??” his volume rose.

Then he shrugged.“It didn’t matter.Something worse would come if Ididn’ttake a mate.If Ididn’tprocreate.She was adamant about that.”

It was supposed to have been me.I should have been the one to die.Maybe then his—our—son … oh, Goddess, it was too awful to think.

"So instead of taking me as your mate, you condemned Ruby."The words tasted like ash on my tongue."She died because of us.”

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