Page 126 of Broken Wolf Heart
“But she’s the alpha of the Giovanni pack,” Levi says carefully.
“Yeah.”
“And you’re the alpha of your own pack now,” he adds.
“What the fuck does?—”
“Mates—true fated mates,” Mac says softly, “are meant to share a bond that goes deeper than any pack bond ever will.”
“I know that,” I say, my words clipped. Had they come here to insult and lecture me?
“However,” Mac says carefully, and Levi angles himself closer to her, “a pack bond is still a necessary part of the equation.”
“No shit.”
Mac lifts a brow. “You just said your pack doesn’t include Lexi.”
I blink then shake off her insinuation, even if it does raise my wolf’s hackles that someone is questioning our devotion to our mate. “Lexi is my mate, which makes her my pack by default. You don’t understand our hierarchy?—”
But Mac shakes her head. “Maybe for another wolf, that could be true, but this alpha power you both have with the hex magic woven into it… We think it’s changed the way you bonded. Chloe said the gene mutation elevated your wolf so there would be no equal, so the wolf in power could rule alone?—”
“Lexi has it, too, though,” I say quickly.
“Right. Which is why I think you have to claim each other as pack to fully seal it—to truly share it.”
“Share it?” I echo, “You want me to let this darkness inside her too? No way. Absolutely fucking not.”
“Your bond with Lexi,” Levi interrupts. “Do you feel it right now?”
“Of course I do.”
“Where is she?”
“She’s at the estate.”
“Do you know that in your head, or do you feel it through your bond?”
“I…” I blink, realization dawning. My sense of Lexi’s location points vaguely east and suggests a distance of several miles… but that’s it.
My gaze snaps to theirs. “What the fuck,” I breathe.
Mac’s eyes glimmer with sympathy. “These injections your former alpha gave himself, between the gene mutation and the hex magic…Chloe said it’s too much power for one wolf. Trying to contain it in a singular shifter—even an alpha—is basically only ever going to end badly.”
“Shit.” My chest hurts as the hope I’d begun to feel is stamped out.
“But you can stop containing it in just one wolf,” Mac adds.
My head snaps up. “What are you talking about?”
“Alpha power is meant to be shared.” Mac looks at Levi, love shining in her eyes as bright as the fucking moon. “Two alphas—fated mates—stabilizing each other.”
I stare at her. No, I stare past her. My head spins. My hope reignites.
“You’ve closed yourself off from the bond with your mate,” Mac says, “But the key to stopping the madness is to let her in.”
“Franco never would have done that,” I say.
“Maybe it’s the missing piece in the research. The reason why he could never make it work properly,” Levi says quietly.
