Page 84 of Stalked By the Alphas
“You’re better off without me. Without all of us.”
“That’s not for you to decide. Please, Zach. Come down from there, and we can talk about this.”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” he says, his voice hollow. “We’ve ruined everything. The things we’ve done… it’s unforgivable.”
“So tell me. Tell me, Zach. Tell me what you’ve done, because at the moment I’ve got speculations and some half-arsed confessions from your leader. To truly be able to forgive you, tell me what you’ve done.”
I see Noah take a step forward, and I snap my head to glare at him to stay back. He is not happy about this in the slightest. Carter, even less so. But tough.
“Let’s hear it. Let’s hear this confession of your sins. I’ll start you off, shall I?” I’m getting into this now. I hold my finger up even though he can’t see me. “One, you’ve driven away every alpha I tried to get close to,am I right? Yeah? What for? All it did was make me run away from Cornwall, from all of you. Two, you somehow tried to fuck up the sale of my bookshop, but that was tough shit because it went through, anyway. Three, and this is a stab in the dark, so do correct me if I’m wrong, you broke into my house while I was in the middle of my heat and had sex with me? Is that right? Am I close? Or was that another ‘figment of my imagination’?”
“Hazel,” Noah warns as Zach lets out a loud whimper.
Zach’s shoulders shake as he lets out a choked sob. “Yes,” he whispers. “All of it. We did all of it.”
My stomach churns at the confirmation. “My heat.” I hadn’t wanted to believe it, but I knew deep down it was true. It wasn’t delirium. It was real.
“We broke in and came to you. You consented. We asked, and you wanted us. I know how that sounds, but we told ourselves you wanted us.”
“I was in heat!” I snap. “I would have wanted anyone with a knot. That doesn’t make it okay! It’s like the furthest thing from okay! I didn’t know what I was saying or doing. You didn’t give me a choice!”
Zach flinches. “I know.” He shuffles closer to the edge of the railing.
“Hazel, please, not now—” Noah starts, but I cut him off with a hiss.
“Don’t ‘not now’ me. You wanted me here. Well, here I fucking am, learning all your dirty secrets.”
“You’re right,” Zach says. “We took advantage ofyou. We justified it to ourselves, but deep down, we knew it was wrong. I’m so sorry, Hazel. For everything.”
His words hit me like a punch to the gut. Part of me wants to rage at him, to scream and cry and maybe even give him a push after I tell him how much he’s hurt me and throw the other two lying bastards over the railing with him. But another part sees how broken he is, teetering on the edge of that bridge, and how my anger doesn’t make me a killer. Not even a secondary one. If I walk away, he will jump. I know that in my soul.
“Zach, please,” I say, my voice shaking, trying to control the anger and pain. “Come down from there. We can talk about this, but not like this. Not with you up there.”
He shakes his head. “I can’t face you. Not after what we’ve done.”
“Then don’t face me,” I say. “But don’t do this. Don’t jump. It won’t solve anything.”
“What else is there?” he asks brokenly. “We’ve ruined everything.”
I take a deep breath, steeling myself. “Maybe you have. But that doesn’t mean it has to end like this. Come down, Zach. Face what you’ve done. Make amends if you can.”
“How?” he whispers. “How can we possibly make amends for this?”
“I don’t know,” I admit. “But you can’t if you’re dead. Please, Zach. Give yourself a chance.”
He turns his head slightly, looking at me for the first time since I got here. The raw pain and anguish I see there makes my breath catch.
“Why do you care?” he asks brokenly. “After everything we’ve done, why are you even here?”
“I—I don’t want this to be how it ends.”
Zach’s shoulders slump. For a long moment, he’s silent, and I hold my breath, terrified he’s going to jump anyway.
Then, slowly, he turns and slides off the railing back onto the bridge. My knees go weak with relief.
As soon as his feet touch the ground, Noah rushes forward, wrapping Zach in a tight embrace. I hear him murmuring soothing words as Zach breaks down, sobbing into Noah’s shoulder.
I stand there awkwardly, unsure what to do now. Part of me wants to go to them, to offer comfort. But another part, the part that’s still reeling from all the revelations, wants to run far away from here and never look back.
