Page 50 of His Problem Alpha
I stagger back like he’s hit me. Leaving. He’s really leaving. The room tilts, the floorboards seeming to shift beneath my feet. I grab the doorframe to steady myself.
“Don’t do this,” I say, and I hate the way my voice breaks. “Alex, please. You didn’t kill him. It wasn’t your fault.”
It’s the wrong thing to say. I know it the second the words are out. He whirls on me, his face a twisted mask of a rage so raw it’s almost beautiful in its devastation.
“You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,” he snarls, advancing on me until I’m pressed back against the doorframe. “You weren’t there. You didn’t make the call that put him on that road. You didn’t have to look my parents in the eye at his funeral and know you were the reason for the hole in their lives.”
“It was an accident,” I insist, holding my ground even as he looms over me, his shadow swallowing me whole. “A horrible, tragic accident. The drunk driver—”
“Stop.” The word is a blade, sharp and final. “Just stop. You think you understand because Finn gave you some sanitized version of the story? You don’t know anything.”
“Then tell me,” I plead, my hand lifting, wanting to touch him, to anchor him. “Help me understand.”
He recoils from my almost-touch like I’m white-hot iron. “There’s nothing to understand! I destroy everything I love. I got my brother killed, and I’ll do the same to you if you don’t get the hell away from me.”
“That’s not true,” I argue, desperation clawing at my throat. “You didn’t kill him! Loving people isn’t dangerous—running away from them is!”
He actually recoils, and then he laughs. It’s a harsh, broken sound ripped from his chest, utterly devoid of humor. “That’s what Ethan did,” he says, his voice dropping to a low, venomous whisper that chills me to the bone. “He loved me. He ran right toward me when I called. And now he’s dead.”
The words silence me. They are a wall of his grief, his guilt, his unshakable, twisted logic. There’s no argument that can scale it.
“So that’s it?” I finally manage, hot tears burning the backs of my eyes. “You’re just going to run? Again? Like you ran fromyour family, from your hometown, from everyone who ever gave a damn about you?”
“Yes,” he says, the fight draining out of him, leaving him looking hollowed and exhausted. The anger is gone, replaced by a bone-deep weariness that ages him a decade right in front of me. “That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
“Why?” The question is small, pathetic.
“Because it’s what I do,” he says, turning back to his bag. “I run before I can break anything else.”
“That’s bullshit,” I say, but the words have no fire. “You’re not a monster. You’re just scared.”
He zips the duffel bag closed. The sound is brutally final, a door slamming shut in my face. “You’re right,” he admits, not looking at me. “I am scared. I’m terrified of what I’ll do to you if I stay.”
“Alex, please—”
He finally turns, finally meets my eyes. There’s nothing in them. Just emptiness. A complete and total void. “Find someone who deserves you, Devon,” he says, his voice flat. “Someone who won’t ruin your life.”
He shoulders the bag. He walks past me, close enough for me to feel the cold radiating from him, but he doesn’t touch me. He doesn’t look at me again.
I can’t move. Can’t breathe. This can’t be happening. It can’t end like this.
“Alex!” I call after him, my voice finally breaking free. “Don’t do this. We can figure it out. Together.”
He pauses at the front door, his back to me, shoulders hunched as if under an immense weight. For one heart-stopping, hope-filled second, I think he might turn around. He might change his mind.
“Goodbye, Devon,” he says.
He closes the door behind him. Just a soft click. Somehow that hurts more than if he’d slammed it.
The silence buzzes in my ears. I can’t hear anything but the frantic, useless thumping of my own heart.
And then I feel it.
A sudden, gut-wrenching cold spreads through my chest, a physical sensation of loss. The warm, constant hum of his presence in the back of my mind—a presence I hadn’t even realized was there until it was gone—just vanishes. Snapped off. The air in the apartment feels thin, unbreathable, like all the oxygen left with him. His scent, which had saturated everything, is already starting to fade, leaving behind a hollow echo. It’s the feeling of being utterly, biologically alone.
“Fuck you,” I whisper to the empty apartment. “Fuck you for making me care and then just… leaving.”
My legs buckle. I slide down the wall to the floor, my body a dead weight I can’t hold up anymore. The apartment feels huge now, the silence a crushing presence. His scent is everywhere—coffee, leather, that earthy smell that’s justhim. It’s on the couch. The doorknobs. My skin. I can’t escape it.
