For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Raquelle remained standing beside the door, studying the girl on the bed with a heavy, guarded gaze.
Melissa looked visibly better than she had the day before, but the exhaustion was still deeply evident in the lines of her face.
She sat quietly beneath the thin blankets, her fingers intertwining nervously in her lap as she avoided the Alpha’s piercing eyes.
“How are you feeling?” Raquelle asked, her voice flat but carrying an underlying layer of genuine concern.
“I’m fine, Alpha,” Melissa whispered, her voice small in the quiet clinic room.
Raquelle pulled the visitor’s chair closer to the bedside and sat down, leaning slightly forward.
“Are you sure?” Melissa nodded quickly.
“Yes.” Raquelle studied her for another long moment, the silence stretching thick between them before she broke it with a sudden, heavy question.
“Do you have a mate?” Melissa’s expression shifted slightly, a flicker of confusion crossing her face before she shook her head.
“No, Alpha.” Raquelle nodded slowly, her posture stiffening as her gaze suddenly hardened into absolute ice.
“You heard what happened to him, right?” Melissa hesitated for a beat before giving a small, tentative nod.
“Yes.” “You know I gave the order to kill him.” “Yes, Alpha.” Raquelle took a slow, deep breath, fighting the hollow ache currently tightening in her chest like a vise.
“But guess what?” Melissa frowned slightly, sensing the sudden, dangerous shift in the room’s pressure.
“What?
Alpha.” “The man who hurt you…” Raquelle paused, the words tasting like burning copper on her tongue.
“…was my mate.” Melissa’s eyes widened in pure, unadulterated shock.
“Your mate?” “Yes,” Raquelle said, her voice remaining perfectly steady despite the raw agony tearing through her soul.
“I killed my own mate because of what he did to you.” Melissa stared at her, completely stunned into silence by the massive revelation.
The weight of what her Alpha had sacrificed for her safety hung heavily in the air.
Raquelle leaned forward slightly, locking her golden eyes directly onto Melissa’s.
“If I could kill my own fated mate for what he did, then you should understand something very clearly.” Her voice dropped into a dark whisper.
“I can kill anyone who deserves it.” Melissa swallowed hard, the sheer dominance in the room making her inner wolf tremble.
“I understand.” “Good.” Raquelle rose smoothly from the chair, smoothing down her clothes.
“You’ll be leaving tomorrow.” Melissa blinked in confusion.
“Leave?” “You’re leaving the pack.” “Where will I go?” “Abroad.
Somewhere far away from here,” Raquelle’s voice softened just a fraction, though the finality in her tone was unyielding.
“I’ll take care of everything.
Your travel, your accommodation, whatever you need.
You won’t have to worry about a single expense.” Melissa lowered her gaze to her lap, her voice trembling.
“Why?” Raquelle’s expression tightened, her features fracturing for a brief second as she looked away toward the window.
“Because I can’t let you stay here.
Every time I see you, I remember the mate I lost.
I don’t want that reminder around me anymore.” Melissa remained silent, recognizing the deep, untouchable grief behind her Alpha’s cold command.
“I understand, Alpha.” “Pack your things tomorrow, you will be leaving tomorrow night” Raquelle said, turning back toward the door.
She paused at the threshold, her golden eyes flashing with a dangerous light.
“And don’t tell anyone I ordered you to leave.
Is that clear?” Her dominant Alpha voice slipped into those final words, filling the small clinic room with unmistakable, suffocating authority.
Melissa immediately straightened in her bed, her instincts forcing her to submit.
“Very clear, Alpha.” Raquelle gave a short, sharp nod.
“Good.” She turned the handle, opened the door, and walked out.
*** Outside the private room, Beta Dominic Blue walked down the sterile corridor, his long strides carrying him farther from the room with every passing second.
Stacy hurried right after him, her shorter legs working double-time to keep up with his pace.
“I haven’t seen you for a while now, Dominic,” she said, her voice turning sweet as she played nervously with a strand of her hair, looking up at him through her lashes.
Dominic glanced at her briefly, his expression completely blank.
He honestly preferred that she called him Beta.
They weren’t close enough for the familiarity of his first name, but given her status as the Alpha’s sister, he had never bothered openly correcting her.
“Yeah, right,” he replied simply, not slowing his pace.
Stacy smiled, taking his short response as encouragement.
She hesitated for a moment, gathering the courage to finally push for what she wanted.
“Hmm…
Are you free this weekend?
Maybe we could—” “I’m not free.” The rejection came so quickly and firmly that Stacy stopped dead in her tracks.
Dominic stopped too, turning around to face her fully.
His expression was completely serious, his eyes devoid of any interest or warmth.
Stacy’s hopeful smile faded instantly.
“Oh,” she whispered, lowering her gaze to the tiled floor as she desperately tried to hide the sudden, sharp hurt bleeding into her eyes.
“I’m sorry.” Dominic heard her, but he said absolutely nothing.
Instead, he rolled his eyes slightly at the awkward drama and turned away, continuing down the corridor without a second thought.
Stacy remained standing there alone for a long moment, her fingers slowly falling from her hair.
The rejection stung far more than she wanted to admit, bruising her pride.
But rather than giving up, her eyes narrowed as she watched Dominic’s broad shoulders disappear around the corner.
Something in her expression shifted subtly.
The embarrassment melted away, replaced by a sharp, intense determination.
She was not gonna give up on him yet.
*** A few miles away, the atmosphere in Gamma Jake’s private quarters was thick with heat, heavy sweat, and the smell of sex.
A sharp, breathless scream tore from the throat of the female wolf beneath him as Jake banged her hard against the bed.
His large hands clamped with a bruising, iron grip onto her hips, his knuckles turning white as he completely lost control of his beast.
He flipped her over, pulling her up onto her hands and knees as a primal growl tore from his throat.
He was trying to drown out the memory of the conference room.
He was trying to erase the ghost of Raquelle’s desperate, frantic lips against his, and the humiliating realization that she had only tried to use him as a mindless distraction to run away from her dead mate.
But the faster he went, the more the control slipped right through his fingers.
Positioned behind her, Jake lined up his throbbing length against her wet, aching core.
With a heavy, brutal thrust, he buried his thick cock all the way inside her in one single, punishing motion, stretching her wide.
The girl let out a high-pitched, vocal scream at the sheer depth of him, her fingers clawing frantically into the bedsheets.
Jake didn’t slow down.
He began slamming his hips against her ass in a savage, unyielding rhythm, each loud, wet slap of their skin echoing off the walls.
He shut his eyes tight, but the darkness offered him no escape.
Suddenly, the illusion in his mind took over completely.
The girl’s features began to blur and contort until he was no longer looking at a stranger.
In his head, the tangled black hair on the pillow belonged to her.
The golden, defiant eyes belonged to her.
The tight, slick walls gripping his cock belonged to his Alpha.
The delusion made him so fucking horny it felt like a physical slap to his chest.
His blood turned to pure fire.
His pace turned entirely feral, his heavy shaft sliding all the way out before plunging deep back inside her over and over, driving her into the bed as he imagined he was claiming Raquelle.
He needed her.
He was losing his goddamn mind over her.
“I love you so much, baby,” Jake groaned, his voice rough and completely unhinged.
He reached forward, gripping the girl’s chin and forcing her face back into a deep, bruising kiss, his tongue sliding into her mouth while he completely lost himself in the illusion.
The heat coiled violently in his gut, reaching a dangerous, explosive breaking point.
He started to cum, the intense pleasure ripping through his spine as his cock twitched and flooded her completely, releasing his thick warmth deep inside her.
His chest heaved violently as the raw, forbidden name finally tore from his throat.
“Fuck…
fuck, Raquelle…
ahhhh!”