Page 23 of The Alpha Under My Bed (The Chosen #1)

Twenty-Three

MALCOLM

Ellie was gone.

Not just out of reach. Fucking gone.

Her scent—fresh. She hadn’t been gone long. But beneath it, there was something else. Something sharp. A faint edge of stress, the ghost of fear. It wasn’t obvious. Wasn’t strong.

Which meant whoever took her knew what the fuck they were doing.

I turned toward the door. Locked.

Windows? Shut.

Her phone? Still on the counter.

I exhaled through my nose, forcing my hands to unclench.

My stomach twisted, nausea curling in my gut like acid. Ellie must have left on her own.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, vibrating against my palm like a warning. I answered before the screen could light up. “Tell me you have something.”

A pause, then a familiar voice. “We just flagged a purchase.”

Everything in me went still. I turned toward the nest, staring at it like it would somehow change the words that had just left their mouth. “What kind of purchase?”

A breath. Hesitant. Like they already knew I wasn’t going to like the answer.

“Claudia made a cash payment for heat inducers.”

My vision tunneled.

The apartment blurred at the edges. My pulse was no longer steady, no longer even. It pounded. A slow, dark throb that echoed in my ears, in my bones, in the fucking bond inside me that was already screaming to tear the world apart until I found her.

I barely heard myself speak. “How long ago?”

“An hour. Maybe less.” A pause. “She also put in an order for some… specialized restraints.”

The air in my lungs turned to fire.

My grip on the phone tightened, my knuckles aching from the force. “Where?”

“We’re tracking it down now, but?—”

“I need a fucking location.”

“We’ll have it soon, Mal, but?—”

I ended the call.

I couldn’t breathe.

No. Not couldn’t. Wouldn’t.

Not until I had my hands around Claudia’s fucking throat.

I had fucked up.

I had fucked up.

I should have put Ellie in the apartment I built for her. Should have locked her in. Should have tracked her the second she bonded to me. Should have chipped her.

The thought slammed into me, ugly and sharp. I had thought about it before. Every time she had a heat. It would have been easy. A simple subdermal tracker, placed when she was too deep in heat to notice. She never would have known.

And I would have never lost her.

I had convinced myself it was too much—too controlling, too obsessive. That tracking her, keeping her locked away, would cross a line I couldn’t come back from.

And now?

Now, I was paying for it.

The cold realization settled in my bones, spreading like ice through my veins. My fists clenched at my sides as I turned toward the door, my pulse a slow, heavy thud in my ears.

And then?—

A knock.

Loud. Firm. Wrong.

The kind of knock that sent a warning straight to the gut, that made instinct crawl up my spine like a live wire.

I didn’t hesitate. Didn’t second-guess.

I yanked the door open?—

And there they were.

Pack Cross.

The second I swung the door open, my brother’s scent slammed into me like a fist to the gut.

Julian stood there, all tall, golden, and fucking perfect. His smug smile didn’t just piss me off—it twisted something sharp in my chest. He actually looked pleased to be here, as if this wasn’t a damn invasion. As if I was supposed to be happy to see him.

Behind him were the same faces I’d known all my life—the same pack that had stood by him when they’d dismissed Ellie all those years ago. The same ones who had let him decide she wasn’t worthy of their time. Worthy of anything .

I barely heard his voice over the roar of blood in my ears.

“Mal.” Julian’s tone was too calm—too controlled. Like he had any fucking right to show up at my door with his pack in tow, acting like this was some kind of family reunion. “You going to let us in?”

I didn’t move. I just stared, letting the silence stretch.

I breathed .

For a split second, I considered snapping his neck right there in the hallway. It wouldn’t have been the first time I’d thought about it.

Instead, I stepped forward, closing the space between us. My body blocked the doorway like a wall.

“You’ve got thirty seconds to tell me why the hell you’re here,” I growled, “before I start breaking bones.”

Julian’s lips twitched—amusement—because he thought this was some fucking joke.

“We’ve been trying to reach you,” he said, casually, as if I should give a shit. “You don’t answer calls. Don’t visit. Don’t check in. We were worried.”

I exhaled slowly, letting the control flood back in. “I told you I wasn’t coming back.”

His expression didn’t budge. He’d heard it a thousand times. “Yeah, I figured.”

“Then why the hell are you here?”

Julian’s gaze slid past me, his eyes scanning the apartment, lingering—searching—for something. Or someone .

My hands curled into fists. “Eyes on me, Julian.”

He smirked—like I had just confirmed whatever the hell he’d come to prove.

“Relax, little brother,” he said, his voice dripping with amusement. “I just wanted to see if it was true.”

I stilled. “If what was true?”

Before he could answer, another voice, softer but laced with a bitter edge, cut through the tension.

“You marked her.”

I turned slowly, my eyes locking with Ethan’s—his face twisted with something close to disappointment.

Ethan. Always stuck up Julian’s ass, hoping to earn the man’s approval, trying to be something he was never going to be. I hated him. Always had.

I took a breath—slow, steady, controlled. Deadly.

Ethan sighed, rubbing a hand over his jaw, brows furrowed as if I’d just crushed his last bit of hope. Grief flickered in his eyes. Grief for the fact that I had bonded with my mate.

Julian tilted his head, eyes gleaming with something dark. Something knowing. “So, we’re doing this then?”

My pulse kicked into overdrive, thrumming in my veins like a drumbeat. Warning.

“Doing what?” I asked, my voice low, dangerous.

Julian’s smile stretched, smug and knowing. “Having two omegas.”

The world tilted. Everything inside me snapped.

The air in the room shifted, thickening, as though the very space we stood in could sense the chaos coming.

Julian must have felt it, because his posture stiffened, just slightly, enough to remind me that he knew exactly what I was capable of.

I took one more step forward, slow. Deliberate. Until there was barely an inch between us. I could feel his breath. Feel the tension hanging heavy in the space between us, thick with the promise of violence.

“I will give you one chance,” I said, my voice low. Final. “Turn around. Leave. Don’t fucking come back.”

Julian’s smirk was slow. Unbothered.

“You haven’t even met her yet, Mal,” he murmured. “You haven’t smelled her.”

He leaned in, dropping his voice to something only I could hear.

“She’s your scent match. Our scent match. Our perfect omega.”

The words landed with the weight of inevitability.

Because I had already known.

That phone call had prepared me. I had been expecting this moment, had braced myself for it. I already knew they had found her.

But I hadn’t known who she was.

And now?

Now, I did.

Julian pulled back, his eyes searching, reading every minute shift in my expression. He was waiting for the hit, for the moment it would sink in, the second he would see it break me.

Because even though I had already known this was a possibility—even though I had long since accepted that fate had chosen someone for me, that somewhere in the world there was a scent that would match mine perfectly, that would send every instinct in my body into a frenzy?—

I had never cared.

Because Ellie was mine.

She had always been mine. And nothing about this—not fate, not Pack Cross, not Julian’s smug fucking satisfaction—was going to change that.

Julian sighed, the sound laced with something almost pitying, something that sent rage burning slow and hot beneath my skin. “You always were stubborn,” he mused, shaking his head. “But Mal, she’s?—”

“Not Ellie.”

The words came out flat. Final.

Because that was the only thing that fucking mattered.

Julian’s jaw flexed. “She’s our match.”

“And Ellie is my mate.”

He exhaled through his nose, patience thinning, temper simmering just beneath the surface. “Then you’ll have two.”

The words dripped with certainty, as if this was a solution, not a problem. As if the very idea of rejecting my scent match was unthinkable.

Then, with a slow, practiced flick of his wrist, he gave the silent signal.

The doors opened.

And everything changed.

A scent hit me—soft, delicate, and dangerously inviting. It slithered through the room, a silent command that whispered to every primal instinct buried deep in my bones. Warm and sweet, it wrapped itself around me like a lover’s touch—subtle, but unmistakable. Every inhale was a calculated seduction, designed to ensnare, to weaken, to bind.

But it wasn’t Ellie .

My mind screamed the truth, but my body didn’t listen.

Something inside me reacted before my brain could even catch up—a violent, gut-churning twist, a sharp, visceral pull that had nothing to do with logic or choice. It didn’t care that I had spent years loving her, that I had sworn loyalty to someone else.

This was something deeper. Something I had no control over.

The alphas around me stiffened, their shoulders straightening with the ease of predators recognizing their prey. Their tension evaporated into something far more dangerous—satisfaction. This was what they’d been waiting for. The moment they had been preparing for.

Because the omega standing before me?

I knew who she was.

Genevieve Laurent.

Her name had drifted through high society for years, carried in the hushed, reverent tones of alphas who dreamed of a mate like her. She was pedigreed perfection, a genetic masterpiece designed for breeding contracts and power plays. The kind of omega people killed for.

And I had never given her a second thought.

Because I had never scented her.

Not until now.

My body betrayed me first. A deep, instinct-driven breath dragged her scent into my lungs, latching onto my biology like a parasite, like a trick. My stomach turned as my muscles coiled tight, a sickening, foreign pull twisting through my instincts.

And that was the cruelest fucking joke of all.

Julian smirked, his satisfaction palpable as he watched my reaction, as he saw the way my body responded, even as my mind rejected everything about this.

“She’s exquisite, isn’t she?” he murmured, his voice smooth, coaxing. “Genetically selected. Your perfect match.” His eyes gleamed, a slow, victorious tilt curling the edges of his lips. “Your fated mate.”

My stomach churned, my jaw clenching so hard my teeth ached.

Genevieve.

My scent match.

The irony bled through me like poison.

Ellie had been discarded. Genevieve had been treasured.

And I still chose Ellie.

Julian could put on this little show. He could parade Genevieve in front of me, let her scent flood the room, let my instincts betray me with deep, unwanted pulls of recognition.

But he had already lost.

Because there was nothing in this world—not fate, not instinct, not even biology itself—that could change one undeniable truth.

Ellie was my everything.

“She’s yours, Mal,” Julian continued, his voice sickeningly smooth. “You belong here. With us. With her. That little omega you’ve been playing house with?” He scoffed, shaking his head. “She’s a fucking joke. And you know it.”

Something snapped.

I turned, slow and deliberate, locking eyes with him. “You don’t get to talk about her.”

Julian arched a brow, his smirk widening. “What? Afraid to admit the truth? You think that little nothing of an omega is enough for you?” He gestured toward Genevieve. “You deserve better. We found you better.”

I took a step forward. Genevieve flinched. Julian didn’t. His smirk deepened, his confidence unwavering, like he had already won. Like my body’s reaction to her scent was all the proof he needed. Like he thought he had me pinned down, shackled to the fate he had carved out for me before I was even fucking born.

And maybe, for a weaker man, that would have been true. But I wasn’t weak. I had already made my choice.

And they had no fucking idea what kind of monster they had just unleashed.

I tilted my head, my voice low, measured, deadly.

“You think a fucking scent match means something?”

Julian blinked.

“Do you know what I did to the last alpha who tried to take what was mine?” I continued, taking another slow, deliberate step toward him. “Do you know how long it took him to die?”

The air shifted. The smugness in Julian’s face faltered—just for a second—but I saw it.

I smiled.

And then I moved.

The second Julian hit the floor, the others closed in.

Six of them.

Ethan. Theo. Carter. Sawyer. Levi. Marcus.

I knew them all. Grew up with them. Trained with them. Ate with them. Called them my brothers.

Now?

Now they were just obstacles.

They thought numbers meant something. That I wasn’t already beyond reason. That they could bring me back.

The second they moved, I ended that illusion.

Ethan lunged first. Stupid. Predictable. The beta had always been a brawler, always relied on his size to win fights. That only worked when you weren’t up against a monster.

I sidestepped his charge, caught his wrist, and used his own weight against him. He hit the floor hard, his skull cracking against the coffee table with a wet thud on the way down.

One down.

Carter and Levi tried to coordinate, moving in at the same time. I ducked Carter’s punch and twisted at the last second, grabbing his arm and yanking him forward. His own momentum sent him crashing into Levi. Sloppy. Weak. Slow.

They scrambled to recover. I didn’t let them.

I caught Carter by the throat and drove him back into the wall. The sickening crunch of bone against brick sent a shudder down my spine. His body slumped. His legs twitched. He was done.

Levi barely had time to get his bearings before I grabbed him by the collar and wrenched him forward. Face, meet my knee. Blood sprayed. His nose crunched. He collapsed.

Two more down.

Sawyer hesitated. His hands were up, but he wasn’t attacking yet. His jaw clenched. I saw it in his eyes—doubt.

“I don’t want to do this, Mal.” His voice was tight.

I laughed. Sharp. Mean. Bloody. “You already are.”

And then I lunged.

He never stood a fucking chance.

We hit the floor together, my weight pinning him down, my knees pressing into his ribs as I wrapped my hands around his throat.

He struggled. Twisted. Tried to buck me off.

I held firm.

Sawyer had always been too soft. Always second-guessed himself. He never belonged in Pack Cross, and deep down, he knew it.

His pulse pounded beneath my grip. Fast. Desperate. Weak.

I pressed harder.

His kicks slowed. His struggles weakened. His breath turned into choked gasps.

Then—nothing.

Four down.

I rolled off him before his body even settled.

Marcus and Theo were still standing.

They didn’t hesitate. They came at me at the same time. Like they had a chance.

Theo got to me first. He tackled me, slamming his shoulder into my ribs and sending us both crashing to the floor. The air left my lungs, my vision going white for half a second—enough for Marcus to get his hands on me.

They thought they had me.

I let them think it.

Theo pinned my shoulders. Marcus grabbed my wrists, forcing them down, his knee pressing into my ribs to keep me from throwing him off. I could hear them breathing hard, could feel the way their muscles strained.

They were struggling.

I wasn’t.

I grinned. Then I moved.

I wrenched one arm free and slammed my fist into Theo’s face. He yelped, his weight shifting just enough for me to twist out from under him.

Marcus barely had time to react before I flipped him onto his back and drove my elbow into his throat. The sound he made? Beautiful.

Theo tried to scramble back, but I grabbed his ankle and dragged him toward me.

“Mal, don’t?—”

I drove my knee into his chest. He choked.

I grabbed him by the hair and slammed his head against the ground.

Once. Twice.

Done.

Marcus was trying to crawl away.

I stepped on his back, grinding him into the floor. His breath hitched.

“Still think I’m coming home?” I murmured.

He shuddered beneath me. Didn’t answer.

Smart.

Then I leaned down and snapped his fucking neck.

Six down.

Julian was the only one left.

I turned to him, breathing heavily.

He was still on the ground. Still alive. Barely.

He tried to sit up.

I stepped on his chest, pinning him down.

He wheezed.

“Mal—” he choked. “We can still fix this.”

I smiled. Slow. Sharp. Bloody.

“Fix this?” My foot pressed harder, cutting off his air. His hands scrambled at my ankle—useless. “You can’t fix dead, Julian.”

His gaze flickered past me.

I followed it.

And then I saw her.

Genevieve.

They thought bringing her here would do something to me.

Like I would see her and fall to my knees. Like my instincts would override everything else. Like I would forget Ellie, forget everything, just because of some fucking scent match.

Julian wheezed a laugh.

“She’s right there,” he rasped. “She’s yours. She was always supposed to be yours.”

I blinked.

Then I laughed. Laughed so hard my ribs ached.

I crouched down, gripping his jaw, forcing him to look at me.

“You still don’t get it, do you?” I murmured.

His eyes widened.

Realization.

I leaned in, my voice dropping to a whisper.

“You were never strong enough to have her.”

His body locked up.

“You were never strong enough to have me either.”

His breath hitched.

I pressed my fingers into his mouth. Into his jaw.

And then—I wrenched it open.

The sound it made?

Fucking beautiful.

His body convulsed once, then went still, so I let him go.

Julian was dead. My pack was dead. Genevieve was still shaking. Frozen. Silent. Waiting to die.

Good.

I didn’t rush it. I let her feel every second of it, let the weight of what had just unfolded settle into her trembling bones. The thick, suffocating silence was broken only by the wet drip of blood hitting the floor—each drop a reminder of what had just been done. The bodies at my feet were cooling, their blood pooling beneath them.

She wasn’t stupid. She knew. Knew she wasn’t leaving this place alive.

But I wasn’t done with her. Not yet.

I tilted my head, letting my gaze slide over her, lingering as I scanned her the same way Julian must have when they first laid eyes on her. A pretty little omega. Delicate. Sweet. Soft in all the ways Ellie wasn’t.

But all I could see was wasted potential.

A thing bred to be worshiped, handed everything she’d ever wanted on a silver fucking platter. An omega who had never had to fight for anything. She had been given everything without ever earning it.

She wasn’t Ellie.

But Julian had still marked her.

The sight of it made my stomach turn.

A perfect mating mark, nestled against the soft curve of her throat, a symbol of possession that belonged to someone else. It was the brand Julian should have placed on Ellie. She should have been the one to wear that mark. She should have been his—theirs.

Instead, she was mine.

Genevieve’s scent spiked—fear. Fresh. Raw. And she didn’t fight it. Didn’t beg. Didn’t try to run. She just trembled.

But I was the one who controlled this.

I took a slow step closer, closing the gap between us, the air thickening with every inch.

She just stood there.

Resigned.

Pathetic.

I reached up, trailing my fingers over Julian’s mark, feeling the way the fresh scar tissue stretched beneath my touch. She flinched. I smiled.

“You think they loved you?” I murmured, watching the way her throat bobbed, the way she refused to answer.

I already knew the truth. No one in Pack Cross had ever wanted her. Not really. She was just convenient. Just another pretty little omega to add to their collection. Just a backup plan.

Her breath hitched. She knew.

“That must suck,” I whispered, brushing my thumb over Julian’s mark one last time.

Then, without warning—I sank my teeth in.

Genevieve screamed.

She finally fought.

Too late.

I tasted Julian’s claim as I ripped it off her fucking throat.

Flesh tore. Blood bloomed.

She choked on it, sobbing, hands flying up to the gaping wound I had left behind.

But I wasn’t looking at her anymore.

I was looking at what I had taken.

The torn, bloody scrap of skin between my fingers.

Julian’s claim. His last mark on this fucking world.

I lifted it, holding it up to the dim light.

Then—I smiled.

Ellie deserved a gift.

Something to prove that no one would ever take what was hers again.

Something to remind her exactly what kind of monster she had bonded.

I curled my fingers around it, my grip tightening until blood leaked through my knuckles.

Then, without another glance at Genevieve, I reached up, snapped her neck, and let her crumple at my feet.

I turned toward the door, blood still dripping from my hands.

Because now?

Now, I was going to get my fucking mate back.