Page 29 of The Careless Alpha

He rejected us,Sapphire said in my mind, her voice raw with pain and fury.He severed our bond and cast us out like garbage.

I pressed my hand to my chest, where the phantom pain of the broken mate bond still ached like a physical wound. The connection that had defined me since I was thirteen was gone, leaving behind a hollow emptiness that made it hard to breathe.

"I know," I whispered, not caring if other passengers thought I was talking to myself. "But we're alive. Our pup is alive. That's what matters now."

Our pup deserves better than this.

"Our pup deserves better than a father who would reject his child," I said firmly. "We'll be fine on our own."

But even as I said the words, I wasn't sure I believed them. I was seventeen years old, pregnant, and completely alone in the human world with less than three hundred dollars to my name. I'd never held a job, never lived anywhere but the pack territory, never had to survive without the safety net of pack support.

The bus to Maine would cost most of my remaining money, but I'd chosen it for a reason. Crescent Bay was as far from Washington State as I could get. A small coastal town where no one would know me, where I could disappear and start over.

If I could figure out how to survive that long.

"Now boarding bus 47 to Portland, Maine, with stops in Salt Lake City, Denver, Chicago, and Boston," announced a tired-looking woman over the intercom.

I picked up my duffel bag and joined the line of passengers, my legs unsteady beneath me. The bus was old and smelled like diesel, and too many people in too small a space. I found a seat near the back, next to a window that looked out toward the mountains where my pack, my former pack, territory lay hidden in the forest.

As the bus pulled away from the station, I pressed my face to the glass and watched the landscape of my childhood disappear. Somewhere out there, Luna Etta was probably wondering where I'd gone.

She had come to my room the moment I’d fled the dining hall, her face a mask of fury and heartbreak. While I threw my belongings into a bag, she had wrapped her arms around me, begging me to stay.

“Don’t go, Annalise,” she’d pleaded, her voice thick with tears. “Stay here. I will handle this. When Marshall comes back to the house tonight, we will sit down, and I will make him see reason.”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” I’d choked out, the pain of the severed bond a raw, physical agony in my chest. “He hates me.”

“No,” she’d insisted, gripping my arms. “He’s a prideful fool, but he doesn’t hate you. He needs to fix this, and I will make sure he does. That’s my grandpup you’re carrying.”

I’d stared at her in shock, my hands instinctively flying to my stomach. “You know?”

A sad, knowing smile had touched her lips. “Of course, I know, sweetheart. I can smell him. He’s a Kane, through and through.”

“Then why couldn’t Marshall…?” The question died on my lips, too painful to ask.

Luna Etta’s expression had hardened. “Ranger would have known instantly. He would have been celebrating. The only way Marshall wouldn’t know is if he chose to block him out, to let his pride roar louder than his soul.” She squeezed my arms one last time. “Please, Annalise. Just wait. Let me talk to him.”

I had nodded, wanting to believe her, wanting to hope. But after she’d left, promising to return as soon as she found Marshall and convinced him to rescind the order, I’d heard them. Through my open window, the sound of the on-duty warriors gathering in the courtyard below had drifted up. Their voices were low, but my shifter hearing caught every brutal word.

“Thirty minutes, that’s what the Alpha said.”

“And after that?”

“Orders are clear. If she’s on our land a second longer, we treat her as a rogue. Lethal force authorized.”

“He really wants her dead?”

“He wants the betrayal erased.”

The hope Luna Etta had given me curdled into pure, cold terror. He didn’t just want me gone. He wanted meerased. I grabbed my duffel bag, scrambled out the private staircase of the Alpha house, and ran. I ran without looking back, the warriors’ casual discussion of my execution echoing in my ears.

The pack was probably gossiping about the scandal, already moving on with their lives as if I'd never existed.

And Marshall...

Don't think about him,Sapphire said fiercely.He made his choice. He chose to believe we were a whore rather than trust the bond between us.

But I couldn't stop thinking about him. About the way his amber eyes had blazed with fury and disgust when he'd called me those terrible names. About how easily he'd discarded four years of our life together, thrown away everything we were supposed to be. I was his mate. Even if he couldn’t remember, he should have believed me.