Alpha's Broken Luna's Heart

Chapter 3

“ Please, Alpha, don't do this to me,” I begged. “ You know he hates me.”

He ignored all my pleading and groaned in pain.

“ Then he will learn to love you. You're his fated mate.” He declared. “ I know I sound like a heartless and cruel Alpha. But believe me I'm doing this for everyone. I need to save my son, you and my pack members. The unknown danger is looming outside and I need to protect my pack before I will be gone.”

"Amber." The Alpha's voice had gentled, and when I met his eyes, I saw the father I'd known. "Please. For me. For the pack."

How could he ask this of me? How could he not know what he was condemning me to?

But I'd seen the plea in his eyes. The desperation of a man who knew he was dying, who needed to ensure his pack would survive his death. And beneath my own pain, beneath my screaming instinct to run, was the truth I couldn't escape.

I owed him everything.

I moved out of the room with heavy steps and burning tears, the door closed behind me with a soft click.

Now I stood in the hallway, my back against the wall, my hands curled into fists at my sides.

I heard footsteps approaching and I didn't need to look to know it was my uncle.

I couldn't glance at my uncle. Couldn't bear to see whatever expression he wore. "Uncle Marcus—"

I'd lost my parents when I was seven. Uncle Marcus had raised me, had taught me control over my moon-touched abilities, had been the only family I had left in this world.

"You have to do this, Amber." His voice was rough, strained. "You have to marry Steven."

"He hates me!" The words burst out of me, all the pain and fear and desperation I'd been holding back for a year. "He looks at me like I'm garbage, like I'm something offensive to his senses. He has other women, flaunts them in front of me, makes sure I know exactly how little I mean to him. And you want me to marry him? To bind myself to someone who despises my very existence?"

"You're his mate—"

"I'm his punishment!" I was on my feet now, shaking with the force of my emotions. "That's how he sees me. As the cosmic joke the Moon Goddess played on him. Tying him to someone beneath his station, someone he would never have chosen, someone he can barely stand to be in the same room with."

"The bond will change things." Uncle Marcus finally looked at me, and his eyes were pleading. "Once you're married, once you complete the mating bond, he'll feel differently. The pull will grow stronger, the connection will deepen. He won't be able to help himself—he'll come to care for you, to see your worth."

"You don't believe that any more than I do."

Silence stretched between us, heavy with all the things we weren't saying.

"I raised you." Uncle Marcus's voice had gone quiet. Dangerous in a different way than the Alpha's threats. "After your parents died, when no one else wanted the responsibility of a moon-touched child, I took you in. I fed you, clothed you, trained you to control your gifts. I gave you everything."

My breath caught. "Uncle Marcus, please—"

"I'm asking you to do this one thing for me. For the family that raised you. For the pack that's protected you." He moved closer, and I could see the desperation in his eyes now. "If you refuse, if you defy the Alpha, I'll lose my position. Everything I've built, everything I've worked for—it'll all be gone. Is that what you want? To destroy me?"

"That's not fair—"

"Fair?" He laughed, but it was a broken sound. "Fair is understanding obligations. Fair is recognizing what you owe. I could have sent you away, let you become some other pack's problem. But I didn't. I kept you, raised you as my own. And now, when I need you to step up, to do your duty, you want to refuse?"

Tears burned hot trails down my cheeks. "He'll make my life miserable."

"He's your mate. The bond will soften him, in time. You just have to be patient, be understanding. Show him you're not a burden, but a partner." Uncle Marcus reached out, gripping my shoulders. "Please, Amber. Please don't make me lose everything because of this."

"There has to be another way—"

"There isn't." His fingers tightened. "And Amber... if you refuse..." He swallowed hard. "I won't survive.. I won't be able to live with the humiliation of my niece defying the Alpha because of me. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Horror washed over me, cold and nauseating. "Uncle Marcus, no—"

"I'll do it. I swear to you, I will. I'll end my life if I don't manage to fulfill our Alpha's command," His eyes were glassy now, fevered with something that scared me more than any of the Alpha's threats. "You're all I have, dear. You're my legacy. And if you destroy that, if you make me a laughingstock, a failure... I can't. I won't live with that."

"Please don't do this," I sobbed. "Please don't make me choose—"

"There is no choice." He released me, stepping back. "Marry Steven. Fulfill your duty as his mate. Or live with the knowledge that you drove me to my death. Those are your options."

A bitter laugh escaped me before I could stop it.

My uncle was quiet for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice was heavy with something that might have been regret.

"Your power makes you valuable, yes. But it also makes you vulnerable. Do you think I don't know what some of the other packs would do if they knew the full extent of your gifts? Marrying into the Alpha line will protect you. It will give you status, security,” he said.

His eyes hardened. "The Alpha is dying. Steven is young, untested. There are already murmurs from the other packs, challenges waiting to be issued the moment the old Alpha's heart stops beating. Steven needs you, whether he realizes it or not. Your power combined with his bloodline—it's the only thing that will keep this pack intact."

"And what about what I need?" My voice broke, and I hated myself for it. "Doesn't that matter at all?”

He reached out, his large hand cupping my cheek the way he used to when I was small and scared.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry, little one. But this is the life we were born into. We serve the pack. We do our duty. Even when it costs us everything.”

I closed my eyes, feeling the tears spill over. Trying to understand what the Moon goddess had written about my faith. Trying to understand why being moon touched, being special, felt so much like being cursed.

My uncle's thumb brushed away my tears. "You've always been stronger than you know, Amber. Stronger than your power, stronger than your pain. You survived losing your parents. You survived growing up different. You can survive this too."

But what if I don't want to just survive anymore? What if I want to actually live?

I sank back into the chair, my legs unable to hold me anymore. This couldn't be happening. This couldn't be real. My uncle, the man who'd raised me, who'd been the one constant in my chaotic life, was standing here and essentially threatening suicide if I didn't agree to marry a man who hated me.

Alpha Derek was already on the verge of death. I kept losing everybody. I couldn't bear more.

What choice did I have? What choice had I ever had?

"I'll do it," I whispered. The words tasted like ash. "I'll marry him."

The relief on Uncle Marcus's face was immediate and profound. "Thank you. Oh, thank you, Amber. You won't regret this, I promise. Steven will come around. The bond is powerful—once you're truly mated, once the marriage is complete, he won't be able to resist it. You'll see. Everything will work out."

I nodded numbly, not believing a word of it.

Uncle Marcus kept talking, something about wedding preparations and pack traditions, but I couldn't hear him over the roaring in my ears. Couldn't process anything beyond the simple, devastating truth.

I was going to marry Steven. The man who'd looked at me with revulsion from the moment he'd learned we were mates. The man who'd tried to reject me, who'd made it his mission to show me exactly how little I meant to him.

And there was nothing I could do to stop it.

Because what was my alternative? Let my uncle destroy himself? Let the Alpha's wish unfulfilled? I was moon-touched, yes, but that just made me valuable, not powerful. Not in any way that mattered. I had no allies, no resources, nowhere to run that the pack couldn't find me.

I was trapped. Completely, utterly trapped.

"It'll be okay," Uncle Marcus was saying, his hand on my shoulder. "You'll see, my dear. Mates are meant to be together. The Moon Goddess doesn't make mistakes. Steven will learn to love you. The bond will bring you together."

I closed my eyes and tried to believe him. Tried to summon some shred of hope, some small light in the darkness that my future had become.

But all I could see was Steven's face. That look of pure disgust. That hatred that burned colder than any ice.

And I knew, with a certainty that settled into my bones like poison, that Uncle Marcus was wrong.

Would the bond really change Steven? Would it make him love me? Would it make him see me as anything other than the burden he'd been forced to bear.

My life was about to become a living hell.

And I had just agreed to walk into it willingly, with my eyes wide open, because the alternative was watching our Alpha dying and knowing it was my fault. I couldn't save him.

This week on full moon.

And then I would belong to Steven.

The thought made me want to scream. Made me want to run, to shift and let my wolf carry me far away from this place, these people, this impossible situation.

But I wouldn't. Couldn't.

Because despite everything, despite the pain and the fear and the absolute certainty that I was about to sacrifice myself on the altar of duty and obligation, I couldn't let my uncle die.

He was all I had left.

Even if that meant giving up everything else.

Even if it meant giving up myself.