The Genetic Bride: Alpha's Obsession

Chapter 4: Shattered Bond

SEBASTIAN

They ran into the darkness together, holding hands tightly as they fled from the mansion and from me.

The massive front doors continued to slam open and shut in the howling wind behind them, but I stood frozen in the foyer as if my feet had grown roots into the marble floor.

I could not process how determined my fated mate was to break free from me, nor could I understand why she looked at Riven as if he were her salvation—while she only looked at me with terror and resistance.

When they finally vanished into the heavy fog of the woods, the burning rage inside my chest erupted. I ripped my ruined shirt straight down the middle and threw it into the mud—the fabric itself felt like blistering fire against my skin. The freezing night air slammed against my bare chest that instant, and the rain poured down in heavy sheets.

But I did not feel the cold. All I could feel was the phantom memory of her hands in my hair and her soft breath in my ear from only hours before. Her body had not been lying to me under the full moon, yet she was risking her life to run away with a human photographer who did not deserve to look at her.

Driven by absolute betrayal and resentment, I plunged into the forest to follow their tracks. Mud sucked at my boots, and sharp branches snapped against my shoulders as I closed the distance… but nothing could slow me down. I was moving faster than the wind. My heart thundered against my ribs as fury consumed me entirely—until I could finally hear their panicked breaths and stumbling footsteps echoing through the dark ahead.

When a sharp flash of lightning cracked the sky open, I finally saw them. Bella was soaked to the bone, her dark hair clinging to her face as she desperately pulled Riven forward by the hand.

"Bella!" I roared, my voice sounding so raw and beastly that it shook my own chest.

She turned her head, and when her forest eyes met mine through the storm, something inside my soul tore clean in half. My bones screamed for the transformation, my skin burning with the urge to shift, but I forced the wolf to wait. I wanted Riven to look me in the eyes when he realized he would never take her from me alive.

Riven stopped running and stepped in front of Bella to shield her from me yet again. His jaw clenched tightly as he shouted over the howling wind, "I will never let you touch her again, Sebastian! You’ll have to kill me first!"

That defiance was the final thread that snapped my sanity. I let out a guttural, inhuman roar as the transformation overtook me like a wildfire through dry timber. My spine cracked and reshaped itself, claws ripped through my fingertips, and midnight-black fur burst across my skin, my human vision bled into shades of predatory gold. The man was completely gone, replaced by a massive beast.

I expected the human to scream and run, but Riven did something that made my wolf snarl in genuine surprise. His entire body began to shake violently, as if he were trying to contain a sudden explosion of power from within. Then, he dropped heavily to his knees. Bella screamed his name and reached out to hold him, but he did not answer her. His skin was already splitting harshly to reveal a coat of silver fur.

I watched in disbelief as his bones lengthened and his chest broadened under the pouring rain. He rose from the mud not as a broken man, but as a massive silver wolf with eyes that burned like black flames. He was a shifter too—a dormant beast who had hidden his true nature from the world. Now, his wolf had finally awakened for the sole purpose of protecting my mate.

My chest clenched with both rage and resentment—the sight only made my wolf more eager for blood.

We didn't wait for the storm. We clashed in an instant, our heavy bodies colliding with enough force to shatter the lower branches of the pine trees. Jaws snapped and claws slashed through the mud and rain as we tore into each other. I was shocked by how heavy his strikes were. He fought with the strength of a true protector, but he was no match for the Alpha of Blackvale.

I roared with wrath as his fangs sank deep into my shoulder. Using my massive weight, I rammed him hard into the trunk of a pine tree. Before he could recover, I seized his throat with my mouth and bit down hard until blood seeped through. Riven’s agonizing howl echoed through the entire forest. Then, I flung him across the clearing toward a jagged boulder. His silver body hit the huge rock with a sickening crack.

The sudden silence that followed was deafening.

The silver wolf form melted away into the mist, leaving Riven lying in a broken, motionless heap on the muddy forest floor.

Bella's heart-wrenching scream ripped through the trees a second later. She threw herself to Riven’s side and cradled his head in her lap, sobbing violently. Her hands were immediately soaked in his blood.

"You killed him!" she screamed up at me, her voice filled with a terrifying mix of agony and deep hatred. "You killed him!"

Before I could take a step toward her, she grabbed a heavy rock from the mud and hurled it straight at my bleeding shoulder. The physical impact meant nothing to me, but the sheer revulsion in her eyes crushed whatever sanity I had left.

When I tried to move closer again to comfort her, she recoiled from me as if I were a monster and raised another jagged stone to strike me. My instincts completely shattered under the weight of her rejection. My vision blurred into a white-hot haze of anger, and my massive foreleg swung out in a blind, subconscious strike to defend myself. The force of the blow lifted her entirely off her feet. Her fragile body flew through the rain and crashed hard against the jagged boulder next to Riven.

A dull, hollow thud echoed through the clearing, and the storm seemed to stop in that exact second.

"Bella..." I whimpered, whispering her name in my head.

But she did not move.

My claws retracted and my bones twisted painfully as the wolf retreated in horror, pulling me back into my trembling human form.

I dropped to my knees in the dirt, watching the rain wash over her pale, motionless face as the terrifying reality of what I had done set in. I crawled toward her on hands and knees, my fingers shaking uncontrollably as I reached out to brush a wet strand of hair away from her cheek.

She was entirely cold, and the sweet scent of her blood was already staining the storm-soaked earth beneath us.

"No," I choked, pressing my forehead against her unmoving brow as my voice cracked completely. "No, no, please open your eyes, Bella. I didn't mean to... I didn't mean to hurt you. Please..."

The rain continued to pour harder, muffling my desperate cries against her skin.

But the universe did not answer me. I had killed the only woman I was ever born to love.

A broken, agonizing roar tore from my chest, echoing uselessly into the empty night.

My Bella…

As I cradled her lifeless body in the dark, I knew I had finally become the exact monster she had always feared.