The Alpha’s Fallen Angel

Chapter 6: Questioning

Zade’s POV

I tasted iron and salt on the back of my tongue and the world narrowed to the shape of her.

“What the f**k is going on?” I whispered, voice low enough that it might have been the wind. Her energy was wrong, like a song sung out of tune, and my chest tightened with a knot made of rage and something like grief.

My wrists throbbed. Heat pooled under my skin and my wolf howled somewhere at the edge of my mind. My mate?

Questions slammed through me in a rush. How did she break into the ceremony?

Everyone in town spoke of the ‘Accursed’ as if it were a cautionary tale whispered to frighten children. Yet when I looked at her something inside me shifted, a spring sliding into place I did not want to accept.

She was ethereal in a way that felt criminal. Blue hair like moonlight caught in a storm. Silver irises that did not blink. For a second I thought I was hallucinating, then the image sharpened until it hurt.

“Please, Alpha, I— I couldn’t. I didn’t,” she begged.

The pleading made the charm vanish. If there was anything I despised more than liars it was weakness dressed as apology.

“I say she burns,” someone hissed nearby.

The crowd moved angrily. Pebbles flew. One struck her temple. She flinched and a thin line of blood ribboned down her face. The guards moved in like carrying beasts. No mercy was in their faces as they hauled her off.

“Alpha, you have to see this,” Beta Antonio Reece called out, bringing in the woman who was meant to be my bride.

They brought her in. Sasha, the woman I was supposed to marry, or the thing wearing Sasha, sat like she had been stripped down to nothing and left on display. Her underdress was torn. Her eyes were raw and red. Claw marks scored her skin.

“Sasha, dear, can you tell us what happened?” Beta Antonio tried.” Beta Antonio asked. Her parents stayed at her side, useless as hands tied with string.

She could not answer. Her jaw moved like a busted hinge. No words. No explanation. Just that stare.

“She cannot speak. Have her placed in the guest chamber. Keep her under watch until she stabilizes,” I left the grounds before anyone could ask questions. My lungs burned and I needed space to think, or not to think at all.

Is the Moon Goddess playing some pathetic joke on us, Lynx, my wolf snarled in my head, every whisker bristling with rage. We both felt betrayed, and I did not trust the sensation of being pulled toward a thing I wanted to scorch.

“I know, damn right. This is unacceptable,” I ground out immediately I entered my room, knuckles whitening as I punched the wall above the mirror. ‘Fuck.’

The door swung open and Nico walked in like he belonged to any room he chose. He wore that infuriating stupid grin that meant trouble and a cigarette I did not think he ever actually needed.

“Crazy night” he said, tilting his head as if fate were his personal joke.

“Don’t push it, Nico. This is f****d up.” My anger was hot enough to boil. “How did she even infiltrate…? I mean—”

Nico’s face folded into a concerned frown for half a breath before he shrugged it into his usual lopsided smirk. “Do not start,” I said. “This is not a joke.”

“Is it ever?” Nico shrugged. “So she breaks into the ceremony. She is injured. She cannot speak. And you are not laughing. That checks out.”

“How did she get in?” I asked. “How did she do that? And who allowed this circus?”

“I do not know,” Nico said. “But people will ask. The usual suspects will make a stunt of it. We handle that… thing….., like always.” He trailed off as if choosing the appropriate word.

“You do not get it,” I said. I let the words slow so he would feel them. “She is my mate. I hate her. I might as well just kill her with my bare hands.”

Silence pressed into the room for a beat, a small, brittle thing, and then the ridiculousness poured out of Nico like water from a surprised jug.

He doubled over laughing, breath coming sharp and sudden. “You… mates with the Accursed?” He slapped his knee and his grin split his face, the dimple in his cheek flashing. “Oh man. The Moon plays dirty.”

“None of this is funny, you bastard,” I growled. “Get the f**k out of my room right now or I will send you to join your mother in heaven.”

“Harsh,” Nico said, mock wounded, folding his hands over his chest as if I had insulted his honor. He chuckled, then sobered. “Okay. Now what? You know this is serious.”

“Is that something to be considered?” I looked at him like he had suggested we had a picnic. “I am rejecting her.”

“Woah, slow down,” Nico held his hands up in surrender and smiled like the world was a complicated but fixable joke. “I mean do not be rash. We need information before we create a funeral pyre.”

I let out something between a snort and a laugh, a bitter sound. “Listen to me good.” I drew the Alpha in me like a blade. “There is no way that accursed, wolfless hound will be the mother of my pups or rule my land. She is a witch? Fine. I am the devil. I will burn her in hell.”

Nico nodded slowly, his wolf-sense folding around him. There were lines even he would not cross, and we both knew the difference between politics and personal ties.

His voice hesitated only a fraction. “We tried questioning her. She refuses to speak. She is one hard nut to crack.”

“Who said you had to crack her?” I c****d my head and let the threat hang in the air, each word a soft mallet. “Break her. Do whatever it takes.”

Nico’s smile was thin for a heartbeat, the kind of look that meant he had thought of darker things and decided to keep them. “Violence first, questions later. Original plan as always.”

“I do not want theatrics,” I said. “I want answers.”

“I will see what I can pull.” He cleared his throat.

I leaned forward. “We cannot gamble. We control the narrative. You get me witnesses, you get me guard logs, you get me every i***t who saw or heard anything. You tell the parents to say nothing to the pack council. You make sure the crowd does not decide the verdict before we do.”

Nico tapped his cigarette but did not light it. “You want me to manage the noise and the pain. I can do both.” he smirked, “I’ll also make sure no one tries to lynch her before we learn what she is.”

“That is the job,” I said. “And if she does not talk?”

“Then she gets useful pain.” Nico’s voice went flat. “And by useful I mean it leads somewhere. We do not hurt people for sport. We hurt them until they sing facts we can work with.”

There it was. The clean kind of practical cruelty. He knew how to make people compliant without becoming the monster we had to explain later.

“Keep me updated,” I said.

Nico stood. He hesitated at the door and grinned like a man who lived for this exact mess. “Also, try not to torch half the town in the process. The paperwork is a bitch.”

“You are in no position to judge my methods,” I retorted.

“You wish,” Nico laughed, easy as breathing.

“Bring me names, times, statements. I will decide what comes next.”

Nico gave a quick salute like a joke and left. The hall closed behind him.

Alone, I let Lynx speak. The wolf did not howl. He pressed a single, patient thought into the edges of my mind. We will get what we need.

I ran a hand along my jaw. She could be a fraud. She could be a threat. She could be a broken woman who stumbled into a worse mess. It did not matter yet. The only thing that mattered was control.

If she was a fire, I would find where the flame began and douse it. Because unlike Nico, I let my monster run free. No surprises, I never claimed to be a good man after all.