FORBIDDEN BOND

CHOICES 2

CHAPTER 3

Adela’s POV

The scent was stronger now.

Male. Familiar. Too familiar.

Panic surged in my chest.

I pressed myself flat against the cave wall, every muscle coiled tight. The cold seeped through my shirt, but I barely noticed. My focus was on the faint crunch of leaves just outside, the brush of a boot against stone.

Not now. Not here.

Draven shifted beside me, wincing, the sound of his breath hitching like gravel scraped against gravel.

“Don’t move,” I hissed under my breath. “Don’t make a sound.”

He lifted one brow–barely–and gave me the smallest, most infuriating shrug like he wasn’t planning on it. But his body was tense, his senses sharpening.

He smelled it too.

My fingers hovered at my hip. Dagger. Easy draw. Clean kill if I had to.

But the second I saw the silhouette at the mouth of the cave, my heart stopped.

Ronan. My Mate.

Shit.

Why did it have to be Ronan?

I could make excuses to anyone else. Lie. Distract. Maybe even confuse them long enough to lead them away.

But not him.

Ronan knew me too well.

He’d trained with me, bled beside me, laughed with me.

He was the first one to teach me how to disarm a man with just my pinky and a little rage.

And right now, he was the one I might have to fight.

He stepped into view, just a sliver, backlit by the moonlight. His stance was casual, but his nose twitched–tracking.

He was following the blood trail.

I swore under my breath.

“You going to tell him?” Draven’s voice barely brushed my ear, low and husky.

“Shut up,” I whispered, eyes still locked on Ronan’s shadow.

“I mean,” he drawled, “I’d like to know if I’m about to be a bargaining chip or a body shield.”

“Neither,” I snapped.

“You sure?” he murmured, amusement threaded under the pain. “You’re shaking.”

I hadn’t even noticed.

My hands trembled at my sides. Not from fear. From pressure. From the war inside me that wouldn’t stop.

I felt my wolf rise again, her presence circling just beneath my skin. Watching Ronan. Watching him.

She didn’t like this.

Any of it.

I was breaking too many rules, crossing lines that couldn’t be uncrossed. And I couldn’t stop.

Ronan took one more step into the cave.

I stepped into the open, blocking his view.

“Adela?” His voice was rough, confused.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, forcing calm into my tone.

He tilted his head. “Tracking. You linked the Alpha. You said you had a lead.”

Shit. I had said that.

“Yeah. Lost the scent. I doubled back, thought I caught something. Just… ended up here.”

His eyes narrowed. “You alone?”

I didn’t blink. “Yeah.”

He stepped closer.

Too close.

His eyes dropped to the side–just past my shoulder–and I knew he was going to see the faint shape on the ground behind me.

My hand moved before my mind did.

The dagger flashed out and up, pressed to his throat before I even registered it.

He froze. I did too, wondering where this foolishness of mine was coming from.

“Adela?” His voice was low, stunned. “What the hell are you doing?”

I didn’t answer.

I couldn’t.

His eyes searched mine. “What’s behind you?”

My grip tightened. “Nothing.”

“Bullshit.”

The silence stretched until it broke me.

“Don’t make me do this,” I whispered. “Please.”

His eyes darkened. “You’re hiding him.”

I said nothing.

“You have him.” His voice cracked on the edge of a growl. “The vampire. The one who killed Dalen. The one the Alpha wants dead–you brought him here?”

I swallowed hard.

“He’s not–”

I faltered.

Not what? Not dangerous? Not guilty?

Not mine?

I didn’t know anymore.

But Ronan took my hesitation for confession. His expression twisted into something I hadn’t seen on him before. Fury. Betrayal. Hurt.

“Adela, move,” he ordered. “Right now. Before I do something I’ll regret.”

I stood my ground.

“I can’t.”

He looked over my shoulder again, jaw flexing. “Then you’re forcing my hand.”

He moved fast.

Faster than I was ready for.

I barely blocked his swing, sparks flying as his blade met mine. We clashed hard, the echo of steel against steel ricocheting through the cave.

My blood pounded in my ears.

We fought like we’d trained–quick, brutal, efficient. Except now there was no holding back.

This wasn’t practice.

This was real.

And gods, it hurt.

Every time our blades locked, I saw the question in his eyes: Why?

And every time, I didn’t have an answer.

He caught my side with the blunt edge of his weapon and I stumbled back, breath catching.

“I don’t want to kill you,” he snarled.

“Then don’t,” I gasped.

He hesitated–just a second.

But it was enough.

Draven moved behind me.

Even half-dead, he was fast.

He tackled Ronan to the ground with a snarl that didn’t sound human.

His fangs were out.

Ronan shouted, the two of them crashing into the cave wall with enough force to shake dust from the ceiling.

“NO!” I screamed.

I threw myself between them, shoving Draven back with all the strength I had left.

He growled, but backed off, breathing hard.

Ronan lay on the ground, blood running from a cut on his temple. He stared at me–not with hatred, not even rage.

Just… disappointment.

“I trusted you,” he whispered.

Then he passed out.

And the silence that followed was deafening.

I stared down at him, chest heaving, every nerve frayed and trembling.

Draven leaned against the wall, sliding slowly back down to the floor.

“Well,” he said hoarsely. “That was... dramatic.”

I didn’t answer.

I couldn’t.

Because I’d just crossed a line I couldn’t uncross.

I’d attacked my own packmate. Lied to my Alpha. Saved a vampire.

I knelt beside him, hands trembling as I adjusted his jacket, brushing away leaves and blood. He looked pale and still, the flicker of his breathing the only thing anchoring him to this world.

I didn’t know what to do. How to fix this. How to fix him.

His body jerked.

I startled back, heart catching in my throat.

Ronan’s eyes shot open.

Not scared.

Not even grateful.

Just... blank.

Empty.

He sat up too fast for someone who’d gone through what he did. I reached for him, instinctively–

“Wait–Ronan–”

He flinched away like my voice burned him. His eyes swept over me, cold and distant. He rose slowly to his feet, unsteady but determined, shoulders squared.

“You shouldn’t have chosen him,” he said.

My chest hollowed.

“I didn’t–”

The words stumbled out, weak and useless.

“I didn’t choose anyone.”

His laugh was bitter. Short. The kind that says he’d already built the worst version of me in his mind–and believed it.

“Don’t insult my intelligence, Adela.”

My name in his mouth sounded wrong. Foreign. Like it didn’t belong there anymore

I tried the bond.

Nothing.

“Ronan?” My voice cracked. I stepped toward him. “Don’t... don’t do this. Just talk to me.”

Still nothing.

No twitch of emotion. No flicker of pain. He turned away from me and limped out of the cave towards the trees.

Panic surged up my throat.

I reached for the mindlink on instinct–only to slam into a wall of silence so loud it rang in my skull.

He’d shut me out.

Completely.

My pulse skittered.

Fear and fury twisted together.

“What the hell is he doing…” I whispered, panic crawling into my throat.

I stood there, the ache in my chest cracking wide open. Then my knees buckled.

I slid down the cave wall, hands pressed to my face, shoulders shaking.

The tears came too fast to catch.

He left me here.

And he shut me out like I meant nothing.

I tried to breathe but the air tasted thick, bitter, sharp with grief. All I could see was the look in his eyes.

Not pain. Not sorrow.

Resentment.

Had he hated me? Blamed me?

Or worse… had he pitied me?

A low noise caught in my throat. I couldn’t stop shaking.

Behind me, Draven stirred.

I didn’t look up. Couldn’t. My heart felt like it had been dragged out and smashed against the rocks. What had I done wrong? Was choosing to help him a mistake? Was I the mistake?

He was gone, and now I didn’t know who I was anymore in this story.

“Don’t say it,” I whispered to the dark. “I know it’s my fault.”

Draven was silent.

And then…

He spoke again. Quiet, almost like he was talking to himself.

“You shouldn’t have chosen me.”