Fighting for her Alpha Mate

Chapter 7 - Something in the Air

Selena

I was running in the woods.

Worst of all, I wasn’t in my body. I wasn’t anywhere I recognized. It felt like a dream dragging me through shadows and silence, like I was being pulled by something I couldn’t see.

The woods around me were also wrong. The trees had no leaves, only blackened arms that clawed at the sky. The moon above was too close. It was a full moon. And it pulsed like it had a heartbeat of its own. My breath came in short gasps, but I couldn’t feel my feet hitting the ground.

Something was chasing me. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it. And it was coming closer and closer.

Then I heard him.

Not the thing chasing me, but a person in front of me.

It was Phil.

“Selena.”

He wasn’t calling me to run. He wasn’t warning me.

He was waiting for me.

I stopped running. I turned, and suddenly there he was standing in the middle of the clearing.

His shirt was open at the chest. His skin glowing in the moonlight like something not entirely human. His eyes weren’t the brown I remembered. They were glowing silver, and I couldn’t move at the sight of him.

I tried to speak, but no sound came out.

He raised a hand and when his fingers brushed mine, the ground cracked open beneath my feet and then the forest vanished.

I woke up choking on my own breath.

My fingers clutched the bedsheet like they were trying to hold unto the dream. My skin was damp with sweat, and my hair stuck to my neck.

I sat upright gasping for air. The journal was still pressed against my chest. I was sweating, freezing and confused and one name kept circling my mind like a whisper.

Phil.

What the hell was that?

The dream still pulsed behind my eyes. I could still hear his calm but deep voice. I rubbed my face and stood up, trying to shake it off but it still clung to me.

That weird feeling like I was being pulled towards him.

I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t stay still. I couldn’t pretend like everything was fine anymore.

I needed answers.

The journal was still warm in my hands. Phil’s last name glared at me from the page like a secret I wasn’t supposed to see.

Moretti.

That was all it took.

I didn’t know where he lived. I didn’t even know his last name until a few hours ago. But something inside me refused to let it go.

I decided to go back to the attic. I held a flashlight in one hand and the journal in the other. I tore through the boxes I hadn’t opened. I was not really sure what I was looking for. But maybe I could find something that connected this all together. My grandmother’s handwriting curled around spells and names and locations.

Then I finally found something. There it was ma buried in a list of names under “The Protected Bloodlines.”

Strange.

Philippe Moretti — dormant alpha, status: unknown, location: Westmoor Valley.

I didn’t even hesitate.

I pulled on the first clothes I could find. A pair of jeans, a black hoodie and some boots. I grabbed my keys and ran down the stairs, the house creaking behind me like it knew I wasn’t coming back the same.

Dalia would kill me if she knew. But I couldn’t ignore it now.

The drive to Westmoor Valley was longer than I expected. And it was somewhat creepy also with

back roads, winding hills, no streetlights for miles.

By the time I saw the first flicker of civilization, my hands had molded to the wheel from gripping it too tightly.

It was almost dawn when I saw the house.

It was just by the edge of the woods.

I couldn’t have known this was his. But somehow I did. And I’m sure as hell I couldn’t explain it. I just knew. I felt somewhat drawn to it, like I had been here before in some other life.

I got out of the car and approached the house slowly. My heart thundered in my chest so hard it made my throat ache. The porch groaned beneath my feet. There was no doorbell by the door. It just had a heavy knocker that looked older than time.

I raised my hand as I was about to knock on the door.

Then the door opened almost immediately.

Phil stood there facing me. He was barefoot and shirtless. His eyes were dark and unreadable. His hair was a mess and his chest rose and fell like he’d just woken from a dream too.

But he didn’t look surprised to see me.

“Selena,” he said softly, as if he had known I would come.

I blinked.

“Don’t ask how I found you,” I said, breathless. “I just… I had to.”

He didn’t answer.

I stepped inside without waiting to be invited, the weight of the journal heavy under my arm. His scent hit me like a punch to the gut but in a good way. He smelt like a mixture of cedar and ash and a little touch of something wild and dark.

He closed the door behind me as I stepped into the room.

I turned to face him and held out the journal like a weapon.

I shoved the journal into his chest, harder than I meant to.

He caught it without flinching. His fingers curled around the worn leather like it wasn’t the first time he’d held it. But he didn’t open it. He just looked at me.

Like he was waiting for how I’d react or testing how far I’d go.

“You were in it,” I said, my voice shaking. “Your name was in it. Your bloodline. A war of some sort.”

He didn’t move.

My throat felt tight, the way it gets when you’re trying not to cry and trying not to scream and trying not to fall apart all at once. My skin still smelled like sweat from the dream. The air in his house was warmer than outside, but I was freezing.

“I don’t understand any of this,” I said, quieter now. “I don’t even know why I’m here. I just… I couldn’t stop. I saw your name and I couldn’t stop.”

Phil exhaled slowly, and his shoulders dropped like something inside him gave out. But he still didn’t reach for me. He stayed right there. Close enough to smell. Close enough that I could feel the heat coming off his chest. But not touching.

“You’re not supposed to be here yet,” he said, like the words hurt to say out loud.

“Then maybe you shouldn’t have saved me.”

His eyes locked on mine.

And just for a second, I wished I hadn’t said it.

Not because it wasn’t true. But because of what flickered across his face when I said it. I immediately wanted to take it back.

“I didn’t save you,” he said quietly. “I chose you.”

The silence in the room hit different after that.

I stepped back, but my heel hit the edge of the rug and I stumbled slightly. He reached for me almost immediately. I felt a spark lingering from his touch and immediately I pulled my hand back.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

Phil looked down at the journal again, like maybe if he stared long enough, the truth would climb out and say it for him. His jaw tightened. His throat moved when he swallowed.

Then his voice dropped.

“Do you really want to know?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I need to know.”

He finally looked at me again. And this time there was no wall in his eyes.

Just exhaustion. And something else I didn’t recognize.

“Then you should sit down.”

“I’ll stand.”

“That’s not how this is going to go.”

He stepped forward, and my back hit the wall behind me.

My breath got caught in my throat. The way his body took up space like he didn’t belong in this world anymore, and maybe never had.

He raised his hand and pressed it lightly against the wall beside my face. Not trapping me. Just… being there.

“I’ve spent years keeping this quiet. Years keeping people away. And you—” his voice cracked and he pulled it back in, “you weren’t supposed to remember any of it.”

My hands clenched at my sides.

“Remember what?”

His eyes dropped to my lips like he was afraid of the answer. Or afraid he might give me one I wasn’t ready for.

Then, finally, his voice came low.

“You already know. You just don’t want to believe it.”

And I didn’t.

I didn’t want to believe a damn thing.

Not the war. Not the journal. Not the dream. Not the way his hand was just inches from mine, and my whole body felt like it was begging me to close the distance.

But I couldn’t pretend anymore.

So I said the only thing I had left.

“Then stop talking around it and go straight to the point.”

I pushed the journal harder into his chest, so close I could hear his heartbeat beneath the leather cover.

“Tell me what the hell I am.”

And this time… he didn’t step back.

He whispered it.

“You’re mine.”