The Alpha's Forbidden Vow novel Chapter 51

POV: Selene

The Mating Ceremony.

The words were a death sentence, echoing in the frozen, silent cavern of my mind. It was a final, sacred, unbreakable bond. He had chosen her. Forever.

That night, I was a hollowed-out shell. I put Leo to bed, my voice a monotone whisper as I read his story, my touch numb as I kissed his forehead. I locked myself in my small servant’s room, the cold silence a fitting companion to the frozen wasteland that was now my heart. I didn't cry. I was beyond tears. I simply sat on the edge of my bed, staring at the wall, completely and utterly numb.

That’s when I felt it. A tremor in the floorboards. The approach of a storm. My inner wolf, a dead weight in my gut, suddenly stirred, whimpering in terror.

The door to my room didn't just open; it exploded inward, the wood of the frame splintering as Zane kicked it in.

He stood in the doorway, a figure forged from shadow and torment. He was a beast undone, his eyes blazing with a desperate, self-destructive fire. The mate bond, stretched to its breaking point, was driving him insane, and he had come here to make it my torment, too.

He stalked into the room, the scent of whiskey and his own enraged musk filling the small space, choking the air. He looked at my empty eyes, my lifeless posture, and any words of explanation died in a snarl of pure agony. There was nothing left to say. There was only this.

He reached me in two strides and hauled me to my feet, his grip like iron. He stared down at me, his gaze a war of self-hatred and a desperate, all-consuming need. Then he shoved me back onto the bed, his heavy body following, trapping me beneath his weight.

I didn't fight. I simply closed my eyes.

My utter lack of resistance seemed to enrage him more than any fight could have. A low, wounded growl ripped from deep in his chest.

He ripped my thin nightgown down the middle, the sound of tearing fabric sharp and violent. “Look at me,” he snarled, but I kept my eyes shut.

His mouth crashed down on mine, a brutal, punishing kiss that tasted of whiskey and despair. He was trying to force a reaction, to find a flicker of the woman he was losing.

My silence enraged him further. He fumbled with his pants, freeing his cock. It was thick and hard, a weapon of punishment. He shoved my legs apart and drove into me without any preparation.

The pain was a searing, splitting fire. I was dry, and he was huge. A choked scream tore from my throat.

“Is this what you wanted, Zane?” I whispered, my voice a broken rasp against his lips, the numbness finally cracking to reveal the raw fury beneath. “Is this how an Alpha fixes things? You just decided to go ahead and rape me?”

He began to move, a punishing, angry rhythm, his hips slamming into mine. “You are mine,” he growled, the words a desperate claim.

“Am I?” I choked out, tears finally beginning to burn my eyes as I glared up at him. “You just agreed to bind your soul to another woman! You’re going to be her mate, her Alpha. So what does that make me? Just the cunt you keep in the servant’s quarters?”

My vulgarity hit him like a physical blow. I felt him flinch. His anger shifted, the rhythm of his thrusts becoming less about punishment and more about a frantic, desperate possession.

He drove deeper, faster, his pace becoming frantic as he neared his edge. I felt the base of his cock swell, his knot beginning to form, the ultimate, primal claim of a werewolf. He was going to lock himself inside me.

His release was a guttural, soul-deep roar that he swallowed against my neck. His body convulsed, his seed flooding my womb, hot and thick. His knot locked him in place, trapping him inside me, forcing an agonizing, panting intimacy upon us.

He didn't pull away. He couldn't.

He collapsed on top of me, his full weight a crushing, final claim. His ragged breaths were hot against my ear. As the knot slowly receded, he began to whisper, his voice a broken, hoarse litany of a king who had just lost his kingdom.

“Mine…” he murmured, his face buried in the curve of my neck. “You’re mine… fucking only mine…”

He repeated the words over and over, a desperate prayer to a goddess who had abandoned us.

I just lay there, my body aching, my soul a wasteland.

I stared up at the cracked ceiling, the empty darkness a perfect mirror for my own.

And a single, silent tear traced a cold path down my temple and disappeared into my hair.