Chapter 32 – Temptation’s Chains

(Cole’s POV)

The night air clung to me like a second skin, damp with mist, heavy with judgment. Every step I took across the training yard felt like i was being watched, measured, weighed. Whispers trailed in my wake like smoke.

The Alpha’s son can’t seem to focus.

Since the bond he has become weaker.

Maybe it’s the human who is making him soft.

My jaw tightened, and I swung harder at the practice dummy, my fists bruising against leather. The wood splintered, but the satisfaction never came. No matter how hard I hit, the pull in my chest didn’t ease. That damn bond, Ella’s quiet presence pressing into me like a constant heartbeat I couldn’t be able to silent. Her emotions brushed against mine, faint but undeniable: exhaustion, determination, a fragile steadiness that only made me feel more unsteady.

I hated it. I hated her. Or maybe It myself I hated more for harboring feelings for her at all.

By dusk, my knuckles throbbed and my pride was in tatters. As I left the yard, Warriors gave me sidelong looks, sweat streaking my back. I could almost hear their unspoken questions—how could the Alpha’s heir, fated mate to a human, be trusted to lead them?

I told myself I didn’t care about the murmurs. But the truth was, every whisper dug deeper than the last one spoken.

I needed to find a release.

I found it waiting in the shadows behind the clubhouse.

“Cole.”

Her voice was honey, low and coaxing. Sasha leaned against the wall, her hair gleaming like spun gold in the moonlight. Her lips curved in a smile that wasn’t entirely kind.

I should’ve walked away. But I didn’t do that.

Instead, I let her step closer, her perfume curling around me, tugging at memories I’d managed to bury down, memories of summer nights when she’d been the one at my side, years before the bond had snatched my choice from me. She’d laughed with me, trained with me, whispered promises beneath the trees. Back then, it had been simple.

Now nothing was simple.

“With me, you don’t have to pretend,” Sasha whispered, her hand grazing my arm. “I know what this is causing you. That bond—it’s suffocating you. You never desired nor want her.”

Her words burrowed into the cracks that were already splitting me apart.

“She doesn’t deserve you. She doesn’t even have a wolf. What kind of Luna can’t shift?”

I didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Because part of me wanted to believe her.

Her touch slid higher, to my chest, over my hammering heart. “We were supposed to be together. You said it yourself, once. Before fate got in the way.”

I closed my eyes. I remembered the vows I whispered under the stars, the certainty I’d felt at that time. But now? Now all I feel is a gnawing ache of a bond I never chose and a hollow pit where my freedom used to be.

I should’ve pulled back then, but instead I leaned forward.

Her lips found mine, and for a moment, I let the storm inside me quiet. I let her pull me into the shadows, into the lie that she was the escape I craved.

But even as I kissed her, the bond flared. Heat stabbed through my chest, it felt sharp and accusing. More than ever, Ella’s presence bloomed stronger, this time it wasn’t distant but it was vivid, it was as though some part of her could sense the betrayal.

I broke away, gasping.

Sasha caught my face in her hands, eyes blazing “Don’t think about her. She means nothing.”

I wanted to believe that. I really wanted to.

So I let it happen. I let Sasha’s hands and lips and her words drown out the pull, just for a little while.

When it was finally over, I felt nothing but emptiness. The bond still burned hot. Ella’s heartbeat still throbbed faintly against mine, steady where I was not. Strong where I was breaking.

I staggered away, shoving Sasha’s hands off me. “This—this doesn’t fix anything.”

Her smile was razor-sharp. “It doesn’t have to. It just reminds you who you truly belong to.”

Her words followed me back to my cabin like chains.

I poured whiskey down my throat until the room blurred, until the taste of her mouth was dulled out, until Ella’s quiet presence in my chest was nothing but a ghost pressing against my ribs.

But no amount of drink could silence the truth.

The bond wasn’t loosening. If anything, it was tightening.

And the more I fought against it, the more I realized I wasn’t just chained to Ella.

I was also chained to myself. To my own choices.

I collapsed into the bed, my heart heavy, Sasha’s perfume still clinging to my skin like guilt.

“I’ll never love her,” I whispered into the dark. The words felt hollow, weak. A lie I couldn’t even sell to myself.

And still, the bond throbbed on.

Unrelenting.