All Chapters of The Alpha's Fated Encounter: Chapter 161 - Chapter 170

MADDYThe leaves crunched beneath my feet as I sprinted across them. My paws moved so fast that I almost floated. For a moment, I had the sensation of flying. The wind rustled along my fur, tickling the skin beneath it. Running through the forest was almost a transcendent experience. The smells, the sounds, and all the tiny details I didn’t or couldn’t notice in my human form were amplified a hundredfold when I became my wolf.Sheltered by the canopy of the trees, the early morning sunlight shone through in small spears and shimmers. It was late fall, almost winter, but the pine forest was still lush and thick—the perfect place to get rid of some tension. My anger and anxiety were less intense and easier to manage when all I had to worry about was me, my wolf, and the forest around me.I had a lot going on in my mind, and running had become my main source of therapy. It was the only thing that could calm me down when I started to get overwhelmed. That had happened this morning. Nico h

Abi stared out the window for so long that I thought she’d forgotten I was there. Right as I opened my mouth to say something, she spoke up but didn’t look at me. “I’m sorry. It’s not that I don’t want your help. It’s just that for a few weeks, while they had me, all the food and drinks they gave me were drugged. I guess I’ve developed an aversion to food. I’d… well, I’d eat something, and then after a while, I’d get dizzy or groggy. Sometimes my brain was foggy, like I was stoned out of my mind. Then those guys would beat me while they questioned me. Nothing major because they wanted me to stay healthy until they didn’t need me anymore. They… uh…” Her breathing started to get heavy and labored as she worked up the courage to say something. I went to kneel beside her. She went on. “Well, the guards would get sort of… handsy, you know? They were… assholes,” she hissed, tears starting to slip down her cheeks. “I think if Sebastian hadn’t come for me when he did, I’m pretty sure they wou

“You got it. The stories will start to roll in soon. Maybe another day or two. ‘Feral’” — he made air quotes with his fingers— “shifters being killed to protect some family, or a guy out hunting, or a family pet. Whatever it is, it’ll be bullshit. That whole feral thing is a cloud of crap. Do you know how rare it is for a shifter to go feral? One in ten thousand at most. And most of the time, they can get help before they go off the deep end completely. I’d love to know what kind of horseshit she showed the government to fool them into this. It had to have been good.”I put a hand on his knee and leaned forward. I had a strange, dizzying sensation of a reversal of roles. It was like I was the father trying to console his scared son. The juxtaposition was strange, and I didn’t like it. Pushing those thoughts away, I forced a smile. “It’ll be okay. We’re smart. We can figure this out. I know we will.”Dad chuckled ruefully and shook his head. “The confidence of youth. I miss it. I reall

When I got to the creek, I flopped down on the ground. The air was cool right by the water, and I tried to zone out as I tossed small stones into the stream. Eventually, my mind drifted to my birth mother. I hadn’t thought about her much since we got home. Now I wondered where she was and what she was doing. Had she managed to escape that night? Or did Viola still have her? That didn’t seem right. If Viola still had her, I had no doubt she’d have tried to use her against me. My birth mother was the only trump card the royals had. No, I told myself, she’d gotten away. How? I’d probably never know. If she’d managed to keep the fact that she was a shifter hidden for all these years, she probably had a lot of tricks up her sleeve. It was a hope I clung to, even though, in my deepest heart, I wondered if I was wrong. It was hard to think of a way she could have escaped. That wasn’t something I wanted to think about, though.I sat there for several hours before getting up and strolling alon

Maddy burst out laughing. It was one of the first real belly laughs I’d heard from her since we got back from Europe. The sound was a welcome one and echoed through the house. “Okay,” she said. “I wasn’t sure if I’d actually get through to you. I could sense you there and knew you were stressing out. I don’t know how it works, but I gave it a shot.”I grinned and put my forehead against hers. “It’s really freaking weird. But I like it.” I winked at her.Knowing each other’s emotions and understanding what we experienced only solidified what I already knew. Our bond was stronger than any mating bond I’d ever seen or heard of. We were in this together. We were one, and we could do anything. It felt like we could even win against the impossible odds we were up against.5MADDYDays had gone by. Four total days of discussion, argument, and gridlock. All those alphas, all the talking, and there still wasn’t a plan. No one could think of anything to do about the royals other than running an