All Chapters of Marked by the Alpha: Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

ZaraThe thing about watching someone make the choice you'd hoped they wouldn't make is that it happens faster than you can process it. One second Ryan's there, and the next he's gone, and you're standing in a forest that suddenly feels too quiet, like the trees have stopped breathing to watch what happens next.I didn't go after him.That's the part I knew I'd have to live with. That's the part that matters."He's going to die," Simon said. Not as a prediction. As an observation. The way he observed most things, like he was reading information off a page that only he could see."Probably," I said.We moved east anyway. Through the tree line, the way Zara had instructed before everything became something else. Before we understood that Rourke hadn't been waiting on the ridge. He'd been waiting somewhere closer. He'd been waiting for exactly this moment when Ryan would run toward the valley and we would run toward the trees and he could step out of the darkness like he was part of it.

ZaraThe number of things Ryan had carried was something I didn't think anyone could carry. Even though he was the Alpha, most feared man in all of the kingdoms, he was still a man at heart, someone who needed an extra love. I had seen what he was capable of and words couldn't even do justice to the kind of person he was. He was the epitome of grace, strength and everything a man needed to become strong and he never for once failed in any aspect. Being pushed into something like this, groomed from an early age was something that anyone should never experience but yet again, he had gone through it all with so much boldness I didn't think anyone was even capable of doing."Ryan," I called out.He glanced at me, pain in his eyes and even though I knew what he was doing, I still didn't want to accept it. At this point, I realized that he didn't want to see me get hurt even though all the revelations leading to this moment was enough for him do away with everything that had to do with me b

Zara"Ryan, you know if there's anything you need to discuss with me... you can right?" I said.That morning was cold, colder than any other days i had ever experienced and the series of deaths within the past few weeks made everything worse. Ryan was under so much depression because he regularly needed to live up to his role as the Alpha of the pack."I know..." he mummured.There was no feeling in his words, everything he said was baseless and very flat, i knew i because I knew the kind of person he was when he was in the right frame of mind but now, he wasn't and I couldn't blame him. Even though he wasn't emotionally connected with Mira, I had seen the influence she had on him even though she didn't like me. That had to have meant something at least."Please... talk to me, what can i do to help out?" I asked.I placed a hand on his, assuring him that I was here to stay and I wasn't going anywhere. It was very hard to convince someone like him who had experienced so much loss and d

ZaraI ate because he told me to. That was the part that annoyed me most. Not that he'd lied, Ryan lied the way most people breathed, efficiently and without drama when he decided the truth was a problem. What annoyed me was that I'd gone and done exactly what he said, walked out of that room, gone to the kitchen, picked up a bread roll like some obedient packmate who didn't notice when she was being managed.I put the bread roll down.Jude was in the east corridor when I found him. He saw me coming and didn't slow down, which meant he already knew why I was there."Don't," he said."I haven't said anything yet.""You have your face on.""I have a face, Jude. It's the one I was born with.""You have that face." He kept walking. "The one that means someone's about to have a bad morning."I fell into step beside him. "Ryan got a message.""He gets a lot of messages.""Not ones he lies to me about."That made him slow. Just slightly. I caught it."It was from Damon," I said. "And before

ZaraI knew something was wrong the second Ryan sent everyone out of the war room, because he never sent everyone out. He liked witnesses. He liked people who could tell the council later that he'd been reasonable, that he'd listened, that he hadn't just done whatever violent, self-sacrificing thing his instincts told him to do. A closed door meant he already knew what he was going to do and didn't want anyone talking him out of it.I stood in the kitchen pretending to eat something I couldn't taste and counted the minutes.Mira found me there, of course she did. She had a talent for arriving exactly when I least wanted company, like she could smell it on me, the fear, the way I always seemed to be waiting for something to go wrong."You look like you're about to be sick," she said, not unkindly, which was somehow worse than if she'd been cruel about it."I'm fine.""You're never fine when his door's closed." She leaned against the counter, arms crossed, watching me with that particul