The Alpha's Greatest Regret のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 51 - チャプター 60

BENJAMIN’S POVJohn had her cornered by the fountain. That was the first thing I saw — the set of his shoulders, his hands easy in his pockets, the whole patient shape of a man waiting for the scene to catch up to an ending he'd already decided on. Alice had her arms crossed. Their voices came through the courtyard glass muffled and low, but John's carried.You could reject it. A formal rejection. He accepts it. The bond breaks. It's over.I pressed my hand flat to the wall.Alice said something quieter. I caught the shape of it more than the words. Yes. I know.Then do it.And the silence after that went long. Long enough to build the whole case in my head — that she was thinking it through, that John was right, that it was the only rational move for a woman who'd been handed nothing but reasons to go, that she'd say yes because of course she would, because I'd given her every reason, because the math of it was plain, because —No.I stepped back from the glass.John said something

BENJAMIN’S POVJohn was at her door before I was.He'd been there a while, leaning on the wall with his arms crossed, planted there already, and the fact of him standing where he was told me everything. She'd known I was coming. He straightened when I came around into the corridor and he didn't move aside."She doesn't want to see you.""I need to talk to her.""She doesn't want to see you." Same steady voice, but there was an edge sitting under it now. "You've kept secrets. You let her find out the truth from Lisa Scott, in front of a room full of people. What could you possibly say that makes any of this better?""I'm not trying to make it better. I'm trying to tell her the truth.""You had three years to tell her the truth. You chose not to." He set himself square in front of the door. "She's in there right now trying to figure out if anything you've said in the past few weeks was real. And you want to go in there and unburden yourself so you can feel better about what you did.""T

ALICE’S POV"Alice." His voice landed rough. "Whatever you're thinking—""I, Alice Watson, hereby, formally reject you, Alpha Benjamin Kane, as my mate."The words were built for exactly this — learned before I shifted, final in the way ordinary words never were. They came out right. I watched them landed, exactly as I meant it.The bond answered at once. A convulsion that doubled me forward, my hand flat against my chest. I breathed through it. One breath, then another.Benjamin's hand flew to his chest. The color left his face all at once, and his breath came out in a short, sharp sound. Between us the bond pulled — my rejection waiting on his acceptance. Just two words from him, and it would be done.I waited.He didn't say them."No."I stared at him. "What?""No." He stepped closer. He wasn't shielding his face anymore. "I won't accept it.""You don't have a choice. The rejection is mine to make. You have to accept it.""I don't have to do anything." His voice was climbing, the c

ALICE'S POVThe bond was still there when I walked out — the same press against my chest it had been since the clearing.The compound was quiet. I crossed the frozen ground barefoot and didn't feel it.John was on the step outside my door, still in his training coat, the cold pressing it flat against him. He stood when he saw me. He took in my feet, my hands, the way I couldn't stop pressing my palm to my chest."What happened?"I opened my mouth. The words left me before they reached the air.He didn't push. He stepped forward and pulled me in — one arm, then both — and I pressed my face against his coat.His arms were steady."You're freezing," he said. "Come inside."He sat me on the edge of the bed and waited. Somewhere in the compound, a door opened and closed."I rejected him," I said. "Under the full moon. The formal words.""And?""He refused to accept it."John went still. "He can do that?""The ritual requires both parties. If he doesn't accept, the bond stays." I pressed my

BENJAMIN’S POVI set the blade down and turned.There was a man at the edge of the yard. Tall, dark-haired, arms crossed. He'd been standing there long enough to watch two passes go by and he hadn't made a sound.He had the same bone structure I'd been looking at for weeks without letting myself look straight at it. Same jaw. Same line through the shoulders. The eyes were the difference — storm grey, not ocean blue — and he held himself the way Alphas do when they've already decided they don't need the room to know it. No announcement. That was its own announcement."You lost?" I said."Probably not." His voice was even. "I'm not here for help."He stood with his arms crossed, his eyes going over my face. His hands, where they gripped his own arms, didn't quite hold still.He was tall, dark-haired, and the jaw hit me before anything else did — the same jaw I'd been tracking in someone else's face for weeks without ever letting myself land on it. Same set of the shoulders. Alpha. I wa