All Chapters of Pregnant With The Alpha's Forbidden Child: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

Chapter TwelveThe Guard Who RememberedAlan's POVI told Desmond to keep the guest list moving, then found myself walking toward the east barracks instead of my study. I hadn't planned the detour. My feet decided for me.The night of the Hunter's Moon gathering had been sitting under my skin for weeks, and Hazel's question in the garden hadn't helped. Pieces. Nothing that makes sense as a whole. Saying it out loud to her had only made the gaps feel wider.Desmond caught up with me along the gravel path. "You're not usually out this way.""I want to talk to whoever was posted near the guest wing the night of the gathering."He slowed to match my pace, his face carefully unreadable. "May I ask why now, after all this time?""Because I still don't actually know what happened, Desmond. Everyone else seems to have already decided the story for me.""Or you're hoping the story changes," he said. "Those aren't the same thing."I didn't answer that. He let it go and went to find the guard.I

Chapter FourteenWhat Ruth Was Told to ForgetDesmond's POVThe outer village took most of the morning to reach, a cluster of cottages pressed against the tree line where pack members went once they no longer wanted the mansion's politics following them into old age. I found Ruth's house by asking a boy selling apples near the well. She lived alone, he told me, and rarely welcomed visitors.She answered the door herself, a small woman with gray hair pinned back and eyes that studied me the way people study something they already suspect is trouble."I know who you serve," she said before I could introduce myself. "You can turn around and walk back the way you came.""Five minutes," I said. "That's all I'm asking."She didn't invite me in, but she didn't close the door either, which I took as permission enough. I stayed on the step."I left that house for a reason," she said. "I don't involve myself in mansion business anymore.""I understand. I'm not here on the Alpha's business. I'm

Chapter SixteenThe Wine That Wasn't HisDesmond's POVThe servant records were kept in a small room off the west archive, ledgers dating back further than I had patience for. I found the guest list for the Hunter's Moon gathering within the hour, along with the staff assignments for that night.A young man named Teo had been listed among those serving the guest wing. I didn't recognize the name, which meant nothing on its own, but when I asked one of the senior stewards where he'd gone, the man frowned like he was trying to remember something he'd deliberately let himself forget."Teo," he said slowly. "He left not long after that gathering. A few weeks, maybe less.""Left on his own?""That's the odd part. He never said goodbye to anyone. One day he was carrying trays through the east hall, and the next his room was empty. Someone said he'd taken a position with a pack up north." He shook his head. "No one saw him pack. No one saw him go."That was enough to make me uneasy. People w

Chapter EighteenThe Keeper of the Guest WingAlan's POVI hadn't slept well since Desmond told me about the ring. I kept turning the same details over until they wore smooth in my mind and stopped meaning anything at all. A soft voice. A silver ring with a pale stone. A hand on my shoulder I'd spent two years assuming belonged to the woman I loved.Desmond found me in the study before I'd finished my first cup of coffee."There's something you should see," he said, closing the door behind him.He set a ledger on my desk, one of the household inventories kept by the steward's office. "This tracks who requested private deliveries to guest rooms during large gatherings. Wine, food, anything outside the standard service.""And the Hunter's Moon gathering is in here?""It is." He turned to a marked page. "Someone requested a bottle sent up separately that night, listed under 'special reserve, guest wing, east corridor.' No name attached to the request. Just a steward's initials confirming

Chapter TwentyThe Woman in the PortraitHazel's POVThe final fitting took longer than the first, mostly because the seamstress had decided the bodice needed adjusting twice more than she'd originally promised. I stood on the small platform while she circled me, pins between her teeth, muttering about seams I couldn't see anything wrong with."Almost finished," Mabel said from her chair near the window, offering me a small, encouraging smile.I nodded, though my arms had begun to ache from holding still, and let my eyes wander around the room instead of thinking too hard about the dress itself. That was how I noticed the portrait hanging above the mantle, one I hadn't paid attention to during my last visit.It showed a group of women from an older generation, dressed in the formal style the household still used for important gatherings. I recognized a much younger version of the current Alpha's late wife near the center, and beside her, slightly turned toward the artist, a woman I di