Fated To the Alpha by Jessica Hall
Chapter 256: Marabella POV
Kora howled in my head, her pain amplifying mine, making it ten times worse. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, like the air was being crushed from my lungs, agonizingly slowly.
Everything was fine, then it wasn’t. I knew something was up with him because he was blocking the bond. He had been quiet all night. Yet I didn’t expect him to reject me.
A person can only take so much before they break and only suffer for so long before the suffering becomes nothing but a burden to carry. In the midst of so much darkness for so long, so much loneliness in your life, you realize it is no longer worth it, that you can’t live with the heartache.
Everything was in chaos, and when I look at what has come to p@ssin my life, I wonder how the hell I got here. What was the one part of my life that determined it would get to this point? Where did I go so detrimentally wrong that I ended up here at this exact moment? Was it because I wasn’t strong enough like they all claimed?
Looking at Lucas, who was frantically calling my name, I glanced around and thought, is this it? Is this all it will ever be, and will I always be this unhappy? Unhappy in love, disappointed in life, and down with how things turned out.
I couldn’t hear a word he was saying. I am sure he meant well, but I was deaf and mute to my surroundings, drowning in my grief.
For years, I lost the perception of seeing myself clearly. Kyan let me see who that was, only then to take it back from me. My life I thought, was changing. I was giving value to myself, and I allowed myself to see a future with him and Jonah. Now that dream was gone, and I was back where I started.
Standing up, I felt nothing. Nothing at all like I switched off to life, pulled the plug. I was dead long before I recognized I was dying.
Alone and grieving for a life of that would never be. I thought we would work it out, had it mapped out in my head. Now there was no map, and I was stumbling blindly back into the abyss of myself.
This isn’t the life I wanted or would choose for myself. So this time, I will choose differently. If the shadows wanted me, they could have me, so with that, I chose death.
How foolish of me, how silly of me to believe I was anything but another burden. I won’t be the burden
anymore; I won’t go back to that place. I couldn’t go back to living on autopilot, going through the motions but not living the moments, doing what’s expected while expecting nothing in return. No, I couldn’t live like that anymore, and if that was living, I wanted no pan of it.
I was vaguely aware of my phone ringing beside the bed. It rang out, and as I watched his name pop up on the screen, it vibrated off the bedside table and started ringing again.
Bending down, I picked it up and unlocked it. Kora was long gone, and I had no idea where she went, but she left me, too.
I didn’t realize I was typing until I hit send on the message. Blinking, I stared at the message before it started ringing in my hand again, and I dropped it. Locked the door and sat on the bed. Kyan’s scent was everywhere, and I heard Lucas talking to me through the door.
I must have said something back because he left. I had no idea of the words I spoke. The echoes of his footsteps leaving told me I was now alone again, that whatever I said must have convinced him I was okay, although I was anything but.
This is what depression does. Your life slips by without you realizing it was passing, and I couldn’t go back to that. I could identify the traits because they were mine so long, and I refused to live like that again, making my family
suffer again by watching me turn back to an empty shell. No, I would rather be free. If my only freedom was death, so be it.
Jonah POV
Something had to have happened. Pain rattled through my chest, and it was pure agony coming from one source, and that source was Kaif. Kyan wasn’t answering his phone, so I tried Lucas, who answered and told me what had happened; said Kyan went to work and had rejected Mara.
I was twenty minutes out of the city and driving like a madman, trying to get back to them. Yet I was torn in two directions. I needed to check on them both. However, something was nagging at me when Mara wouldn’t answer her phone.
Some gut instinct told me something was wrong. I knew Kyan rejected her. There was no doubt that that was the crippling pain I felt coming from him. Giving up when no one would answer, I continued driving when a cold rush coursed through me, making every hair on my body stand or end.
Jax whined restlessly, and I grabbed my phone to see a text message had popped up without me noticing. Relief flooded me when I saw it was Marabella, yet the message itself made my blood run cold.
‘It should have been you.’ I nearly swerved off the road as I dialed her number, yet still, she didn’t pick up. Pick up, pick up, I thought anxiously, but no answer. Dialing Kyan’s number, he answered finally.
“Where is Mara?” I asked.
“At home,” Kyan answered, and I swerved off the road, sending dust and debris everywhere.
“Where are you?”
“Heading back home, I went to check things at work,” Kyan answered, and I tossed my door open. Jax was on edge, picking up something that told me to trust his instincts.
“You need to get back home,” I tell him.
“Yeah, I am on my way back,” Kyan says before he gr0@ns and I hear the sound of metal on metal when pain smashes through my chest.
” No,” I gasp as Kyan’s suffering intensifies before I feel it through Kaif. I knew he had an accident, but he was alive and breathing. I knew that much because I was still alive even though for the first time, I wished I was dead when I felt the pain of her tether to him disappear.
Jax shifted before I even had time to register what it was. I felt it rip through Kyan and we were running, running through the forest, headed toward the manor.
We had never run so fast, running off fear and adrenaline, and I could feel Kaif had taken over Kyan. He had lost control and was also trying to get to her, but I knew it was too late. That became all too clear when I heard Kaif’s wailing scream as I reached the manor.
Everything blurred around me as we smashed through the place and up the stairs. Kaif was on his knees, and my legs gave way when I saw her in his arms as he untangled the rope around her neck.
“What have I done?” Kaif murmured, looking down at her. Lucas stood horrified as he looked in the doorway. Tears trekked down his face as he cupped his mouth in horror at her lifeless body when Kaif suddenly shifted, and Kyan took his place.
I just stared at the markings that wrapped around her throat, her limp body in his arms. She can’t be gone.
“Do something,” I ch*oked out.
“I K*lled her,” Kyan whispered, looking at me helplessly.