Bad Love an Alpha’s Regret by Elise Sinclair

Chapter 315

EMILY

Axel is infuriated, and I think he must have seriously heightened senses to be able to smell Ronan on me when we barely touched for more than a few seconds.

“No one!” I yell angrily–though that anger is fed by a healthy dose of fear now that I know who Axel really is.

“Tell me the truth, Emily!” he growls menacingly.

“Fine!” I yank harder, and this time he releases me, and I stumble a step. But he crowds closer to me until I’m backed up against a tree with no means of escape.

“It was just some guy,” I lie, hoping he can’t somehow tell I’m not telling him the truth. “I tripped over on the trail up there, and he helped me up. That’s all. It was just some stranger. We barely even spoke!”

Axel stares at me, eyes hard, glittering and threatening.

I half think he’s going to run off and track down Ronan to ask him for his version of events.

However, Axel doesn’t do any of those things.

Instead, he moves back just enough to give me room to breathe.

Still, I don’t know whether he believes me, or knows I’m lying.

“Shift, now. We’re heading back to the mansion.” Somehow, his already intimidating stare becomes even more threatening. “And don’t even think about running off on me again. You won’t like the consequences.”

Part of me wants to defy him.

I wish I was brave enough–like Ronan had said–to ignore his threats, to shift and run and escape him and my brother and their stupid suffocating rules.

But I’m not that brave.

least not today.

like Axel so aptly pointed out, I’m reliant upon Aaron for

clothes and food and pretty much everything else

to live in the human world, and likely be

I could petition the Council to join another pack, but that wouldn’t solve

still be hiding the monster within me.

in fear that someone might

secret.

might somehow find out and come for me, just like we were warned in those scary fairytales as kids.

status as a wolf with the power

simply block or stop any petition I might

So I’m trapped.

as I was living in that isolated house

hard and fast and I choke on

be weak. I

have Axel’s features changing and I shove away from him and shift before I can allow myself

my clothes and rolls them into his own. He’s squatting, watching me. And I don’t dare let myself–my wolf self–linger on the sight or scent of him.

I run.

fast over the terrain. The scents I encounter are all

think seeing that man Ronan was a complete oddity. We don’t traipse much near the public parks and the state preserves don’t typically see too many visitors this far out. Why

in my room. I’ve been gone most of the day and it’s almost dark by the time I walk back into

have already packed and left for Romania, I try not to feel hurt.

own fault I wasn’t here to say goodbye, and Aaron probably viewed

I honestly didn’t

jet had been booked to take off. And because it is our own jet, he easily could have asked to postpone for an hour or two so I could be here

telling me how high his regard is for me, and where I am on his life priorities.

is to say low to the point of not caring.