Mated to My Fiancé’s Alpha King Brother

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144 Chapter 144

Damien’s POV 1

I was already reaching for my car keys before Ophelia could respond.

“Whoa.” She caught my arm, her grip surprisingly strong. “Slow down, Damien. We need to think this through.”

“Think what through?” I shook her off, my heart racing with the first real hope I’d felt in three weeks. “If Sera’s there, I need to get to her

now.”

“And what if she’s not? What if we’re wrong?” Ophelia’s voice was gentle but firm. “You’ve been holding it together by a thread. I won’t watch you fall apart if this is another dead end.”

Her words hit me like cold water. She was right. I’d been surviving on pure willpower and desperation. If this didn’t pan out…

“But what if she is there?” I asked quietly. “What if she’s been there this whole time, and I’ve been searching in all the wrong places?”

Ophelia studied my face for a long moment. “Then we go get her. Together. But we do this smart, okay?”

I nodded, though every instinct screamed at me to get in the car and drive until I found her.

“Do you even know where Caleb lives?”

“I can find out.”

An hour later, I stood in my driveway, keys in hand, watching Ophelia throw an overnight bag into her car. The sun was already setting, painting the sky orange and pink. We’d lost daylight, but I couldn’t wait until morning. Not when I might be hours away from holding

Sera again.

The front door opened, and Adrian appeared on the porch in his pajamas, his dark hair sticking up at impossible angles.

“Daddy?” His voice was small, uncertain. “Where are you going?”

My heart clenched. “I have to go somewhere for work, buddy.”

“At nighttime?”

I knelt down to his level, looking into those silver–blue eyes that were so much like mine. “Sometimes grown–up work happens at weird

times.”

unnerving perception children sometimes

to the chest, I’d been so careful, so sure I was hiding the truth from him. But kids saw

gave them credit for.

you think

Adrian said

a moment, fighting back tears. When I opened

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144 Chapter 144

expression.

I said finally. “I’m going

“Can I come?”

need to stay here with Ms. Sarah and take

bottom lip wobbled slightly. “I miss her

him into my arms, holding him tight against my

“Is she lost?”

carefully. “But I’m going to find her and bring

drive to the border took four hours. Four hours of tense silence, broken only by Ophelia’s occasional directions

hands gripping the steering wheel so tight my

rural territory. Towns gave way to farmland, then

place where people went when they wanted

left at the next intersection,” Ophelia said, squinting

road that seemed to

about ten miles to the town

to hide from a world that

softly. “What are you going to say to her?

past four hours. What did you say to the woman who’d

thought she

admitted. “I’ll figure it out when I see

roadsmall, quiet, exactly what

a neon “Open” sign flickering in the window, and in the distance, the glow of what looked like a

Repair. The sign was old but well–maintained, and there were

lot, my heart hammering against my ribs. This was it. Either Sera was here, or I was about to face another crushing

for this?”

“No.”

I got out

house behind the repair shop looked lived–in and welcoming. Warm light spilled from the windows, and

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