Big Bad Alphas novel Chapter 44

I feel dazed. My memory is a mess, and I do not have the patience to sort through it. There is a certain urgency yelling at me to get up, shouting nonsense, but I can hardly hear what it is saying. My surroundings are soft to the touch, my fingers stroking the fabric beneath me before scrunching into a fist. My back aches, more than the rest of my body at least. I feel bruised, like a fruit dropped to the floor one to many times.

   The smell of heaven is terribly familiar. Have I died before? I want to open my eyes and take in the city of white, but I struggle to do so. Suddenly, I find myself drifting off again, slipping into a warm darkness.

  Time is inexistent in heaven. The urge to wake comes to me again, and I do not know how long it has been. An hour? A day? A month? A year? Everything blends together into one long night. But, I have this urge, so this time I try harder than before.

   My eyelids are heavy, hardly letting in a sliver of light, but the light is there overall. It takes patience, which I fight myself for, and slowly but surly I am getting somewhere. I stretch my legs, move my arms, take a couple deep breaths, filling myself to the brim with life. The concept of heaven is leaving me. So far, I feel quite normal, but I thought death was supposed to take away the pain—and my aching back is exactly that, aching.

   When I manage to open my eyes fully they do not seem to take in my surroundings, as if none of it matters. My brain is too focused on the fact that I am alive process anything else. I lay in my spot, wherever I may be, and I attempt to remember how I exactly got here, in this bed. Steadily, the images come back to me. Alpha Kenns death, his killer, Olivia, my missing sister, my mate who I have no update on, and finally, the Wolf that attacked me. I remember running from him, leading him towards the heart of the ambush. I also remember the trembling noises of my back hitting the rocks. From the way I am moving I can tell that nothing is broken, though.

I do not want to wake up only to be told bad news. My mind can conjure the terrible outcomes so easily, tossing together one horrible story after the other. They will tell me, Kendra, she has been missing for days and no one can seem to find her, Caroline, she ended it all after her mate was killed by one of Alpha Kenn's men, and finally, Eric—and I will fall to my knees at the mention of his name, too weak to not cry—there were too many to them too quickly, he was over powered, I am truly sorry.

Eric cannot be over powered, though, so I will change it. At the sight of my limp body, he was distracted, giving the enemy just enough time to strike with the final move.

He would die because of me.

I roll over in my sheets and squeeze my eyes shut, wanting to fall back into my death-like slumber. If this is really how it all ended, I would not be able to take it.

Like my mother, if I discover my mate to be dead, my soul will die with him. A life without him seems impossible. Every morning, waking without him beside me would feel like a slice of my throat every time. Every day without him is starving to death. Every hour is bleeding out on the floor. Knowing that I will never seem him again will be the end of all I am. There is no Isabella without him.

I cannot wake up only to find him gone. I rather die now without knowing. My mind is cruel to me.

There is a sudden noise beyond the bedroom doors and on instinct, I shut my eyes and pretend to sleep, like a child staying up past their bedtime. I hear the door open, followed by gentle footsteps. Curiosity begs me to peek, but I do not.

It smells of her, Caroline. I take it in.

I flinch at the touch of her hand stroking my cheek, and she stops. "Isabella?"

I stay silent, letting out relaxed, even breaths.

"Are you awake?" She questions softly.

There is something about her voice that is not right. That is it, he must be dead. My heart clenches, and that must be the feeling, a mate sensing the death of her one true partner. My eyes squeeze, a dam holding back tears.

She coos, "Isabella?"

I cannot take it. I cannot breathe.

"Tell me it's not true," I whisper, a sound of struggle clear in my tone.