Healing The Ruthless Alpha novel Chapter 32

Laura and I abandoned the tour of the impossibly huge castle and settled on having tea and snacks in the greenhouse. It afforded us privacy as there was nothing but plants here and we could see when anyone was coming in.

"I can't tell you everything because it is not my place," Laura started, "but I want to see Cahir happy. He has been sad for too long. You're the only chance he has at happiness, Sia." She took my hand and squeezed.

This was the first time I ever felt anything close to motherly affection and it warmed my heart. I couldn't say a woman who just met me loved me but I didn't feel any negative energy from Laura. She was an open and kind person who made it easy for people to relax around her.

"You know we were taken from our pack when Cahir was just ten years old. Alpha Boston raided our small pack, slaughtering most of the adult men and women. He took the rest of us captive and brought us to Alpha Blood to work as his slaves but Cahir –" She paused with a shake of her head. Her tone turned halting and subdued as she looked at a space behind me without focusing.

"Cahir was our Alpha's son. Our Alpha and Luna prayed many years to have him and when they did, we all doted on him but he could not feel their love for long. Alpha Boston, you may have heard, used to be called the mad Alpha." I nodded as Lauretta spoke.

Alpha Boston had been called the mad Alpha because of his love for destroying things. He was the second son of the Alpha so his brother was set to take over from their father until he fell into a lake and drowned. I'd heard people talk about Boston's inferiority complex which made him target others to make himself seem bigger and better.

"Boston took Cahir, the little boy." Lauretta sounded choked. She dabbed a handkerchief on her reddened eyes, continuing to shake her head. "He locked him in the dungeons for eight years." My blood ran cold at that. "And for all this time – he would – he did cruel things to Cahir. He broke him."

I knew that Cahir had been taken from his pack and imprisoned in Alpha Blood pack but I did not know for how long. The finer details were lost to the public – none of us knew how young he had been taken or how long he spent in captivity.

"He managed to escape and the rest – Everyone knows the rest," Lauretta sighed.

Cahir escaped when he got his wolf at eighteen and at twenty, he led the rest of his decimated pack on an attack against Alpha Boston. The battle took two years and he came out the victor after he massacred everyone at the top.

"Cahir is a good man," Lauretta started. "No matter what the world says about him, he is a good man. He took over Alpha Blood and he has bettered the pack. He had the capacity to lay waste to Alpha Blood but he thought of the children of his enemies, children that may rise up one day to avenge their fathers. He thought of the innocent members who had nothing to do with Alpha Boston and chose to take on the responsibility of these people. He is a true alpha and no one can convince me otherwise." The way she crossed her arms and set her lips in a thin line, it was clear that she would not be convinced otherwise.

I always thought that Cahir took over Alpha Blood pack because he could gain more from ruling them than he would from destroying them. The wealth in Alpha Blood belonged to him the minute he bested the pack's Alpha. It would be unwise to throw that wealth away by slaughtering the people. I never thought he would choose to rule over his enemies because he pitied the children or the innocent ones in the pack.

"But he is so cold," I whispered, hugging myself as I remembered how callously he bargained my life for barrels of oil and drums of wolf's bane.

"Cahir is a broken man, of course, he would be cold," Laura scolded. "But he is your mate. If there is anyone who can thaw the ice in his heart, it's you." She smiled at me but I could not return her smile.

"I am not sure I can do that." I was not sure I wanted to do it.

The last thing I wanted was a difficult mate – The last thing I deserved was a man who did not know how to treat others with warmth and kindness. I'd had enough of people being cold to me. I spent all my life trying to get them to warm up to me and now I had to do the same thing with my mate? Didn't I deserve a break?

"Luna Sihana, you are the only one who can heal the wounds he hides from even himself." Lauretta sounded like someone had died. Her mournful tone made the air around us more subdued and the omega in me responded to her grief.

"What about my wounds? Who will heal them?" I asked.

"He can heal your wounds too. That is what mating is about, Luna. For the first few months, it may feel like it is all about the tussle in the sheets, but mating is for life. You both must work together to make each other better."