Betrayed by My Ex, Marked by His Alpha Emperor Brother novel Chapter 204

Chapter 204: Chapter 204

Kaelen’s POV

The headache split my skull like an axe.

I woke in pieces. Fragments of consciousness returning one at a time—the throb behind my eyes, the taste of bile coating my tongue, the weight of my own body pressing into the mattress like something dead.

Then the smell.

Salt. Iron. Fear.

And beneath it all—her.

My eyes opened. The ceiling swam. Morning light sliced through the curtains in pale, accusatory blades. I turned my head, and every broken shard of the previous night reassembled itself with surgical precision.

Elara.

She lay beside me on the far edge of the bed. As far from me as the mattress allowed. Curled on her side, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around herself. Her ink-black hair spilled across the pillow in tangled ropes. My shirt hung off one shoulder—when had she put that on?—and beneath the white linen, I could see them.

Bruises.

Deep purple. Almost black at the centers. They ringed her throat like a necklace made of violence. Teeth marks—not the sacred claiming bite, not the bond-mark between mates—just damage. Just cruelty stamped into pale skin.

My hands.

My teeth.

My doing.

The nausea hit so fast I barely made it to the bathroom. My knees cracked against the marble floor and I retched into the basin—brandy and acid and something darker, something that tasted like the rot inside me finally coming up. My body heaved. Again. Again. Until there was nothing left and I was just shaking, forehead pressed against the cold porcelain, strings of saliva hanging from my mouth.

I gripped the edge of the basin. My claws had extended without my knowledge—they always did when the wolf surged close to the surface. But Alex was silent. Completely, utterly silent. No whimper. No defense. No snarled justification about mates and claiming and instinct.

Because there was no justification.

I drove my claws into my own palms. Slowly. Deliberately. Felt the skin split, the flesh give way, the warm slide of blood pooling in my cupped hands. The pain was nothing. Less than nothing. A fraction of what I deserved.

I stayed on the bathroom floor until my hands stopped shaking. Until the blood dried in dark rivulets along my wrists. Until I could stand without my legs buckling.

The mirror showed me a monster.

Red-rimmed eyes. Hollowed cheeks. Scratch marks down my shoulders—her nails. Her desperate, futile attempt to stop me. I stared at the marks and felt my throat close.

She had fought.

She had screamed.

And I hadn’t stopped.

---

I returned to the bedroom on legs that felt borrowed from someone else.

Elara was awake.

She sat on the edge of the bed, facing the window. My shirt fell to mid-thigh. The bruises on her neck were worse in the morning light—mottled, swollen, grotesque against the white column of her throat. She didn’t turn when I entered. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t move at all.

I opened my mouth.

"Elara—"

Her hand came up.

Not fast. Not violent. Just a simple, quiet gesture—palm facing me, fingers slightly spread. Stop. The word she didn’t need to speak because every line of her body was already saying it.

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