The Ice Alpha’s Mate (Aria and Ryder) novel Chapter 46

Chapter 46

ARIA

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It’s pretty late-I don’t know what the time is but the whole hospital has gone very quiet, which means that most patients are probably asleep by now.

I’m still awake. I’m having a hard time quieting my mind. It’s just so much. I spent my whole life thinking I was a runt, but apparently. I’m not, and apparently, that doesn’t matter. I’m still an outsider and I have even more reasons to worry.

And then there’s Ryder, who’s somehow always in the back of my mind even when I try to convince myself that he doesn’t exist. I don’t know what to do with the memories I have of him.

I don’t know how to.

This isn’t something that can go away with the blink of an eye. He’s my fated mate, and at some point, I’ll have to address this. We both will. Or I’ll be bound to him forever, neither of us able to do a damn thing with our lives.

Unless we reject each other, we won’t be able to claim another mate.

All these thoughts shut down when I snap my head to the left and see Uncle Barty watching me. I feel elated, mostly because I thought he had left a long time ago.

“You’re still here,” I whisper.

He smiles and inches closer to me. “I couldn’t leave my girl alone here, now could I?”

I smile, too. Despite our endless arguments. I don’t know what I’d do without my uncle. He’s taken care of me for as long as I can remember, and we’re a team. Always have been.

I’m the one who’s been giving him a hard time. I know everything he does is to protect me.

“Can’t sleep?”

I shake my head. “No. I can’t. My mind…”

He nods. “You’re thinking about what I told you.”

I can hardly wait to get out of here so I can know the truth. Every second I spend in here is agony. Uncle Barty stands up suddenly and checks outside to see if there’s anyone around.

He spends about two minutes doing this. When he returns, he sits back down in his coach’s uniform and tells me, “You don’t have any neighbors, and it seems the nurses have all gone away. They’re not here.”

I search his eyes. “Does that mean you’ll tell me the full story now?”

My uncle runs a hand down his face, and it makes a scratchy sound because he hasn’t shaved. “Yeah. I think you ought to know. I can’t bear watching you beat yourself up like this.”

I don’t even bother reminding him that we could be in danger if someone overhears us. There’s nobody around. I do my best to turn on my side and wait for him to start talking.

He takes a long time to start. His eyes are glued to the ground, and even though the light in my cubicle is turned off, I can see how conflicted he is. How haunted.

What happened? How bad can the story be? I’m not sure if I’m ready to hear the truth about my existence.

“First off, I’d like to start with your parents, particularly my sister he claims. “One thing you need to know about being a

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17:22 Sat, Feb 21 EIRA

Chapter 461

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Nocturn-the kind of wolf you are-is that it’s random. The gen skips generations, and sometimes, it disappears entirely. I’m an Omega but my sister-your mother-wasn’t.”

His voice is low but I can hear him well. I feel a pinch in my ches at the mention of my mother. Uncle Barty always avoided talking about her, so I grew up with an image of her that wasn’t. ntact. I don’t know who she was as a person.

It hurt me at first when he refused to talk about her, but then I get used to it and just stopped asking.

“My sister was a brilliant woman, like you, but she was stubborns hell,” he explains. “The arguments I have with you are the same ones I had with her. You’re so much like her, Aria. So much You have her exact face.”

Tears fill my eyes at the sight of his own tears. Suddenly, he reaches into his back pocket and pulls his wallet out. He opens it and stares for a long time before pulling out a photo and handing it to me. It’s small, and I already know whose it is. For a long time, I haven’t had the courage to look.

I don’t have a single photo of my mother. Not one.

I hold it to my chest, not feeling ready to look

yet. “And my

father?”

He darkens. “Didn’t like him. Not one bit. He wasn’t right for my sister.”

“Why?”

“He led her down a dark path,” Uncle Barty explains. “I hope that after this, you’ll understand why I didn’t want to tell you this. I always thought you were too young to hear it, and when you got older, I figured you didn’t need to know anymore. And you stopped asking.” He pauses, then adds, “I didn’t like hin. My sister was already a hot-head, and he made it worse. He filled her head with all these ideas that wouldn’t amount to shit. In the end, I blame him for what happened to them.”

I study his face. “They didn’t die in a car accident, did they?”

He hesitates, then shakes his head.

My entire life was a lie.

I recall vividly how Nadia told me this. How did she know? What else is there to this story? I grow cold, but I don’t mention her to him. Not yet. “You told me that Alpha-borns are threatened by my wolf…why? Does it have anything to do with this?”

“Yes. Nocturns are a threat to Alpha-borns because they

anything. Their voice and authority do not affect you” an conol them. Yes, control. You can make an Alpha-born do

“How does that work?”

“To tell you the truth? I don’t know, Aria,” he claims. “Your mother never got to twenty-one, so I don’t know how any of it works.”

I gasp. She wasn’t even my age? Goddess, she died so young.

“Maybe she would’ve remained a runt,” he claims. “Happens with people who have the Nocturn gene. Or she would’ve gotten her wolf, like you. Nobody knows. I’ve never seen one for Nocturn, and she was killed for it by the Alpha of this very pack been hunted and killed. Mercilessly. Anyone suspected of being runts could have Nocturn children, so they’re a threat.”

“Is that what happened to my mother?”

myself. We only heard stories. Our grandmother was a

our current Alpha’s father, that is. For years, Nocturns have runt is also killed. This you know-but that’s only because

Uncle Barty sighs, then nods. “Yes. Your damned father took her down a path from which there was no return. Doing so much research on Nocturns. Trying to figure out their powers. He was selfish, and she paid the price.”

“They were…killed?”

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17.22 Sat, Feb 21 THEA

Chapter 46

60%

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“Yes. I don’t know how it happened. I heard a knock on my door and I was told that she had been killed, and that we’d be closely monitored. They took everything that belonged to her. The only thing I had left was that picture…and you. Before she left, she stopped by and asked me to watch you. I don’t know what they were going to do.” He pauses. “I didn’t know it was the last time I’d ever see her.”

I feel so much pain, but I’m so confused. “But then how did they not suspect me?”

“Remember that trip we took on your sixteenth birthday to the shadowlands Pack?”

Of course. It was the only trip we ever took, and it was hardly a trip because we were back the same day. “What about it?”

“I met a nurse there. Someone I’ve known for a while. She forge hospital reports that you were hospitalized for symptoms of your first shift. I told them I took you to hunt, and then it happened.”

My eyes are wide. I went my whole life without knowing this. “That’s so…what happens if they find out about me?”

He smiles sadly. “Then we’re both dead, my dear niece. You and me.”

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