Rejected Mate and Following Fate novel Chapter 45

I miss him so much it kills me, even if I can't get past what he's done to our bond, and I'm still broken by him. It adds to my urgency in looking around for some kind of pointer in what to do. I shake myself and I remind myself that the girl I was, she's dead. Little Alora of the Whyte pack and Elren farm, peacefully living a carefree life. The war seen to my parent's unplanned leaving, and Juan saw they never came back. She died a long time ago, when her life was turned upside down, and it altered everything she knew. Her path disintegrated, and all those dreams and hopes, they fluttered away on the breeze.

That unwanted, rejected, feeble little no one, who imprinted on a boy ten years later, who stood in her place …. also, dead! She who couldn't be allowed to love her fated mate, because of what she was. She never really existed anyway. She was a lie that was fed to me and made me live under a mask of my own making, because I never knew the truth and this girl, this one right here. She's the Alora who's been holding her breath and waiting for me to find her.

She's the daughter of a warrior. A daughter of a prophetic Queen, who was slain for her power. She's the heroine of a prophecy, and she's a god damn white wolf with red eyes, that makes her some kind of hybrid with gifts, a witch thought so powerful that she bound them until a time when she needed to get them back. A witch who sacrificed her life, and the sanity of her son to protect her. She's someone to be reckoned with, she needs to find the way to bloom.

That doesn't sound like any kind of weak no one to me, not a reject, or unworthy of an alpha mate, and I need to own that shit. Everything I've done in my life for the past ten years has been overshadowed by a black cloud of shame and failure and believing I was never good enough, because they told me so. It's gone. Almost like someone lifted that lid and finally uncaged my soul. There's nothing over my head weighing me down now, and that little voice that second guessed it all. It's dead too. That was never my voice, it was theirs, out there in the world around the mountain. I am deaf to their sounds now.

This girl, she has a right to stand up and be counted as someone worthy, and the fates for whatever reason, led me here and I need to see it through. They knew me before I existed, and I was part of the plan. They know what I'm capable of and they set on my way to be sure I showed everyone else. If they got me this far then maybe they have a plan, and I should stop fighting and listen. Close my eyes and let the fates send me some kind of message through the cosmos and the air… because this is not how it ends.

Th noise of the elevator interrupts my train of thought, a noise so perfectly on cue I blink and open my eyes and my head spins towards the source. Half expecting to Deacon strolling on in and making my day worse, if that was even possible, but it's the doctor, and he's pushing a cabinet on wheels with all manner of things sliding off the top as he dashes to Sierras room. Drawn to the wall to watch him, suspicious of his behavior. Forgetting my pep talk and all my internal boosting of confidence.

He seems different somehow. Wired maybe, a little erratic in his abrupt walking around and hurried movements. He drops a scattering of implements on the floor, the noise of cascading metal, and hard objects clattering and echoing in this large space as he abandons the cart outside Sierras door and swipes the panel to open it. He stops before entering, picks them up, and throws them back on top, scooping anymore he disturbs with his ungraceful and somewhat rushed movements, and then rushes into her room and starts frantically pressing buttons on machines by her head.

I can't do much else but watch, and as he starts picking up small mobile devices and sitting them on her bed, his face ashen and serious and fully focused on what he is doing, I realize he's not just checking on her and something's up. His expression says it all, and there's no hint of gentle jovial eccentric doctor in this moment. He looks frayed and afraid.

Even from here I can see he's sweating, his forehead blushed and shiny and the underarms of his white jacket are beginning to darken with excessive body heat. He's in a state of panic, and I look around expecting his staff or the guards to come flooding down, suddenly worried about why. My own nerves hitching as my stomach ties itself in knots, and I end up flat to the window, palms pressed by the sides of me against the glass, heavily breathing as I watch, anchored to my spot.

Maybe Sierra is crashing… maybe all I was to do was witness her die. God no, please, Colton needs to see her one last time. She can't die…. he needs her!! I can't stand the thought of him losing her without saying goodbye. I need to know what I'm supposed to do now.

The doctor unhooks her from the machine, keeping her heartbeat monitored loudly, and I hold my breath, inhaling sharply as the beep, beep, is stalled so suddenly the air becomes unbearably silent. I don't get why he would take that off, but when he yanks another box from under the bed and plugs her onto that instead I exhale, slightly confused. That familiar beep, beep, starts up again, in a subtler tone from a different machine and he moves to the next, and next, replacing everything he can with smaller mobile devices as my brain pulls together amid my own frantic fear and gives me a shake.

He's not trying to save her, or trying to take her off the machines, he's making her mobile so he can move her.

He stops, rushes off out of sight as he heads into the elevator once more, abandoning everything he's left in chaos and a moment later, comes crashing back ungracefully, pushing another bed. This time it's on wheels, back to her room. I press my cheek to the cool smooth wall in front of me, eyes locked on and heart rate hitching as it filters through. He catches me watching him, notices me with a second snap of his head as though he didn't glance me the first time and makes a weird wave gesture with his hands that translates to nothing. I don't understand.