The Triplet Alphas' Regret

Chapter 85: When Will The Lies End

"That’s enough from you," Rowan said with a low growl of warning. "What are you playing at?"

"Nothing!" I cried out. My frustration was quickly building. I hadn’t attempted to escape that many times for them to immediately think that every little commotion was an escape attempt. "If you would just listen―"

"You have not proven yourself worth listening to," Rowan said harshly. ƒгeewebnovёl.com

I flinched a little at his tone. Even though this wasn’t something out of the ordinary, I still couldn’t keep myself from being surprised by the harsh tone. It was almost as though my non-existent wolf still hoped that things would change, even though the human side of me knew that this was a harder task than spinning straw into gold.

"Not everything I do is an escape attempt!" I snapped back. For some strange reason, I felt the back of my eyes burning. I blamed this moment of weakness on my exasperation. "If I were truly trying to escape, don’t you think that I would’ve been a bit more discreet?"

Rowan pursed his lips, as though he was carefully considering my point.

"Then what were you trying to do, if not to escape?" Rowan quipped back.

"I was trying to get your attention!" I all but yelled. This time, it was Rowan’s turn to flinch in surprise.

"You could’ve just called for one of us," Rowan said, narrowing his eyes in distrust.

"Would you have come?" I retorted, scoffing. "If I had yelled your name — touch your heart and answer me truthfully — would you have even batted an eyelid?"

Rowan kept silent, hesitating. I knew that I had hit the nail on the head.

"That’s right," I said. "I thought as much. You wouldn’t have."

"I would," Rowan quickly argued, but by the look on his face, even he knew that it was a weak rebuttal.

I gave him a pointed look. "You wouldn’t," I said. "You, Soren, and Cassian would’ve simply thought that I had yet another plan up my sleeve. Or at least, Cassian would have convinced you two — and quite easily, might I add — that I was up to no good, and this was just a distraction from a greater plan that I was somehow hatching from this tiny room in the middle of nowhere, with absolutely no other resources than my own two hands!"

If it weren’t for the fact that Rowan had an iron grip on my arms, I would’ve wanted to pull my hair out. Time was ticking, and yet here I was, arguing with Rowan over the semantics.

Rowan’s eyes darkened. "You have never given us a reason to trust you―"

"I have also never given you a reason to distrust me!" I yelled, cutting him off. "I don’t know why you guys hate me so much. Ever since I returned, you have avoided me like the plague. At that time, I didn’t care. You three were just the Alphas, but nothing more. We weren’t even considered friends."

I took a deep breath, feeling a heavy weight in my chest. "But even then, I could tell that you three didn’t like me. I thought it was just because of my sudden return, even though I have no clue why that bothers you at all!"

My eyes squeezed shut. I shook my head.

"You know what? This is a waste of time. I’m having deja vu. I swear we’ve had this conversation before."

Rowan frowned. "Now wait just a minute―" ƒгeewebnovёl.com

"No," I firmly said. "There are more important things than that stupid, same old argument."

Rowan’s hands had finally loosened, and I wormed out of his grip. It wasn’t effortless, but at least it was possible. I quickly grabbed his forearm and tugged him to the window, ignoring his confused expression.

"I need you to see this before you regret it," I said, determined. "I was looking out just now when I saw a wolf."

"A wolf?" Rowan echoed. "You said it was Willow―"

"Yes!" I exclaimed. "It’s Willow’s wolf. She was just..."

I peered out of the window, excited to point her out. After all, with this, I was as good as a free woman. I didn’t even care why the triplets hated me immediately upon my return anymore. At least this guillotine blade would finally be removed from my neck’s vicinity.

However, no matter how much I scanned the grassy plains outside, I couldn’t find the familiar figure of the tan wolf anywhere.

"There’s nothing outside," Rowan said. I couldn’t deduce the tone of his voice. Frankly, I was also too out of it to care about him right now.

"That... That’s not..." My eyebrows scrunched up together.

I reached forward and grasped the window grills, wanting desperately to take a better look. However, the moment my palms made contact with the silver, the sound of sizzling flesh filled the air.

I withdrew immediately, hissing in pain as I took a step back. My back collided against Rowan’s chest as I stared at my reddened palms. It felt as though I had just touched a searing hot frying pan.

I only spared my palms a few seconds of attention before looking at the window again. My heart sank into the pits of my stomach when I realized that I hadn’t seen it wrongly― Willow’s wolf wasn’t there anymore.

"No..." I muttered, shaking my head. My throat felt as though someone had shoved a stopper into it. "No... No! She was right there!" I turned around, my eyes red. "I saw her, I swear! She was... She was right there, and she looked..."

She looked like she was dying. But apparently, she was still well enough to get up and leave at the very moment that I needed her to stay put.

"Briar," Rowan said. His voice was firm, but I could almost hear a hint of sympathy in it. "There’s no one there."

"I... I saw her..." My knees felt weak. They trembled slightly. I would’ve fallen if Rowan hadn’t caught me.

"That’s enough, Briar," he said.

When I turned to look at him, the look in his eyes was conflicted. It held deep hatred, but swirling in the depths also included pity, hurt, and confusion.

I knew that he hated me, but I didn’t know why the other three emotions showed up as well. Maybe I just looked so pathetic at the moment that the humane part of him couldn’t help but pity me.

"Rowan..."

"You don’t have to put on such an act just to escape," he said.

That was the final nail in the coffin. My entire body frosted over, and I could feel my blood freeze in my veins.

"I wasn’t trying to escape," I said. Standing up properly, I tried to put some distance between us. "Honest."

Unfortunately, Rowan refused to let go. The pads of his fingers dug into my flesh, pressing harshly against my bone. I bit down on my bottom lip as a bruising pain spread from the point of contact.

"Let go," I said, struggling. "You’re hurting me―"

"And let you leave?" he asked. "So that you may run back to Lucien?"

I snapped up at Lucien’s name. The mention of Lucien drove some fighting spirit back into my body.

Yet, I didn’t even have the chance to say anything before Rowan chuckled. His lips slowly spread, and I could feel chills running down the back of my spine. I had seen this expression before― right before he took me in his office back in Shadowclaw.

This wasn’t just a look of hatred. That would be Cassian’s face whenever he so much as breathed the same air as I did. Nor was it a look of warmth and regret, which I often saw in Soren’s eyes.

The look that Rowan wore was unbridled possessiveness.

"I―" I said, choked up by the expression on his face. This was something I truly didn’t know how to react to. I was so used to their hatred that this wasn’t something I had learned to deal with. "Lucien is my mate―"

"So are we!" Rowan yelled. I stiffened. He clenched his jaw, and I could see the muscle in his jaw flex as he did so. "So am I," he said in a slightly softer voice. However, it didn’t hide the fact that he was desperately trying to hold himself back.

I had never seen him practice such restraint before. As the Alpha, and more importantly, the leader of the Alphas, Rowan had always done whatever he desired. There was no one who could tell him what to do, and no one who could fault his behavior.

For a second there, my heart trembled. The pull between fated mates that I had buried was slowly starting to rear its ugly head. I had to force myself to ignore the tugging in my heart.

"No," I said. "I have already rejected all three of you. You hate me. Even if there’s anything to connect us, it will not be the fated mate bond. What we have is that of a captive and their prisoner."

Rowan’s eyes darkened. Whatever glassiness that had gathered there immediately evaporated. What it was replaced by was a dark, twisted look. My throat went dry instantly.

"I have not accepted your rejection," he said, his tone dangerous.

"Accepting it is merely a formality," I said, gathering my courage. "I have no intention of ever accepting you as my mate!"