Pregnant Runaway Mate of the Alpha Prince, page 5
part #37 of Forbidden Alpha Kings Series
I didn’t stop running for the entire run home.
My lungs burned for oxygen, and my mind was spinning, but I ran all the same. I got inside and kept running. Up the stairs, down the hall, to my bedroom until I was safe enough to break down.
I met the prince.
My face was soaked with tears, overwhelmed by everything that had happened and the fact that it could never happen again. If Harris found out I was a latent shifter, he’d never want me.
I changed out of my dress, and set my single glass shoe on my dresser.
I needed to get the smell of the prince off of me before anything else.
Even if Vivian was older, and she didn’t shift as often as anyone else seemed to, she would be able to sniff out that I’d been to the ball. I shoved my dress into a tight box, ensuring it was air-sealed so no smell could get out, and then climbed into the hottest shower of my life.
Washing myself all I could think about was Harris.
His body on mine.
What could have happened if I stayed there longer? We might not have been a perfect couple, but what we did together felt so good. I lost my virginity to him. I loved every moment we shared.
It was over, though.
If Vivian was coming home soon, she would expect a spotless home. Although the house was never dirty, she’d undoubtedly find some dust to complain about once she found out her daughters never even met the prince.
I had to get to work.
The home was a two-story property that also belonged to my parents before my father married Vivian. The bakery was only separated by a breezeway, so it ended up feeling like a natural extension of the home.
As much as I loved the property, it was two floors of endless photos, knick knacks, and items that loved to gather dust. Almost everything in it belonged to Vivian.
I was beyond ready for sleep by the time I had mopped the main floor and dusted and cleaned the windows, counters, and tables. However, I heard a car approaching and didn’t have the energy to run back upstairs.
Instead, I waited to see what use I could be.
This was less stressful than being pulled from my bed the moment I tucked myself in. I wavered for a moment, before realizing the bright mark on my neck would give me away if I wasn’t careful. Rushing back upstairs, I grabbed my scratchy robe and wrapped myself with it.
It didn’t feel great on the mark, but it hid it from view.
I started downstairs as the three of them started to walk in. Michaela entered first, her face glowing with happiness, and I wondered who the man she was dancing with was.
“How was the ball?” I couldn’t resist asking. My legs and feet were aching beyond belief, so I had to let myself sit as she answered.
“It was wonderful, I’ve never seen such a crowd. They played music until five in the morning, and I almost didn’t come home,” Michaela teased.
Her sister followed in shortly after, in a far less happy mood. “Stop gossiping with Nema, Michaela. You’ll give her hope that she’ll get to attend the next one.”
I couldn’t bring myself to feel hurt by that comment.
If she knew the truth, Zara would be spitting fire with jealousy.
Vivian finally came in and immediately stopped to inspect the home. “I see you let yourself go to bed early instead of trying to clean,” she spat at me.
I didn’t try to defend myself.
A lifetime of Vivian had made it clear that defending myself would just be seen as me being argumentative. It was easier to let her be cruel.
“Since you’re up early, you can head to the bakery.”
“It’s Saturday,” I couldn’t help myself. “The bakery doesn’t open until ten.”
“Then you can go prepare some dough to freeze. Don’t sit in here and waste time, girl,” she spat at me.
Michaela and Zara were already heading upstairs, and I envied them. Although I was still reeling from the night, I needed sleep if I was going to do an entire shift.
“Yes, ma’am,” I finally caved.
Vivian headed upstairs, and I started some coffee for myself. A hot shower and some caffeine might help me stay on my feet. It’s not like Prince Harris was going to knock me off of them again any time soon.
6
Harris
I wanted to let her go.
In my heart, I knew it was better to give her the freedom to choose.
I stood there for a moment as I watched her flee, confused and still overcome with what we’d done together, before I realized I couldn’t let her vanish this quickly. It was a small kingdom, but I didn’t want to go for a single day without her.
I didn’t even know her name.
When I finally caught up, she dressed and pulled on her shoes. The worry on her face caught my eye, but so did the scars on her uncovered arms.
Who did that to her?
I shifted to try and stop her.
I had to catch her.
As she fled the castle, though, I knew I pushed it too far.
I watched her stumble down the stairs, and I almost shifted back to my human form on the steps to catch her, but she righted herself in time. I couldn’t pursue her further.
I didn’t need to scare her.
Instead, I stood there and watched her run as if she wanted to be anywhere but here. How likely was it that she was telling me the truth about her curfew?
How much truth did she trust me with?
My heart ached as I sat down on the steps, knowing my wolf form was more foreboding than welcoming until a glint of something shiny caught my eye.
Her heels fell off when she fell, and one was still on the stairs.
Lifting it gingerly between my teeth, I returned to the castle and avoided the ball. What was the point if she wasn’t there anymore. Buck followed behind me dutifully, and I was thankful for his silence.
What the fuck was I doing?
My parents threw this whole thing so I’d meet the woman they wanted. I made it clear I wasn’t interested in any woman anyway.
How did I walk away from this, having marked a woman as mine?
Despite the confusion, I didn’t regret a moment of it.
I would mark her a thousand more times if I had to replay this night. She came into my world and was suddenly everything to me.
As I entered my bed chamber, I set the heel down and shifted back to my human form.
Grabbing some pajama pants and underwear, I dressed myself and then grabbed the heel to stare at it. It wasn’t particularly unique in size or shape, but the closer I looked, the more convinced I became that it was made of glass.
I shouldn’t have carried it between my teeth.
If it wasn’t the only damn thing connecting me to her, I’d throw it across the room. How did I let her go? Of course, I wanted to be respectful, but what if I never saw her again?
What if she was gone for good?
Buck stood there.
Waiting.
Eventually, I would have to talk to him. Sighing in frustration, I set the heel down and dropped down onto my couch. “I shouldn’t have let her go.”
“Who was she?” Buck asked without skipping a beat.
I eyed him and shrugged. “I don’t know her name.”
“She’s not the one your parents wanted you to go after.”
“I know.”
He was quiet again, waiting for me to explain myself. Buck was always good at that, ever since he got assigned as my aid when I was ten and barely eighteen. He knew if he waited long enough, I’d talk.
“I think she’s my fated mate,” I admitted.
Buck didn’t laugh like I expected. Instead, he sat down beside me. “What makes you think that?”
“There was something about her. I could feel her there before I saw her.”
“There was a lot of alcohol last night.”
“I didn’t drink,” I reminded him.
Buck nodded, obviously still not sold on the idea. Telling him I marked her already wouldn’t make this much better.
If she showed that off, some may say she had a claim to marry me.
Despite how against the idea I was just a few hours ago, if it was her, I’d marry her instantly and give her the entire castle if she told me her name. Again, these were things I couldn’t tell Buck.
He’d think I was brainwashed.
I had to be smart about this.
Instead of putting all my cards on the table, I shook it off and stood up. “I need to get ready for the morning run. Sunrise is in a couple of hours.”
“Your men are all going to need to sleep this off. Most are probably still at the ball.”
“It’s good for them to train under any circumstances,” I countered.
“Sir, it’s a good idea to let them rest. For you to rest.”
“You just don’t feel like doing the run.”
He rewarded my prodding with a laugh.
“Who was the woman in green I kept seeing you dance with, anyway?” I turned the conversation back on him.
“Her name is Michaela. She thought I was you at first,” he shrugged. Thankfully, she wasn’t mad when I came clean about who I was.
“Sorry to interrupt your dance while chasing after my woman.”
“Your woman, sir?” There was humor in his voice, and I ignored it.
“She didn’t tell me her name. Didn’t say where she lived or what she did for a living. I will go mad if I can’t find her again.”
“What about the woman your parents picked?”
“They have terrible taste. I’m not interested in her,” I admitted.
He nodded.
Buck wreaked forward and plucked the glass shoe off the table ahead of us. I wanted to tear it from his hands for a moment, but I needed better self-control than that.
“Do you remember her face well enough for someone to sketch it out to find her?”
“I didn’t see her face at all.”
He held the shoe and leaned back into the couch thoughtfully. “Every woman in the kingdom would jump at the chance to say she was the woman you danced with tonight.”
“We did more than dance.”
“Regardless,” Buck laughed. “There’s no way you can just put out a request for her to reveal her identity to the palace. We’ll have countless liars and conspirators trying to say it was them.”
He was right.
Countless people would love the power that came with the crown. I didn’t need them knowing there was a quick way to get it.
“I would know it was her immediately if we met in person. I’d know without seeing her.”
“So we just need to get the girl to come to us,” he agreed. “Why did she flee in the first place?”
“Something about a curfew.”
It was a horrible excuse for her to run, but I didn’t know what her life was like outside of that dance. Maybe she didn’t lie to me.
Brock set the heel back on the table.
“This has to be a one-of-a-kind shoe, right? It’s glass.”
“I guess it could be,” I shrugged. “I don’t know women’s fashion that well.”
“Then we should request that the owner of the other shoe be found. Offer a high-dollar reward.”
“What if she doesn’t want to be found?”
“She could easily shatter the other shoe, I’m sure,” he laughed. “If she doesn’t want to meet with you after this, she can hide and not turn herself in.”
I nodded, frustrated with the entire situation.
“Alright, fine. Take a picture of it and submit it to the papers before morning. I need to find her again sooner rather than later.”
“She made that much of an impact on you?” His voice was full of surprise. It was good to know that, after almost twenty years of knowing him, I was still able to surprise Brock.
I was going to find her.
I had to.
7
Ella
Beth had texted me several times since the party started, but unfortunately, I’d left my phone at home. As I began my early bakery shift, clocking back in with feet and legs sore after the longest, best, and worst night of my life, all of her texts flooded in.
They started simple.
“Leaving for the ball now! Can’t wait to see you there!”
“Where are you? This crowd is huge.”
And then, over time, it got complicated.
“I see you! Check your phone. I can’t get back to where you are. The dress I made is fitting strangely on you. Did you lose weight?”
“I just realized that’s Michaela in the dress I made you??? Where are you?”
“They didn’t let me in, but they let Michaela in. Call me?”
Half a dozen more scattered between these, and my heart dropped to my stomach as I started proofing dough for the day. I totally forgot that this entire plan was to help get her dress designs out in front of people.
Instead of helping, I got swept off my feet and ran away without looking for her.
Her texts stopped coming in around midnight, and the final one read, “I hope you’re okay.”
I couldn’t tell her the truth yet.
Even though it wasn’t my fault Vivian stole the dress for her daughter I couldn’t help but feel guilty that I got to go to the ball and she didn’t.
I didn’t even want to go in the first place!
Raising my arms to pull down a new bag of sugar, my apron’s strap dug into the mark Prince Harris left on my neck, and my head spun for just a second.
I sat down, took a breath, and tried to calm myself.
There was no way I could regret this night even if I tried to. Every moment of it was magical and beautiful. I got to enjoy time feeling like a normal woman. I kissed a man, danced for hours, and lost my virginity all in the span of a few hours.
Why did I feel so guilty?
Setting the bag of sugar down on my work table, my face reflected back in the shiny steel top. The bruise from where Vivian hit me was getting darker.
Leaving my task, I slipped to the back and grabbed a small compact I’d buried with my personal items. Vivian was cruel, but she didn’t want the world to know that. If I let a single customer see this bruise, she’d escalate her violence against me.
I feared that more than anything.
Concealer and finishing powder left my face looking chalky but unblemished. I looked like a well-floured dough waiting to rise so I could bake.
The idea pulled a small laugh from my throat, and I relaxed a little as I got back to work.
Unfortunately, makeup wasn’t as good at hiding the mark Harris left on my neck. Although a scarf worked fine when I was in the house, I grabbed a thin turtleneck shirt to disguise it better while I baked and helped customers.
Pale blue light started to flood the streets, warning that morning that customers would be arriving shortly. I chugged the last dregs of my coffee and set up the displays to look as welcoming as possible.
If I could have a successful morning, there was no way Vivian would hold a grudge against me for the rest of the day. It’s not like she really thought her daughters were going to marry a prince.
Marry a prince.
If he knew I was a latent shifter and that the night was a fluke, there was no way Prince Harris would have marked me. He would have kept as far away from me as possible.
My heart ached, but I knew it had to be true. The kingdom needed to be led by shifters, not glorified humans who happened to be related to shifters.
The night was wonderful, but it couldn’t be allowed to be more than that. If he had to turn me down and tell me he wasn’t interested, it would break me further than any hit or blow from Vivian ever could.
I pushed this thought and the ball far from my mind.
If I could focus on work, I’d be fine.
Unfortunately for my plans, customers loved to gossip.
A few regulars filtered in, each asking if I’d attended the ball and whether I thought the prince had picked a bride. I lied to each of them.
“No, I didn’t get to attend the ball,” I said.
My favorite customer, a woman in her eighties who had been going to the bakery since my parents owned it, was the only one who didn’t admonish me for not going. “Balls are boring anyway, dearie. They’re just a bunch of people trying to look important to other people who don’t really matter.”
I laughed, and she kept going.
“Do you think the prince picked a bride?”
My heart ached as I had to skirt around the question. “Maybe! I’m curious what type of woman he’d pick.”
She left, and as the morning passed the conversations I had were mostly the same: until the paper came out.
“Glass shoes!” A woman laughed as she came in.
I froze, afraid that she somehow recognized me from the night before.
“What?”
“They’re looking for a woman who wore glass shoes last night! She fled the ball, and the royal guard wants to have a word with her.”
My face felt hot, and I avoided eye contact while wiping down the counter. “Do you think she broke some law?” Was there some weird risk of me being arrested now?
“She probably snuck off with some royal flatware,” the woman giggled. I almost wish I had gone. I bet there was a lot of interesting behavior in the palace last night.
“Do you mind if I have your copy of the newspaper? I’ll give you the order free in exchange,” I offered.
After that, I spent every break between customers reading the paper.
They were very coy in how they described me.
It didn’t make it seem like they were looking for the prince’s dance partner, but they didn’t make it look like I was some dangerous criminal. Customers were equally excited about the idea of looking for the person with the shoe, as well as confused about how a glass heel could be comfortable.
I couldn’t move fast enough to lock the shop doors as my lunch break finally arrived.
Pulling off my apron in a plume of flour, I grabbed the newspaper and a couple of lemon poppyseed muffins and rushed as quickly as my legs could carry me. Around the bakery, beyond the house, through the garden, until finally, I was at Hazel’s door.
