Page 21 of Fated Alpha Baby

I refuse to accept it.

As the meeting hall fills up with more witches, I stay focused on the door, waiting to see her. Eager. Nervous. Last night, I quickly realized just how much I missed Hannah Young.

She was the most important person in my life until she broke my heart.

She broke my heart for a second time last night when I found out she had a child with another man.

Perhaps it’s a cruel twist of fate that she is my true mate, but it is fate, nonetheless. A destiny I cannot ignore. I’ve been torn up about her for years, and that was the reason for my neglecting my duties and being reluctant to look for my true mate from the ritual.

Deep down, it was because of her.

It was always her…

And becoming friends with Orlando also allowed me to gain some intel.

Clarissa’s father is not in the picture. He hasn’t been since Hannah joined the coven.

He’s probably some low-life, measly human she met when she left the valley. That’s why she can’t answer my questions about him.

She’s too ashamed of what she did, leaving the valley because she was too afraid of becoming the luna.

Now that decision is no longer hers to make, a choice she cannot keep.

I simply must have Hannah Young as my mate and luna.

It is what the Moon Goddess has decided as our destiny.

That’s why I feel her presence long before she enters the hall, the gentle breeze from the open doors carrying her scent to my airways. A missing puzzle piece slots into place in my mind, completing a ritual that was performed twice on the west portion of the Bitterroot Valley.

It wasn’t the hallucinogenic kambo that needed to give me the answers. It is right here, in Augusta Hall, where Hannah Young walks in and my heartstrings are tugged, that I get my answer.

An answer that I’ve tried to escape for eight years.

When Hannah left, I was forced to bury my feelings. But even though I was younger then, I always suspected that she was my true mate. It’s why I wanted her by my side, as my luna, once I became the alpha.

She broke me apart.

But this time, she can’t escape me.

I watch every step she takes as she finds her seat at the back of the hall with the blonde girl, Milly. She doesn’t look up, her braided hair bouncing down her back when she turns, catching the overhead light in a way that makes only the top of her head appear as if it has caught fire.

My breath catches in my throat when she turns again, and I carefully trace the lines and contours of her face as she takes a seat, the way her luscious lips are slightly parted, the way her eyes appear like swords, curved exotically.

“Hey, isn’t that Hannah Young…?” Simon asks beside me, his voice a whisper against the movement and chatter in the hall.

I snap out of my daze and turn to him, more surprised that he would remember her, and I frown.

“It is her,” I whisper in return. “Our paths crossed yesterday already.”

Simon nods thoughtfully. “What is she doing here?” he asks as he watches her through narrowed eyes.

Gulping hard, my hands curl into fists on my lap. Simon was the only Iron Breath wolf who knew about what had happened eight years ago. He was there when I found the note she left behind, and the one who knew how devastated I was because she had left.

“She is a witch in the August Moon Circle,” I whisper under my breath as Hannah and I lock eyes. For a moment, everything around me fades, my vision tunneling until all I can see is her, as if no one else is in Augusta Hall except the two of us.

“Conan…?” Simon responds as if realization is settling into place. “Was Amos right?”

I turn to him just as High Priestess Amalia steps behind the podium, her presence alone commanding silence to settle over the room.