87. Chapter Eighty-Seven

Chapter Eighty-Seven

Rourke

I don't know what I'm doing anymore. Climbing up fire escapes to spy on people instead of trying to talk to them is pretty fucking creepy. I've been lingering around the pack's apartment windows for long enough to know Beth has accepted at least two of them as her mates.

The chef carried her to bed, naked and sleeping, while his Beta trailed behind them with her clothes in his arms. I didn't need to see more, but I had no place else to be. I fell back into waiting around for Beth to leave, not sure she would.

This is it now. She's found a pack.

She doesn't need me.

I should go home and try to forget all of this.

She's safe with them. They won't let her down.

This is what I wanted her to find. Well, she found it.

Now, you have to move on.

And I would, if things hadn't gotten more complicated.

My new mate, the beautiful Omega who accepted me before he knew who I was, is currently having his heat tended to by the other Alpha. He has two of them. I would be surplus to his requirements. Besides, he's mad at me for taking advantage.

I should have told him who I was.

He wouldn't have agreed to that claiming if he knew.

Clearly, I don't know how to hold on to a true mate.

I keep letting them slip through my fingers, as if I don't have any choice.

The truth is the second there's an obstacle I fold, believing it's evidence I don't deserve the happiness I've been given a glimpse of.

It's hard not to think like that.

I've spent my whole life chasing affection from people who were never capable of giving it.

No matter how many times my mother cut me down, I got back up and tried again, harder the next time, determined that I was going to do better. I thought it would make her love me.

Nothing ever achieved that.

Once I figured out it was never going to happen, I didn't need to jump through her hoops anymore. That made her angry, but even that emotion didn't last.

She stopped paying me any attention at all.

Until she found out I had a girlfriend.

Then, she levelled every threat she had at me.

She decided she wanted me to go to an Omega Academy to pick out a mate.

I said no, and I should have known by the look in her eyes that she wasn't going to let it go.

I told myself no one could take Beth away from me.

She was my true mate. It was fated.

We were stronger than anything life could throw at us.

Until my mother decided she would threaten Beth's future.

I knew it wasn't an idle threat, and I had to consider what my mate's life might look like if my mother destroyed her chances of getting into college.

It felt like we could get through anything together, but I knew if I let my mother's poisonous mind start to tear Beth's life apart, she would never stop.

The sickness my mother has doesn't have a cure, so the best I could ever hope for is that she would eventually get bored of trying to break us apart.

It wasn't going to happen.

She doesn't get bored of manipulation.

It's the only thing that makes her happy.

She was over the moon when I broke up with Beth.

Started talking about all the different things we could do to help me find an Omega mate.

I let her drone on, not listening.

I'd lost the one thing that mattered to me.

I could barely figure out how to keep going.

That's how it's going to feel again if I don't do something to fix all the damage I've done.

I can live with barely being able to function, but I need Beth to know I didn't want to hurt her.

So, I wait around until she leaves the apartment, and I follow her home, keeping just enough distance to make sure she doesn't notice me in the shadows behind her and her Beta.

It pissed me off when he told me Beth was his mate.

I reacted without thinking, and I regret that now.

I hide from sight in a nearby alley until he leaves.

Beth is the one I've hurt the most. She takes priority over everyone and everything else.

I slip into the alley by the side of her building, and I make my way up the fire escape to her window. It doesn't matter how long I have to hang around, I'll stay close until she's ready to talk to me. She deserves to know the truth.