He's an Alpha She doesn't Care

The fluorescent lights above me blur into white streaks. My throat burns like I've swallowed glass, and every breath scrapes against my lungs. Someone's calling my name, but the voice sounds like it's coming through water.

"Lyra. Lyra, can you hear me?"

I force my eyes open. Pack Doctor Morrison leans over me, his weathered face creased with concern. The sterile smell of the hospital room clogs my nose antiseptic, bleached sheets, the faint metallic tang of medical equipment.

"Water," I croak. The word comes out mangled, barely recognizable.

He lifts a cup to my lips. The liquid hits my tongue, and I have to stop myself from sobbing at the relief. Four days. Four days without water. Without food. Without anyone looking for me.

"Easy now." Morrison pulls the cup away before I can drain it. "Your body's been through hell. We need to take this slow."

I sink back against the pillows, and that's when I notice my wrists. Both wrapped in white gauze, but I can still see the edges the angry red burns where the silver cuffs bit into my skin. The physical proof of what I did. What I had to do.

"How long was I out there?" Morrison asks, his tone carefully neutral.

"Four days." My voice is steadier now. Colder.

His jaw tightens. "And in those four days, did anyone "

"No." I cut him off. "No one reported me missing. No one organized a search. No one gave a damn."

The memory hits me like a fist to the gut. Six days ago, sitting on my dorm room bed, watching through the window as Silas stood beneath the oak tree with Gareth.

My boyfriend. My supposed fated mate. And his Beta.

I'd cracked the window open just enough to catch their voices on the night breeze.

"Are you sure about this?" Gareth's voice carried a note of uncertainty. "She's not like the other girls. Lyra's "

"Lyra's mine," Silas interrupted, and even from a distance, I could hear the arrogance dripping from every word. "The bond confirmed it three weeks ago. She felt it too. She's just being stubborn about the sharing arrangement."

Sharing arrangement.

My stomach had twisted into knots.

"What if she says no?" Gareth pressed.

Silas laughed that easy, charming laugh that used to make my heart skip. Now it just made my skin crawl. "I'll sweet talk her, don't you worry. She's wolfless, Gareth. Where else is she going to go? Who else would want her?"

The words landed like punches. Each one precise. Deliberate. True.

I'm eighteen years old and I've never shifted. Never felt my wolf stir. Never experienced that other presence that every werewolf describes that inner voice, that primal companion. I'm empty where others are whole.

And Silas knew it. He'd always known it.

I'd pulled back from the window, my hands shaking. The mate bond hummed between us that invisible thread that connected us since the full moon three weeks ago. When I'd finally felt it snap into place, I'd thought it was fate. Destiny. The Moon Goddess's blessing.

But Silas had just admitted the truth: I wasn't enough. He needed to "share" me with his Beta to feel satisfied. And the worst part? He'd couched it as something romantic. Something special. "You're so extraordinary, Lyra," he'd said, taking my hands in his. "The Moon Goddess blessed me with a mate so perfect that she gave me two bonds. You're bonded to both Gareth and me. How incredible is that?"

I'd wanted to believe him. God, I'd wanted to.

But I've learned to trust my instincts. Being wolfless means I've had to sharpen every other sense, every other skill. And my instincts were screaming that Silas was lying.

So I'd decided to test him.

The silver cuffs had been easy to acquire. The school's security office kept them for restraining rogue wolves wolves who'd gone feral, lost to their beasts. I'd stolen a pair during the lunch rush, when the guards were distracted.

Silver burns werewolves. Weakens them. For someone like me, without a wolf to heal the damage, it would scar.

I'd known that going in.

The canyon was on the far edge of pack territory a place where patrols rarely ventured because the terrain was too treacherous for training exercises. I'd hiked out there before dawn, when the world was still gray and quiet.

The scent blocker had cost me two weeks' worth of cafeteria wages, purchased from a shady witch who set up shop behind the campus bookstore. One vial, painted with symbols I didn't understand. "This'll hide you from any wolf's nose," she'd promised. "Even an Alpha's."

I'd needed that. Because if Silas could track me by scent, the test would be worthless.

I'd found a sturdy tree near the canyon's edge, close enough to hear the river rushing below but far enough from the path that no one would stumble across me by accident. The silver cuffs clicked around my wrists with a finality that made my heart race.

Then I'd poured the scent blocker over my clothes, my hair, my skin. It smelled like rotting flowers and burning plastic. I'd gagged but forced myself to stay still as it soaked in.

Four days. I'd give him four days to notice I was gone. Four days to report it. Four days to search.

If he loved me if he truly felt the mate bond the way he claimed he'd move heaven and earth to find me.

The first day had been easy. Uncomfortable, sure the silver had started burning within hours, and my stomach growled with hunger but manageable.

The second day was harder. The burns on my wrists had deepened, and dehydration made my head pound. I'd watched the sun arc across the sky and listened for the sounds of a search party. Howls. Footsteps. Voices calling my name.

Nothing.

By the third day, I couldn't stand without getting dizzy. My lips had cracked and bled. The silver had eaten through skin down to raw flesh, and the pain was constant, screaming.

Still nothing.

On the fourth day, I'd stopped expecting him to come. The realization settled over me like a lead blanket. He wasn't looking. He didn't care. And if the mate bond was so weak that my disappearance didn't trigger any alarm in him, then it wasn't worth keeping.

I'd used the last of my strength to pick the lock on the cuffs a skill I'd learned from a YouTube video, of all things. My hands shook so badly it took three tries, but eventually the silver clattered to the ground.

The walk back to campus had been a blur. At some point, my legs had given out. Someone found me collapsed on the quad and called an ambulance.

"You're lucky to be alive," Morrison says now, pulling me back to the present. He's rewrapping my wrists with fresh gauze, his movements gentle but efficient. "Another day out there and we'd be having a very different conversation."

"Lucky," I repeat. The word tastes bitter.

He ties off the bandage and meets my eyes. "Lyra, I have to ask. Did someone "

"No." I know what he's asking. "I did this to myself."

His expression shifts from concern to something harder. "Why?"

"To see if anyone would notice."

The silence stretches between us. Morrison's been the pack doctor for thirty years. He's seen everything fights, rejections, rogue attacks, matings gone wrong. But the look on his face now is something different. Something that might be pity.

"And did they?" he asks quietly.

"No." The word comes out flat. Empty. "No one reported me missing. No search was organized. I was gone for four days, and the pack didn't even notice."

Morrison's hand tightens on the edge of my bed. "What about your mate? Silas Croft he's the Alpha's son. Surely he felt "

"He felt nothing." The bitterness finally breaks through. "The great mate bond that's supposed to be this unbreakable connection? It's bullshit. Or maybe it only works one way. Maybe only the worthy wolves get the full package."

"Lyra "

A voice slices through my mind like a knife. 'Where the hell have you been?'

I jolt upright, my hand flying to my temple. The mind-link. Silas's voice in my head, sharp with irritation.

'I've been calling you for days,' he continues, not waiting for an answer. 'We had plans last night. You completely ghosted me. What's your problem?'

My mouth falls open. Days. He's been "calling" for days. And not once did he wonder if something was wrong. Not once did he think I might be hurt, or lost, or

'And now you're in the pack hospital?' His voice drips with annoyance. 'Are you serious right now? You skip our date to check yourself in for what, attention? This is ridiculous, Lyra.'

White-hot rage floods my veins. My vision tunnels. Every word out of his mouth is another confirmation, another nail in the coffin of whatever I'd thought we had.

'I'm coming over,' he says. 'We need to talk about this attitude of yours.'

The mind-link snaps closed before I can respond.

I look at Morrison. He's watching me carefully, and I realize my face must be showing everything I'm feeling.

"He's coming," I say. My voice doesn't shake. Doesn't waver. "Good."

Silas arrives two hours after sunset. The full moon hangs heavy in the sky outside my window, and I feel it the pull. The confirmation I didn't want.

The mate bond flares to life between us as he walks through the door, and I know with absolute certainty what I've suspected for weeks: there's only one bond. Only one mate.

Mine.

Silas is tall, broad-shouldered, with the kind of face that makes girls stupid. Dark hair, sharp jaw, eyes that shift between brown and gold depending on his mood. Right now, they're narrowed with irritation.

"Finally," he says, closing the door behind him. No "are you okay." No "what happened." Just irritation that I've inconvenienced him. "We need to talk about your little disappearing act."

I let him approach the bed. Let him settle into the visitor's chair. Let him open his mouth to continue his lecture.

Then I cut him off.

"I, Lyra Vance, reject you, Silas Croft, as my mate."

The words hang in the air between us. Ancient. Binding. Irrevocable.

Silas's face goes blank with shock. "What?"

"I reject you," I repeat, slower this time. Each word deliberate. "I reject the mate bond. I reject your claim. I reject everything you are and everything you represent."

"You can't " He surges to his feet. "Lyra, you can't be serious. Do you have any idea what you're doing? The pain "

"Say the words, Silas."

"No." He's shaking his head, backing toward the door. "No, you're confused. Dehydrated. You don't know what you're saying."

"I know exactly what I'm saying." I swing my legs out of bed. The movement sends a wave of dizziness through me, but I lock my knees and stay upright. "You left me out there for four days. You didn't look. You didn't care. You only contacted me to complain about a missed date."

"I didn't know you were missing!"

"Exactly." The word cuts through his protest. "The mate bond that's supposed to connect us, that's supposed to let you feel when I'm in danger it didn't work. Because you don't actually care about me. You care about having a mate. Any mate. Even a wolfless one."

His jaw works soundlessly. I can see him calculating, trying to find the right words to sweet-talk his way out of this.

"Save it," I say. "Just say the words. Accept the rejection. End this."

For a long moment, he just stares at me. Then, finally, his shoulders slump.

"I, Silas Croft, accept your rejection."

The mate bond doesn't break cleanly. It tears. Shreds. I feel it rip away from my chest like someone's pulled out my ribs. The pain is sharp, bright, and then

Gone.

I'm free.

Silas staggers, his hand pressed to his chest. His face has gone pale, and actual pain creases his features. "Fuck," he gasps. "God, that "

I feel nothing. A faint ache, maybe. Like pulling off a band-aid.

"You'll regret this," he says, straightening. The mask is back the arrogant future Alpha who's never been told no. "When I get back from Alpha College, we'll come back to this. You'll see how stupid you're being."

I let him have the last word. Let him walk out with his pride intact.

Because I know the truth.

That's never going to happen.

The door clicks shut behind him, and I sink back onto the bed. Through the window, the full moon watches. Judging. Knowing.

I press my bandaged wrists to my chest and feel the absence where the mate bond used to be.

It feels like freedom.