Her Brother, Her Mate

Hadley POV

Mark is helping unpack all my belongings into the dresser in his bedroom. He just took out all his stuff from it, even though I told him he didn’t have to. He stuffed all his pants, socks and underwear into the chest of drawers on the other side of the room and hung up all his shirts in the closet.

The man has way more clothes than me. I don’t know how all our stuff is going to fit.

“I’ll talk to mom about getting a bigger suite,” Mark reassures me as I eye the rest of my belongings still in my bags and the limited space left in the closet.

“I can just stay with Amanda until then if this is too much of a hassle.”

“What? No, you’re staying here,” he tells me firmly, “It’s not a hassle. We can stop unpacking and I’ll talk to her about moving in the morning. I got you here with me, I want you to stay.”

I smile shyly at him. He has been so sweet all day. I had my reservations at first, but now I’m positive that Mark is a vital part of me. He doesn’t just need me, I need him. I’m half of his soul, and he’s a third of mine. There is still that missing piece though….

Mark did a good job keeping my mind off Mitchel all day, but it still hurts. That part of me that shattered last night when he rejected me is still throbbing softly in my core, like a vital part of my internal anatomy is missing.

Whenever there was a moment to think, my mind would wander to Mitchel. Where was he? What was he doing? Who was he with?…..Did he regret it? Does he miss me right now, just like I am undeniably missing him?

I miss him. I miss having that connection with him. I hope whoever that Suzie girl is, she realizes how lucky she is to have him in her life. He chose her over me, and now I’ll have to live with that, and try my hardest to be happy for him. Even if we are no longer connected by the mate bond, we will still be family after Mark claims me.

I still hadn’t told Mark that I was ready. When we first got back to the resort, he ordered us room service for dinner, then we started on the task of unpacking and finding a place for all my stuff. I want to tell him, but the timing hasn’t felt right. It’s like something is holding me back, but I don’t know what.

“I think this is as good as it’s going to be for now, sugar. It won’t be for long. I’ll move our stuff tomorrow to a bigger suite since you insist on going back to work.”

I giggled at his sullen, pouty face, “I told you, I have to work. I don’t mind living with you, but I don’t want to be dependent on you.”

“I know,” he sighs, then looks up at me through his lashes and smirks, “You’re my sugar mama.”

“Okay, stop,” I laughed, not wanting to do this whole spiel with him again.

“Stop what?” he smirks, strutting toward me.

“You need to quit adding the mama to it, or I’m not letting you call me any nicknames at all.”

“You can call me daddy if you want.”

“You are not my daddy,” I giggled. “That’s cringy. I hate when girls call guys daddy.”

“Me too, actually,” he shudders, “Girls with daddy issues aren’t my thing.”

“Oh really,” I lifted my brow, “What is your thing, then?”

He smiles sheepishly, “You. You’re my thing. My one and only thing.”

“Mmhmm,” I crossed my arms, narrowing my eyes at him.

“I’m serious,” he rubs his hands down my arms, resting his forehead on mine.

I’m about to continue giving him a hard time, but someone starts knocking on the door. Mark sighs, k****s my forehead, then heads out to answer it. I go back to my bag on the bed, zipping it so I can put it away when growling startles me, making me drop the bag back down on the bed.

“What the f**k are you doing here?” Mark snarls. I rushed out of the bedroom to see what the problem was. Mark sounds homicidal right now.

Mitchel was standing in the doorway, looking solemn and ragged. His hair is a mess, standing up at weird angles, and his eyes are bloodshot and red-rimmed, much like mine looked this morning. Seeing him like this breaks my heart, but I no longer feel that pull towards him. He ruined that. Now, it’s just sympathy I’m feeling, not his sorrow from my connection to him. That’s no longer there.Property belongs to Nôvel(D)r/ama.Org.

“I need to talk with Hadley,” he stated in a broken voice.

“The f**k you do! I told you to leave the resort, Mitch. You ruined your own f*****g bond, you’re not going to ruin mine.”

“I don’t want to ruin anything for either one of you. I just want to apologize and explain,” Mitchel begged his brother.

“Explain what?” I asked, drawing both of their attention to me. Mitchel’s eyes widened, shame coating his every feature. The storm in his gray eyes was raging with emotions. “Explain why you threw me away for another girl? I don’t want to hear excuses. You made your choice, Mitchel.”

“I didn’t choose another girl over you!” Mitchel practically yells, “I didn’t. I thought I didn’t deserve to be with you, Hadley. I didn’t reject you for anyone else. I couldn’t. I could never love anyone more than I love you.”

His words hurt to hear, and I don’t know if I truly believe him. ‘What about Suzie? Did you not reject me because of her? To be with her?”

Mark is blocking most of Mitchel’s and my view of each other, standing between the two of us. Mitchel tries to come around his brother to approach me, but Mark pushes him back, growling at him.

I sighed, walking over and grabbing Mark’s hand, pulling him toward me so Mitchel could enter the suite. Everyone staying on this floor doesn’t need to listen to us arguing like this.

“Come in before guests start poking their heads out to see what’s happening,” I tell him, keeping hold of Mark’s hand so he behaves while his brother comes in, hesitating before he takes a seat on the couch.

I closed the door, then let Mark lead me to the armchair. He sits, pulling me into his lap, burying his nose against my nape, into my hair, inhaling deeply over and over again like he is trying to calm himself.

Mitchel is watching us, longing written all over his face. He used to feel like the brother I was closest with, but now things are different. I’ve come to fully accept Mark, and Mitch and I share nothing but a broken bond. I can still feel the throbbing in my belly. I miss it. I miss the feeling of the bond and the pull I had towards him, but he hurt me by rejecting me. I don’t ever want to feel that pain again.

“You wanted to talk, so talk,” I told him firmly. His face falls at my harshness, and I feel a pang of guilt, but not enough to soften my words or apologize.

He runs his hand through his messy hair, musing and messing it up even more. “I met Suzie yesterday, but not for the reason you think,” he starts by saying, shrinking slightly as my eyes tighten at the mention of her name. “I promise. I went there to tell her to back off. I never messed with her. I only tried to help her and be her friend because she had no one else.

“When I met her, she tried to poison me. She mixed wolfsbane with my drink. We fought pretty badly, made a big scene, and her brother and our alpha ended up having to come down to arrest her. She yelled at me that she would rather die than be without me, and because of what happened in my past, it triggered me. It triggered me f*****g bad.”

Mitch closes his eyes, resting his head in his hands while he tries to collect himself. Mark has his arms wrapped tightly around me, or else I would likely go to him right now. He looks so utterly and completely broken.

“I thought she meant she was going to kill herself. I thought that she was going to end her own life because of me. I was so f****d up. I hate her, but didn’t want to be the reason someone else killed themselves. I didn’t know what to do. All I could think about was you, and how I was probably going to end up driving you into depression too. I didn’t think I was good for you, and you would be better with just Mark. You deserve more than a guy that still has crazy women stalking him, threatening me with their life, and I didn’t think I could be the man you needed me to be if she did end up killing herself. She had no one but me, and that guilt would have eaten away at me.”

“Then why are you here now?” Mark asked in a hard voice, “If you are so worried about Suzie, why come here and say all this now?”

“She’s dead,” Mitchel says, making me gasp. I covered my mouth with my hand, stunned that what Mitchel feared most came true and he had to deal with it on his own.

“She killed herself?” Mark asks, gripping me tighter, like he is trying to protect and comfort me. Mitchel is the one that needs to be comforted right now, not me. I want to go to him, but Mark is holding me back.

“I killed her,” Mitchel said, making both Mark and myself freeze, staring at him like he had just grown a third head. “I couldn’t take it. Life without you isn’t a life at all. I went to Lady Delilah to ask her to rid me of Suzie for good so she could no longer threaten me or anyone I loved, but it turned out she was already on death row. She fed off her brother when he was defending his mate from her attack, and she was already halfway rogue. Delilah let me kill her after she confessed she was never going to kill herself. Her goal was to kill you, Hadley. I had to kill her.”

“Oh, Mitchel,” I can’t imagine what he has been through. I can’t imagine having to kill someone you once protected to protect someone else. He may not have loved Suzie, but he cared for her for 7 years. He killed her to protect me.

It doesn’t change the fact that he rejected me though. “You still rejected me, Mitchel. It hurt. That was the most excruciating pain I have ever experienced in my life.”

“I know, Hadley. I know. Words could never express how sorry I am. I wanted to take it back the second I did it, but then you accepted and I lost all reason. I don’t deserve your forgiveness, but if you give me a second chance, I’ll spend the rest of my life making up for f*****g things up so badly. I just want you back, Hadley. I want our bond back.”