The Alpha King Call Boy
Chapter 255

Fiona

"Alex. Oh my god, I've been so worried about you." I could hardly breathe while I waited for him to reply.

"Fiona," Alex answered weakly over the phone. "Are you and Lexi okay?"

"We're fine, my love. Oh god, it's so good to hear your voice."

He did not reply. I heard him breathing heavily, though.

"Kayden told us about your injuries, Alex. I'm so sorry, honey. Are you in a lot of pain?"

"No. No, they gave me drugs."

I swallowed, feeling tense. The unfamiliar, depressed tone of my husband's voice was alarming. He sounded even worse than I'd been expecting after hearing Kayden's report.

Alex had been injured - that was Kayden's first statement when he answered Nina's call. Alex had been injured by a vampire, but he'd killed it; the pack had killed them all, in what otherwise was basically a massive victory, but Alex had been badly wounded. I don't know how I held out this long, after hearing that news. But I had not cried again yet. Not since my sobbing session in the shower, back when I didn't know anything about Alex's fate.

Hearing his voice, though. God, my heart absolutely broke for my beloved mate. He sounded so numb, so hollow. So completely not himself.

"Alex. I'm so sorry I can't be there with you." My voice came out thin and fragile now as I fought back tears.

"I'm the one who is sorry," he replied flatly. "I should never have left you there with her."

So Kayden had told him about the fire. About Iris.

"Please don't worry about that right now," I breathed."

I'm just so happy you are alive, and coming back to me."

He held another pause. Another tense moment of breathy quiet on the line.

A long enough time passed in that silence that I was able to exchange a worried glance with Nina.

It was so bizarre, it felt unreal. To speak words of love to my usually endlessly loving husband, and not have him respond at all.

"I should have listened to you," he finally said. His tone of voice now sounded... angry. It scared me. "You told me she was dangerous. I didn't listen to you. I am supposed to protect my family. Instead, I brought an enemy into our home and left her there, left you alone-"

"Alex, please stop," I interrupted quietly. "Please, honey. It doesn't matter right now-"

"Yes, it does!" he growled, stunning me into silence.

Nina's jaw dropped.

I could hear Alexander's fast, wildly agitated breathing through the phone. He was freaking out.

I glanced over to the side room, where Alexis lay asleep in a crib that the palace staff had somehow acquired and moved in here on short notice. I hoped she would not wake to this.

"I'm going to let you rest now," I said into the phone calmly. "I love you, Alex. I'll see you soon. Good night, my love. I'll talk to you in the morning."

I waited a moment, but he did not reply.

I hung up.

Nina looked lost for words.

"He's on drugs," I said, staring down at my phone." He's not himself right now. And he has just been through a horrible ordeal. I can't even imagine what he's gone through today." Nina lunged across the bed to catch me in her arms: just in time. I turned into a ragdoll and crumpled into her embrace.

"What is happening, Nina?" I sobbed senselessly.

"Everything's gonna be okay, Fi. I promise you. Alex will be back soon. He's injured, but he'll recover. And you, Lexi and I are all safe here now. And listen, babe-Iris is fucking gone, okay? This shit has been terrible today, but now that it's over, you really are going to be safer here. She's gone."

I tried to embrace Nina's silver-lining outlook about the Iris situation, even for a small moment. But it didn't help. I could not feel anything positive about Iris's death, even if she had meant me and my family harm.

No, her demise was nothing I could celebrate. It was nothing but horrible. Nothing but tragedy.

I felt absolutely forlorn.

Lexi beat the sun and rose, crying, at five a.m. Nina and I had gotten just a couple hours of sleep, but once we were up, we were up. Memories of all that had happened in the past day rushed back to cloud and trouble my mind as soon as I was conscious. Alex was due back by noon. He was being flown in from the hospital across the country where he'd had emergency surgery overnight.

I didn't know how to talk to him. I still didn't know exactly what had happened to him, exactly what he was going through. He hadn't answered when I called: his cell this morning, and when Nina talked to Kayden, he told her that Alex was asleep. I could not wait for them to get back home. I couldn't wait to kiss my husband's lips again. I longed so desperately to touch him. To connect with him again in that way in particular. A kiss between us had always been so special. So precious. So powerful.

I could not stop thinking about that.

Our next kiss.

Secretly, against all reason and logic, I began to hope that I could heal Alexander with a kiss.

I wanted to kiss him the moment we were reunited.

And I hoped that when our lips touched, my mate would regain his strength and his passion for our love.

He'd return to himself and pull me into a deep, loving embrace, and all of this would be over... we'd be on the other side of all this tragedy, ready to heal from it together...

But that wasn't what happened.

Nina, Lexi and I passed a quiet, anxious morning.

Then, when it was time, we went to the front of the palace and watched as an ambulance surrounded by a huge security escort fleet pulled up to the bottom of the grand staircase.

I watched them roll Alexander's stretcher out of the back. And felt my heart drop down into my stomach.

Seeing him like this... lain flat, wrapped in casts and bandages, completely vulnerable and helpless... God, it was shocking and terrible. And I felt his energy even from a distance. He was in agony.

Some physical pain. But more strongly than that,mental anguish.

My Alpha was hurting deep in his soul. He was deeply, horribly depressed.

He didn't look for me when they rolled him out and up the ramp.

He didn't turn his eyes up to mine until, after one terribly tense minute, the medical crew got him up to the top of the stairs and I approached his side.

Then his eyes moved to meet Alexis's. She recognized her father, even under all his bruises and bandages, and squealed and reached out for him.

"Oh, Alex..." I rushed forward, holding one arm out to embrace him while the other kept Lexi pressed tightly into my chest.

But, to my great surprise he growled, "Don't!" and I stopped dead in my tracks.

Lexi was scared. I wrapped both my arms back around her.

"Don't touch me, Fiona." His energy turned fierce and angry, buzzing off him like white-hot electrical sparks.

I don't want to touch you. Or her, either."

"Alex, don't do this..."

I knew he was in pain, of course. I knew I'd feel it when I touched him, I'd take some of it into my own body, but I didn't care. I could take a little pain if it brought us back together after these terrible days we'd spent apart. If it could bring him comfort. "Take me inside," Alexander commanded to the professionals attending his stretcher. They complied.

Stunned, I followed behind.

I had already made arrangements before he arrived.

For Alex to be moved into that hospital room that Id set up last week for Grandfather, back when I thought he might live long enough to move in here with us.

It kind of worked out perfectly, actually; the room was just down the hall from the forest room, which I'd decided we were now going to call home. Guess it was a good thing I'd gone through with that plan. Maybe somehow I had just known I'd be needing a hospital suite close by, even though I didn't know what I'd really need it for at the time.

Thinking about that didn't comfort me. It only made me sadder.