The Alpha Prince And His Bride
Book 3 The Alpha’s Substitute Bride – Episode 44

~ISABELLA~

I couldn’t believe this was happening to me. I couldn’t believe that the woman Hunter had loved so wholeheartedly turned out to be this sick and manipulative person. How did she even plan all of this?

But more than that, how could she do this to someone like Hunter? He worshipped her in the past and she chose to destroy him for it? He loved her so much that when she’d faked her death everything in his life completely fell apart. He lived a horrible life for five years because of her and she didn’t care about that at all. I’d only entered Hunter’s life recently and even then after five years of thinking she was dead he was completely heart-broken. How could someone live with themselves after being so brutal to another person? I expected to see some sort of remorse on her face but there was none of that, instead all she was concerned about was hurting him, she’d centered her whole life on getting revenge for her brother’s death. She practically was living just to see him suffer. It was crazy to think about all of the things she’d confessed to me. It seemed to me like she wouldn’t rest until Hunter was dying from sorrow. I couldn’t just sit back and let all of this happen. I couldn’t let her harm the man that I loved. He was precious to me and just like she lived to destroy his life; I lived to protect it. If I thought I loved Hunter before; now I was more than in love with him, there wasn’t a word to describe what I felt for him after he’d marked me. Any pain brought upon him would be the same as pain directed to me.

My gaze went back to Maggie; she hadn’t left my side since I’d been brought in here. Was this where she’d stayed hidden all of these years? Maggie’s aunt, the one that hated me was also here. Her actions made a lot more sense to me now. There was this other man around as well, it seemed like Maggie and him had some sort of a relationship. It was weird seeing the way they acted around each other; it looked more like a physical relationship more than anything else. I couldn’t understand how she could choose to stay with someone like him when Hunter was the best man any woman could ever hope to have in their life.

How evil was this woman? If she was this horrible then I couldn’t imagine the type of person her brother had to be for Hunter to kill him. I still didn’t believe everything that she’d told me.

There had to be more to the story than Hunter killing an innocent person. I knew him well by now, he would not do that. People saw him as a monster but I never once saw him act like one. Besides, Esma did tell me that Hunter was loved by all in the past. If he was loved by all of the people that knew him, it only meant that he was a very good person. A good person would not kill an innocent man; her brother had to do something horrible for Hunter to kill him. There was no way he would hurt Maggie’s brother unless there was a good reason behind it.

I looked down at my tied hands and suddenly I felt weak. I’d tried to escape multiple times but whatever it was Maggie had used to keep me tied down it was damn powerful. It must have a spell here, she’d confessed to working with witches and that had to be the case here as well.

I moved my head back and felt the need to puke again. Ever since that first day back home I couldn’t stop the constant feeling to throw up. Eventually it did make me start to worry and I’d brought over a doctor in secret the night before my wedding day to run some tests on me. My signs pointed to that of being pregnant and now I was scared that I really was.

If I was pregnant that would change everything. I wouldn’t stand back and let anyone harm my baby that was inside of me which meant that I couldn’t let anyone hurt me. But I still wasn’t sure that I actually really was pregnant and I couldn’t make Maggie believe that I was. If I showed any fear then it would only make her suspicious. If she had an idea that I could be pregnant with Hunter’s baby she would no doubt use it against him. I was sure that she would do something crazy like make him think that he was responsible for his own baby’s death . . . she was that sick in her head.

She turned and caught me staring at her. I’m sure she saw the venom and hatred in my gaze. She was a demon; in fact a demon had to have more of a heart than she did.

“You seem to be thinking about a lot, you mind telling me what’s going on in your head?” She asked with vicious eyes.

“You’ll never get away with this.” I shouted at her while trying to break free again. “Hunter will find out the truth and when he does he’ll give you the death that you deserve. You shouldn’t have ever decided to come back into our lives. By trying to separate Hunter and me, you managed to bring us closer than ever. That was your biggest mistake. It will only get worse for you from here on. You will pay Maggie and I’ll personally see to it that you do.”

She shrugged her shoulders and took a seat in front of me. “Listen to me b***h. I’ve been planning my revenge on Hunter since I found out that he killed my brother. My purpose in life now is to destroy his life. I’ll get my revenge and I’ll get it in the best way possible. I’ll make sure that you stay alive to see all of it happen.”

I pushed my head forward and hit her hard across her face. She screamed and laid a hard slap on my left cheek. “I can’t wait to see you suffer Isabella. You spoilt my plans but I’ll make sure that I make you pay for that. I should be thanking you however. Because of you I now have a better way of destroying Hunter’s life.”

I narrowed my eyes.

“Why do you need to put a spell on me to keep me tied down?” I demanded. “Are you scared of me? Are you threatened by my presence?”

I wanted to provoke her but she seemed to catch on fast.

“You’ll see why I need to do that right about now.” She answered with a wicked smile. “Salem why don’t you come in and finish up things in here. Hunter’s mate is starting to get on my nerves a little bit.”

I watched as a girl with dark red hair walked in. She looked just as crazy and soulless as Maggie did. No wonder she’d agreed to help someone like Maggie.

“What is this?” I demanded as she wrapped a string around my body. “What is she doing to me?”

“It’s just a little controlling spell. You’ll be conscious and you’ll know everything that’s happening yet you won’t be able to control your body. You’ll say and do everything that my friend here tells you to do.”

My eyes narrowed. “That isn’t all, is it?”

She laughed. “I like how quickly you catch on Isabella. We will order you to kill Hunter. He won’t even know what hit him. The truth is, Hunter isn’t easy to kill. But after marking you, I’m sure that he’ll rather die than lift a finger to hurt you. He will let you hurt him. Of course I won’t let him die so easily. I’ll let you harm him a bit until he knocks out . . . then when he wakes up he will see you dead . . . After we put another spell on you. A spell that was used on me before. Hunter will believe that you died and he would think that he killed you. He won’t be able to live with himself after that.”

A chill travelled down my spine and I desperately wanted to escape from these psychotic people. I didn’t understand how she could plan all of these things without ever once thinking about what Hunter has done for her. She was ungrateful and deserved to die like her brother had done.

I took a look at the bag of b***d on the table and knew that it was mine when they’d taken it from me earlier today. I’d wondered what it was for and now that I knew it gave me chills all over my body.

I couldn’t let this happen. I couldn’t let Hunter think that he’d killed me. I knew what had happened between him and Maggie, now that he’d marked me he would be even more attached to me than he was with her. I knew this because I also felt how much stronger our bond was. It would kill him to think that he’d somehow killed me.

I loved him too much to ever be the reason that he destroyed his life more than he’d already done in the past five years.

I tried to push forward and snap Maggie’s head but my body wouldn’t obey me.

She laughed. “I told you that your body would no longer listen to you. If you think that now is difficult, just wait until you hurt Hunter both physically and emotionally.”

My body started to tremble as I tried to regain control of it but still nothing happened. I closed my eyes as I felt tears flowing down my cheeks.

I couldn’t let this happen. I couldn’t break Hunter’s heart. I just couldn’t!

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

~HUNTER~

I sat up from the bed as a familiar feeling rushed through my body. I only felt like this whenever Isabella was near.

Was she? Was it possible that she’d come back to me? Did her kidnappers free her? I rolled out of the bed and made a run for the door. I didn’t waste any time as I bolted out of the room. I needed to get to her. I needed to see for myself that she was really back, that she’d returned home.

I stumbled down the stairs and picked myself back up as I pushed through the front door.

I paused outside the door, not sure whether I was dreaming or this was real life.

Isabella was standing in front of me, she had on the same dress I’d last seen her in and she looked just as gorgeous. My heart was racing and my wolf was clawing at me to rush to her side. I couldn’t do anything like that however because my feet for some reason was glued to the ground. I didn’t want to move for fear of her disappearing again.

Eventually I couldn’t take it anymore, I felt like I would die if I didn’t get to her soon.

I ran towards her and pulled her tightly against my arms. “Where have you been?” I whispered before leaving k****s all over her face. It felt so good to hold her and k**s her. “I missed you so much Isabell—”

My eyes widened as something sharp connected with my stomach. I pulled away from her with a look of disbelief on my face.

I clutched my stomach and felt something wet there. I slowly lifted my hands and watched the red stain on my fingers. It took me a few seconds to realize that it was my own b***d.

B***d from where Isabella had just stabbed me. The realization of what just happened caused a shockwave down my spine. Did she really just take a knife and stab me? My eyes saw it but my mind refused to believe that it had just happened.

“Isabella . . .”I whispered.

Something didn’t make sense to me. Her body said that she wanted to hurt me but her eyes were saying something else. They were screaming at me to run.

I didn’t understand this. What could have possibly happened for her to come back home and try to hurt me?

I took a step closer to her and it looked like her hands were trembling.

“Please talk to me.” I tried again. “Tell me what I did wrong. Why are you acting like this?”

My eyes widened as the knife connected one more time but this time in my arm. My lips parted and I stared at her broken-heartedly.

“W-why?” I choked out.