Lost by the alpha, p.1
Lost by the Alpha, page 1
LOST BY THE ALPHA
THE ALPHA KING’S BREEDER BOOK 3
BELLA MOONDRAGON
Copyright © 2023 by Bella Moondragon
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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For Lisa.
Thank you for all of your help.
CONTENTS
1. Fantastic Voyage
2. Let’s Skip Dinner
3. When He’s Gone
4. What Do You Want, Stranger?
5. Not Who She Thinks He Is
6. A Name Like That
7. Haunted
8. Queen Contest
9. The Alpha’s Daughter
10. Trust No One
11. Can You Trust a Liar?
12. What’s It Going to Be?
13. The Art of War
14. The Pride of a Princess
15. It Has to Be a Lie
16. She Can’t Know
17. I’m a Princess!
18. A Long Way
19. Make Up Sex?
20. If You Want It
21. Not a Throwaway Princess
22. Zombie Dance
23. These Are My Terms
24. An Invitation
25. The Wages of Sin
26. And So It Begins
27. She Seems Nice
28. Life Is Not a Ball
29. Who Is This Girl?
30. Trinity Knows Everything
31. Going Home
32. Shout It Out
33. The Right Decision
34. Boy or Girl?
35. Bad Advice
36. Letter From the Past
37. Outnumbered
38. Maybe She Should Be the Queen
39. Payback is a B
40. What If I Do?
41. Trinity’s Revelation
42. Beta Belief
43. Should I Stay Or Go?
44. She’ll Say Stay
45. Leaving Safety
46. Thank the Goddess for Friends
47. Is That a Boat?
48. The Treasure Seeker
49. Home Sweaty Home
50. Jungle Trek
51. Voices In My Head
52. Mysterious Light
53. Which Witch?
54. Difficult Choices
55. The Real Treasure is Love
Also by Bella Moondragon
FANTASTIC VOYAGE
*Isla*
Water laps at the boat as we glide across the water. The larger waves we encountered a couple of days ago, waves that made me question my decision to do this and think that there was a good chance I was going to end up in the ocean, have died down, and now, it’s just a calm, rolling motion that makes me want to fall asleep.
But I can’t do that.
I haven’t been able to sleep for days, weeks, not since I had decided that this was something I had to do, even when Maddox had forbidden me to leave the castle.
Fighting with him absolutely breaks my heart, but I have my reasons for being here. He didn’t understand that. He didn’t want to listen to me.
I’d taken advantage of the problems he was having, and now, I am here… even though he may never forgive me for what I’ve done.
Rubbing my hand along my abdomen, I stare out at the ocean, pressing my aching back to the bench behind me. Traveling while so very pregnant is just as uncomfortable as Mystica had warned me that it would be stressful, difficult, unpleasant, even painful.
She hadn’t been wrong, but to me, the importance of coming was far more important than staying at home. I will survive being uncomfortable, but I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if something happened to my baby.
“Are you still sitting up here?” Ben asks me as he comes up from the lower deck. The ship we’ve hired isn’t large, but it’s big enough for the five of us and the two crew members. The sleeping quarters downstairs are pretty comfortable, not that I’ve actually slept any at all, but my youngest brother has seemed cozy enough.
“I am still sitting here,” I tell him, as if he hasn’t figured as much out. “Captain Dave says we should be spotting land within a few hours.”
“Captain Dave has been spotting the gin for a few hours now,” Ben mutters, and I chuckle, but it takes a lot of effort, so I don’t let it linger. “Is your back still bothering you?”
“Yeah,” I tell him, arching it so that I can try to stretch out some of the lower muscles in my back, but it’s hard because the baby is so big these days.
“Do you want me to rub it?” My brother has been nothing but kind to me ever since he snuck out of the house to come with me.
“No, thank you.” I give him a half-smile. “I’ll have Mystica give me some more of those herbs when she gets up.” Everyone else is still sleeping this early in the morning. I wish that I was, too, but I’m still fretting, hurting, and wondering what’s about to happen to us.
“I can go get them if you want,” he offers.
“No, it’s okay. I’m all right.” I’m not sure what I would do without Ben. He’s helped me so much, getting away from the castle, to the train, to the dock, and now… here on the boat.
It’s been a whirlwind week, and I’ll be happy when we get this over with and can get back home, but I have to take it all one step at a time.
I hear footsteps echoing off the stairs again, and I can tell by the footfalls who it is. I grimace a bit and brace myself. Ben slides over and holds my hand. I don’t want to see him. I don’t want to talk to him. I wish he wasn’t even here, but there was no escaping him, not from the moment he’d shown up at the castle and began making demands.
Glowing amber eyes meet mine as I glance over to see him standing there, his blond hair messy from sleep. His clothing is wrinkled, and he has a scowl on what some women may describe as a handsome face, though I can’t think of him that way.
Not after everything he’s said to me.
“Oh, good. Look who’s awake. Mr. Sunshine. Good morning, Antony,” Ben mumbles.
He glares at us and walks over to the railing, staring out at the ocean. “We’ll be home in an hour or so,” he says. “Then, the real work begins. If you think you’re uncomfortable now, on this boat, Princess, just wait until you hit the jungles.”
I am not looking forward to it. I’m not looking forward to seeing the destruction of our homeland, trekking across uneven land, dodging who knows who might be out to get us. No, nothing about what lies ahead of me has me excited to disembark.
But I am curious to see the land of my birth. Mystica insists that there’s nothing there we can’t handle. I’m not so sure. I might have some sort of magical powers that allows me to heal people and maybe even bring them back from the dead, but that doesn’t mean I’ll always be in a situation where I can do that if something happens.
And what if something happens to me?
I doubt I’m going to come back to life again.
Poppy’s tone is almost as disagreeable as Antony’s when she emerges from down below deck. “You’d better have some sort of an idea where the hell your mother is when we get there or else, you’re going to be the next who has to rely on that damn waterfall to bring you back to life.”
Antony turns around and glares at her, and I say, “Poppy—that’s not very nice, considering what happened there.”
“I know!” she spits, coming over to sit next to me, folding her arms across her chest. “That’s exactly why I said it. Your cousin is an asshole, and I’m tired of putting up with his shit. If he’s going to keep being so fucking rude to everyone, I’m going to be rude right back to him.”
“Poppy, has anyone ever told you that you need to be more assertive?” my brother jokes, and I backhand him in the bicep.
Antony doesn’t even turn around. His eyes are fixed on the horizon.
I can’t imagine how all of this is for him. Sure, he’s a bit of an asshole, like Poppy just said, but he’s been through so much in his life. It’s no wonder he’s bitter and angry at everyone.
But his attitude had almost been enough reason for me not to come with him either.
Almost.
Now, as he mumbles, “Land, ho….” I take a deep breath. We will be there soon, and he’s right… that’s where the real trouble begins.
I stand, my back aching, as I walk over to the railing near my cousin and look out.
I can hardly see it, but it’s there, off in the distance. It’s just a green dot on the horizon, my first glimpse of Maatua in almost twenty years. From here, it doesn’t look as big as I expected, but then, perhaps it will get bigger when we are closer. Then, perhaps I’ll get a better indication of exactly what it is I am getting into here.
I just hope we don’t end up having to travel to that other island, my Aunt Mary’s homeland, KiloKilo, the land of wizards and mages, according to everything I could find in the library in the castle before I left home.
“We’ll be arriving at Maatua in two hours,” Jude, the captain’s assistant, says, coming around from the other side of the boat. “We will drop all of you, but as we stated, we will not be staying. We’ll be back in two weeks.”
Two weeks. My hand runs over my abdomen. I’m not due for another month. I hope they aren’t late. I really don’t want my son to be born on the island.
Jude cont
“And how often does that happen?” Poppy asks him.
He looks her up and down, something I’ve noticed him doing before. He’s probably ten years older than her, but it’s pretty clear, the short sailor with greasy black hair is interested in Poppy.
A grunt from next to me makes me wonder if he’s not the only one, though I can’t imagine Antony being interested in anyone but himself—and his mother.
“Not often,” Jude tells Poppy. “That being said, we have seen another boat on our radar that seems to be headed in the same direction. It’s a couple of hours behind us now, so it could change courses. At any rate, be ready to get off when we land because we will not be hanging around.”
“Another boat?” Ben repeats, turning to look at me. My breath catches in my throat. Surely, he doesn’t know already? We have been so careful….
I say nothing in response, and neither does anyone else. But my cousin mumbles, “So fucking stupid. Everyone is so goddessdamn scared of the island. There’s nothing to be scared of. I keep telling all of you, the war is over. There’s hardly anyone even on the island!”
“While that may be true, you can’t say that it’s not dangerous,” I say to him. “If it was safe, you wouldn’t have come for me.”
“I already told you, Princess, my mother refuses to speak to anyone but you. That’s the only reason I had to track you down. I want this over with more than anyone, but you won’t be in any danger. My father’s dead; he has been for over a decade. The war is over. Most of his followers are dead. Those that aren’t have left the island and moved to areas of the mainland like your family did. We’ll be perfectly fine.”
I want to believe what he’s saying, but I can see in his eyes that even he doesn’t fully believe that.
“Two weeks,” I repeat. “And four days until the Blood Moon.”
“That’s right,” he says. “We’ll have time.”
I shake my head but focus my eyes on the green dot in the distance that is growing bigger by the moment.
I hope he’s right. Otherwise, I’ve potentially ruined my relationship with the king to try to save my family’s homeland from permanent destruction based on second-hand information from the son of a mad woman. My own family didn’t even know Antony had survived the earthquake. They thought he’d been killed all of those years ago. His showing up to speak to me had been shocking.
My agreeing to this mission had been a huge risk, and a hundred times a day, I ask myself what the hell I’m doing.
When Maddox finds out what I’m up to, I have a feeling he’ll be asking me the exact same thing—if he will ever even speak to me again….
LET’S SKIP DINNER
*Isla*
Six months earlier…
I am two months pregnant, and I can tell when I look at my reflection in the full-length mirror.
Poppy says I’m glowing. I’m not sure about that, but I think my hair looks a little thicker, and maybe my eyes are a little shinier. I swear my nose is beginning to change shape.
And then there’s my abdomen. It’s not noticeable to anyone else, I don’t believe, but I can see a slight change. It’s kind of like when I’ve eaten too much, or I’m bloated. I smooth down the front of the sequined red dress I’m wearing and stare at it for a long moment. Yes, I can definitely see a change.
I haven’t gained any weight yet. Mystica says that’s typical since I’ve been having a bit of morning sickness. Anything I eat or drink tends to come right back up. She gave me some medicine, and that helps, but I am leery of taking anything since I don’t know how the baby might be affected by the poison I was given when I was just barely pregnant with him.
Satisfied that I look good, I take a deep breath and head across the room to sit in the chair by the window and wait. Maddox should be here any time.
He’s been away a lot recently. With everything going on with Zabrina’s mother, as well as the other packs that are threatening to rise up against Maddox because Zabrina somehow tricked their Alphas or their Alpha’s sons into thinking she was their fated mate, he has a lot of negotiating and peace talks to make.
The last thing he wants right now is a full-fledged war. But everyone knows it may be impossible to avoid. It seems that even when he is here, he’s with Seth, in what they’ve dubbed the war room, which is next to his office. They always have their heads together in there, bending over a table laden with maps, talking about what they should do next, who to talk to, who they can trust, who they can’t, where to gather troops from, where to amass them. It’s exhausting for me just thinking about it, and I don’t know the half of what’s going on with them.
He’s been gone for a few days, and I miss him terribly. I wish that he was here now, but I will wait patiently. He’s planning to take me to dinner and then to the ballroom for our own private dancing session. I still remember dancing with him at dinner that first time. It was so romantic. That was the first time that I knew I wanted to be with him no matter what.
I take a deep breath and focus my eyes out the window. I’m looking in the direction of my parents’ pack. My father is the newly appointed Alpha. Maddox insisted when he realized who he really was that he take over Willow pack. Dad had said he didn’t really want to be a leader anymore, but Maddox said he was the most qualified. I know that Dad was afraid that someone from Maatua will hear about where he is and come after him, not to cause any harm but with questions, questions neither of my parents can answer or want to try to answer….
I have a million of those types of questions myself. But no matter how I beg them to tell me more about what life was like for them there, they refuse. I think they are under the impression that I will somehow fall in love with the idea of Maatua and want to go there even more than I already do. In all honesty, though, my wanting to go there has nothing to do with curiosity.
I just want to make sure my baby is safe.
And Maddox says that’s ridiculous and will put both the baby and me in even more danger than if I just have him here and use my own tears or blood to save him if something is wrong. Since we’ve discovered what I can do, Mystica has been drawing small amounts of my blood and administering them to sick people in the infirmary. They get better quickly, depending upon how much they are given.
I know my blood and tears have magical qualities, but I’m not convinced it will be enough to save my son. I want to be near the same source of water that brought me back to life when he is born, just in case.
I put my hands on my abdomen, protectively, something I do frequently. No one has confirmed to me yet that he’s a boy. Mystica says I can’t know for sure for a few more weeks, and then she’ll confirm it through ultrasound. But I already know. He may have only been with me for a few weeks, but we are already bonded completely. I feel like I know this little boy as well as I know myself. The thought of losing him, of anything ever happening to him, makes my heart ache.
But I also don’t want to do anything to upset the Alpha King. If he says I can’t go to Maatua, I’ll just have to figure out another way to keep my son safe. Mystica and I have been doing some research about it, but it’s hard because no one else has the same history as I do. At least, if they do… they haven’t written it down and put it in a book, not one that we can access anyway.
My thoughts are interrupted by the sound of the door opening slowly. I suck in a deep breath and practically leap to my feet as Maddox sticks his head in. His weary look gives way to a smile, and I grin back at him.
