I Back to the Future, My Alpha Regrets Me in the Past Chapter 06

I Back to the Future, My Alpha Regrets Me in the Past Chapter 06

The words hit Zoe like a detonation.

“Ryan, you’re delusional! I will never dissolve our bond!”

“And you can stop waiting for Rachel to come back. I already told her everything about us!”

Ryan’s eyes went wide. His hand shot to her throat.

“Say that again. What exactly did you tell her?”

“I told her we slept together! That you already marked me! She’s never coming back!”

Zoe’s eyes were bloodshot, the words ripping from her strangled throat.

Ryan’s hands shook with rage.

“I told you she couldn’t find out! How dare you tell her? You did this on purpose, didn’t you? You bitch!”

“I was wondering why Rachel would just leave me out of nowhere. She must have dodged every camera in that restaurant just to get away from me.”

“This is all because of you!”

He threw Zoe to the floor.

Then he collapsed beside her, back against the wall.

He couldn’t imagine how desperate I must have felt when Zoe told me.

The details came flooding back. The images. The moments.

Now even he was disgusted with himself.

Why had he kept entangling himself with Zoe? He should have been building a life with me.

He was beginning to grasp the magnitude of what he’d done. And how catastrophically, irreversibly wrong it all was.

His fingers brushed something beneath the bed. Blood.

He rubbed it between his fingertips. Brought it to his nose.

His heart dropped through the floor.

Real blood. Not ketchup.

The image slammed into him. Me lying on the floor that day, drenched in my own blood.

I had been hurt. Actually hurt.

But he still didn’t understand why I’d been bleeding so much for no visible reason.

Then a memory surfaced. Something I’d said to him a long time ago.

“Ryan, please take care of my fabric. It’s as important to me as my life.”

I’d told him that.

He flew down the stairs and tore through the trash, digging out every shredded piece of the gown he’d destroyed.

He pieced the fragments together, one by one.

When the fabric was whole again, Ryan clutched his head and wept.

“I love you, Ryan.”

Those words had been hidden along the underside of the fabric. If he’d paid any attention at all during the cutting, he would have seen them.

But he hadn’t looked. All he’d cared about was making a gown for Zoe, because she wanted one, and for that he’d destroyed the fabric I’d entrusted to him like my own life.

He thought about how much pain I must have been in that day.

And what had he done?

He’d abandoned me, taken Zoe to the bathroom, and fucked her.

I must have heard everything.

How much must that have hurt?

The questions spiraled through his mind, relentless.

They crushed the air from his lungs.

“Rachel, I know I was wrong. Can you please just come back?”

Ryan’s head was ringing. He had no idea where to even begin looking for me.

Then it hit him. I had no home in this world. He was the only family I had.

And he’d made me suffer through all of it anyway.

His regret peaked so high it threatened to split him apart.

Zoe took his hand again, trying to pull him back.

“Ryan, Rachel was never good enough for you. We’re the real mates here. She chose to leave on her own. Isn’t that better for us? Now we can be together openly.”

Ryan ripped his hand away from her.

“What right do you have to compare yourself to her? If you weren’t my ex, I wouldn’t have glanced at you twice. I have no interest in you. I never loved you!”

Zoe’s face went ashen. She couldn’t believe the man she loved would say this.

“That’s not right. That can’t be right. If you don’t love me, why did you mark me? Why were you so obsessed with me? Why!”

She clung to his hand, begging. All she got was one sentence.

“I was just trying to close a chapter of regret. What I felt for you was physical, nothing more. As for the mark…”

Ryan raised his right hand and began the oath.

“I, Ryan Ashford, swear before the Moon Goddess that I reject you, Zoe Wright, as my mate.”

Agony erupted from the wolf inside Zoe. She stared at Ryan, whose face had gone just as white, unable to believe what he’d done.

She never imagined he would go this far just to prove he didn’t love her.

In that moment, she finally understood. Ryan had never truly loved her. She was nothing more than an old regret he’d wanted to put to rest.

She didn’t argue. She took one last long look at Ryan, turned around, and walked away.