Carrying the Alpha’s Heir, Claimed by the Vampire King Chapter 05

Carrying the Alpha’s Heir, Claimed by the Vampire King Chapter 05

Kieran came himself on a Sunday.

I was walking home from the farmer’s market at dusk when a black Range Rover I’d know anywhere slid to the curb.

He stepped out, and God help me, he looked terrible.

Hollow eyes. Unshaved jaw. Shirt wrinkled. Kieran Blackwood, who had his shirts pressed like armor.

Good. Let him suffer.

“Elara.” His voice was gravel. “Five minutes. Please.”

“You’re in Draven territory.”

“I don’t care.”

“You should. He’ll kill you.”

“Let him try.” He stepped closer, and the broken bond flared under my ribs. “Just hear me out.”

I set my grocery bags on the sidewalk. Not because I wanted to listen. Because my hands were shaking,

and I refused to let him see.

“Talk.”

“Come home. Selene’s gone. I’ll send her out of the country. I’ll be the mate you deserve.”

“You were supposed to be that from the start.”

“I know. I failed-”

“You didn’t fail, Kieran. You chose. Every late night. Every call behind a closed door. Every time you looked

at her instead of me. Those weren’t mistakes. Those were choices.”

“I never touched her. I swear on the moon-”

“I don’t

That stopped him cold.

“You could have been celibate as a monk. It wouldn’t matter. Betrayal isn’t just about a bed. It’s every moment you gave her that belonged to me. Every smile. Every secret Every piece of yourself I begged for,

and she got for free.”

His eyes went wet.

“The dissolution papers were leverage. For the Ashford alliance. I was never going to use them-”

“My blood marks were already drawn, Kieran. You planned the end of our marriage like a land deal.”

“I’ll spend the rest of my life making it right-”

“No. You won’t. Because I don’t love you anymore.”

I watched the words hit him. Watched his shoulders drop and the gold in his eyes gutter like a candle.

Then the temperature fell.

Not slowly. All at once. My breath fogged. The streetlights flickered.

“You’re trespassing, Blackwood.”

We turned.

A man stood twenty feet away beneath a dying streetlamp. Tall. Dark hair. Long black coat, hands in his

pockets. No one had seen him arrive.

Lucien Draven.

I’d imagined something monstrous. Pale and ancient and cruel.

He was none of that. And all of it.

His dark eyes moved over the scene with slow precision. Then they found me.

Something in his face changed. Barely. Like a lock that had been sealed for centuries hearing a key.

“Ms. Hale,” he said. Not Luna. Not Mrs. Blackwood. “Are you hurt?”

Kieran’s lip curled. A low growl rulled out of his chest. “This is between me and my mate.”

“Your former mate. She rejected you. You’re harassing a woman under my protection.”

“Since when is she under your protection?”

“Since your wolves threatened a sixty-year-old baker in my streets.”

Lucien didn’t move. Didn’t raise his voice. Didn’t show a single fang

He didn’t need to.

+45 Coma

“Leave, Alpha. While I am still asking.”

Two predators. One burning hot, one cold as a grave. And even I could feel it. Lucien wasn’t angrier. He was simply older. Stronger. Utterly, terrifyingly calm.

After a long, humiliating silence, Kieran stepped back.

His eyes found mine one last time.

“You’re still mine, Elara. Until I say otherwise.

Then he was gone.

The second his taillights vanished, my knees gave out.”

I didn’t hit the pavement.

Lucien was already there. I never saw him move. One cool hand under my elbow, holding me up like I weighed nothing.

“Breathe,” he said quietly.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re shaking. And your son’s heart is racing.”

He gathered my scattered groceries, placed them in my arms, and stepped back.

Then he paused.

“He wasn’t lying, Ms. Hale. I can taste the bond in the air between you. Frayed, but alive.” His eyes Tarkered “As long as he refuses to accept your rejection, he will always be able to find you.”

He turned and walked into the shadows

And the broken thread in my chest pulled north.

Toward Kieran.