Piss Off, Alpha! You Lost Me Forever-Chapter 155 Fake Concern

SOPHIA’S POV

The commotion settled gradually. People went back to their conversations.

Bianca and I stayed where we were.

I watched Zade from across the room. He was back in his element now. He was surrounded by people who admired him, effortlessly commanding the attention of everyone within ten feet of him. The woman in the emerald gown stood close at his side. Her hand rested lightly on his arm, and he leaned down occasionally to say something that made her laugh. He looked completely at ease.

I felt nothing.

Not anger. Not jealousy. Not even a small ache I might have expected. I just felt empty.

My wolf didn’t even stir.

"He’s unbelievable," Bianca said beside me. She was watching him too with her arms crossed. "He breaks into your room. He saves you from Marcel. He tends your arm and holds you like you’re the only person in the world. And then he walks in here with another woman and starts announcing she’s the one who stays by his side." She scoffed "The audacity. The shameless audacity of that man."

I sighed "Bianca."

"No, I mean it, Sophia. You deserve better than someone who treats you like a game he picks up and puts down whenever it suits him." Her voice had real heat in it. "You deserve someone who chooses you every single day, not just when it’s convenient."

I looked at her. Her eyes were bright with anger. Her wolf energy was fierce around her. She had the particular energy of a woman who loved her friend fiercely and had run out of patience for everyone hurting her.

"I know," I said "I understand who Zade is. I’ve always understood, if I’m honest with myself. He’s intensity without intention. He’s someone who wants the chase more than the person. I won’t be affected by him again."

Bianca studied my face for a moment, searching for the crack in my façade. She didn’t find one. Her shoulders slowly dropped.

"Good," she said quietly. "Because you’ve been through enough."

We stood there for another moment, then I reached out and touched her arm. "Come on. Let’s walk through the children’s zone and then go home. I’m tired."

She nodded, and we started moving.

-

The children’s zone was near the far east entrance of the venue. It was a separate area with softer lighting and smaller furniture. The place was filled with the sound of children laughing. We were almost at the entrance when I saw them.

I stopped walking.

Damien stood near the entrance with Tiffany beside him. Ashley was between them or rather, in front of Tiffany, who was crouched slightly to fix the ribbon in Ashley’s hair. Her fingers smoothed it carefully while Ashley stood still and let her. Damien watched the two of them with an expression I hadn’t seen on his face in years. His expression was so soft.

The three of them looked exactly like what they were - a family.

Something moved through me then. This feeling was a different one. It was somehow worse than the pain I usually felt. It was the low, hollow ache of someone watching a door close on a room they used to live in. My wolf made a small, grieving sound deep inside my chest.

I turned immediately, pulling Bianca with me. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

"Other exit," I said under my breath.

But Tiffany’s wolf senses were sharp. She looked up before we had taken two steps.

"Sophia!" Her voice rang out. She straightened, looking at us with a wide smile “Bianca! What a pleasure to see you both here. Come, come join us. Ashley was just asking about-"

"We’re leaving," I said politely. "But thank you."

I kept walking. I kept my spine straight and my pace even. My face was completely neutral, because I had learned a long time ago that the worst thing you could do in front of Tiffany was let her see that something landed.

Bianca fell into step beside me without being asked.

"Sophia." A voice said.

It was Damien’s voice.

I felt it in my shoulders before I processed it. I slowed despite myself.

His footsteps behind me were quiet.

"Your arm," he said. His voice was lower now "Declan, when he tripped you. How bad is it?"

I stopped.

I stood there for one breath with my back to him, feeling the question deep inside me. He was asking about the injury. An injury caused by his own brother, in his family’s home, while his mother watched and said nothing. He hadn’t been there to see any of it. He was asking now, here, in a public venue, with Tiffany ten feet away ...whether I was all right.

I turned around slowly.

He was standing closer than I expected. His eyes moved to my right arm, then back to my face. There was something in his eyes that looked almost like guilt.

Almost.

I looked at him for a moment - this man I had loved completely, this man who had made me invisible for years, this man who was only now, when it was almost over, beginning to see me - and I felt the hollow ache in my chest harden into something cold.

"It’s none of your concern," I said.

I didn’t say it harshly. I didn’t say it with anger or bitterness or the shaking voice of someone who still cared too much. I said it just plainly, the way you stated a fact.

Then I turned back around and walked toward the exit.

Bianca was beside me before I had gone three steps. She stayed close, to me as we pushed through the venue doors till we got outside.

"You handled that beautifully." She said.

I exhaled. The night air hit my face and I breathed it in slowly.

"I’m tired, Bianca," I admitted quietly. I wasn’t just physically tired. The tiredness I felt was the bone-deep, years-long kind, the kind that came from carrying things too heavy for too long and finally, finally beginning to set them down.

She looped her arm through mine.

"I know," she said. "Let’s go home."