Bullied Mate Of The Lycan Kings
Chapter 161

Cade's

pov

The sounds of howls and chants filled the street, shaking me from the internal turmoil swirling in my soul.

"Alpha! Alpha! Alpha!"

Word traveled fast, I thought, a heavy lump in my throat that was refusing to go down, as I got down from the car and saw the crowd that had formed on either side of the road to welcome us back into the pack.

It was me. I was their Alpha. At 18, this was not the way I'd have. imagined taking over after my mother. I had big dreams and heavy ambitions but I was still young and inexperienced and my mother had made more enemies than friends since she took over. Enemies that will want to take their pound of flesh from me.

My chest tightened.

I guess I'll have to start from somewhere.

We piled into an elevator, Lily and I, then Zac, because he couldn't leave Lily's side, no matter how horrible he felt for almost killing her. I knew Zac, and I knew that he'd never forgive himself for hurting her. I'd feel the same if I was in his position. Bia hopped in with us, because she was terrified of being away from her best friend, and Angelo joined her because he couldn't leave his girlfriend behind.

"Show them to their rooms," I told the maid that met us at the door, contolling the tremble in my voice. "They ll be staying as long as they need to."

Don't break down, I had te remind myself, fisting my trembling hands.

Don't let them know how much this is ripping you in half.

The maid nodded and I was about to make my escape when Lily tugged on my sleeve. I couldn't bear to look into her eyes because she'll see right through me, so I focused on the spot above her eyes and remembered to force a smile. "Are you okay?" She whispered softly in a way that made my heart clench.

"Of course," a beat, two beats, "why wouldn't I be?" |

"I'm just... I'm worried for you. You know you can talk to me right? You can tell me how you really feel. I won't judge you,

I smiled and, taking her face in my hands, I pressed a soft kiss to her forehead, letting my lips linger against her skin. "I want to take & shower."

Hurt and confusion flashed in her eyes but I didn't stick around to reassure her.

I made a beeline for my bedroom. My entire body trembled as I tried to replace a robe and it wasn't until I realized that I was searching the wrong place for it, since all my robes were in the bathroom that the reality hit me again.

My mother was dead and I was the one that had beheaded her. I had killed Cynthia Corrigan

Stumbling into the bathroom, I managed to make it to the toilet seat. before throwing up, my gut clenching and unclenching as I held on to the seat for dear life.

My entire body retched and heaved as I threw up all of last night's dinner but I couldn't get the taste of her blood out of my mouth.

She had begged me to spare her when she realized that she was losing and for a moment I had almost listened. Almost believed her lies again, but remembering that if I did, Lily would spend the rest of her life on the run had sealed my decision. It didn't make the decision any easier.

It didn't make the memory of my mother's dismembered body laying in front of me easy to bear.

"She's dead." I whispered as I flushed the toilet and that was when the tears finally fell. My body shook, huge sobs filling the bathroom as I rested against the bathroom wall and tried to hold myself together.

I was falling apart, the overwhelming sense of loss hitting me like arrows to the chest. It felt like I couldn't breathe.

I didn't have a choice. She hadn't given me any choice. She had killed so many innocent people. She had wanted to kill my mate for power. She had turned everyone in the pack to laborers to achieve her goal. She had ruled with a fist so tight, it had terrified our people and forced them into subservience. All of these were reasons enough for her to meet the end that she got and yet all I felt when I remembered that she was gone was overwhelming grief, loss and sorrow.

I was supposed to be happy that a monster like her was finally dead. I couldn't let the others see me like this. I couldn't let them think that I was mourning for her because I supported any of her actions. She was the definition of a tyrant and yet before Lily, she was the person I had loved most in the entire world even though I knew that she only saw me as a tool.

I had loved her to the point that if she had asked me to die for her, I would have. I had hoped for so long that someday if I continued to show her my love, her cold heart would melt and she would Anally stop her greed. I had prayed that one day she would finally love me like I loved her and did everything to make her happy.

But instead, my love seemed to have been nothing but something she could weaponize.

The last person I wanted to see me like this was Lily. When she had called asking for may help, I had known that I would have to stand against my mother and I didn't have any regrets about stopping the evil that was my mother, but how would I explain if anyone saw me crying like this? How would Lily feel if she saw me like this? Wouldn't she hate me for not being excited especially because we both knew that my mother had wanted her dead?

Quickly forcing myself to my feet, I reached for my toothbrush and quickly brushed my teeth while searching for my clipper. Washing my face, I stood in front of the mirror, clipper in hand and stared at my reflection.

Staring back at me wasn't the Alpha of Gold crest. It was a lost, confused boy who had finally lost both parents.

Taking the clipper to my hair, I turned it on and began to shave my hair off. It was a tradition that was practiced in Gold crest by the families of the deceased to mourn their loss. I hadn't cut my hair since my father died when I was still a very little boy and I had never thought I would do it for someone like my mother. And yet, as shameful as it felt, I mourned her. I mourned who she could have been if she wasrit so power hungry.

All my life, I had done everything that my mother wanted the exact way she wanted it. My father had been the same way. She had been the one to call the shots in everything and we had both been nothing but her soldiers. When my father died, I had had to become the perfect soldier. eating only when she commanded it, killing when she wanted it, hanging on to her every word. The only reason I had ever disobeyed her was because of Lily and when she had taken my memories of her away for those years, I had gone back to what I had done my entire life;

follow her lead.

Now that she was dead, I didn't know who I was or what to do with myself anymore. The concept of freedom was

foreign to me.

Turning off the clipper, I rested my palms on the vanity and leaned in, staring at my reflection in the mirror. Where there had once been golden blond hair long enough to be tied in a man bun, there was now only an inch of jagged soft and spiky blonde hair. My eyes were devoid of life and I looked more rugged, my features sharper. Would I ever be able to the Alpha this pack deserved? What if I was worse than my mother? What if I was exactly like her? What if that madness, that greed for power was genetic? What if I ended up disappointing everyone that was proud of me for doing the right thing?

I heard the door to the bathroom open and when I turned to tell whoever it was that I wanted to be alone, I saw Lily smiling tenderly at me as she entered and closed the door behind her gently.

"Hey," she said, her voice filled with concern that made me want to start crying all over again. Breathing in, I tried to gather myself together and forced a smile on my face.

Pointing to my haircut, I widened my already forced smile "What do you think? I don't look too bad, I hope?"

She didn't answer, only moved close enough that she was standing in front of me and placed her hand on my cheeks. She wiped my tears with her thumbs, her eyes filled with so much love and concern. I hadn't even realized that tears had escaped. So much for my posturing to be alright. I dropped my head in shame, watching as my tears. dropped to the ground and realizing that I couldn't even pretend to not be grieving my mother.

"Hey, look at me." Lily whispered, raising my chin so that I could look at

her.

"Do you regret answering my call? Do you resent me for asking you to fight on my side? Do you reget what you did?"

"No!" I replied almost immediately, shaking my head vehemently to convey my seriousness.

"I don't regret anything. I'm glad she's dead."

"You can be sad she's dead, Cade."

"Why should I be? I'm fine. Of course I am."

"You can't talk to me about how you feel, you know that right? If you're hurting? You can talk about it, I know you loved her."

TRinched almost as if Lily had slapped me with her words which

reminded me of how much I hated that I loved my mother and I shook my head again.

"If it's the hair, don't worry. We have a tradition where the family of the deceased cut their hair. Plus I didn't even do it for her anyways, I wanted a new look. One that said Alpha now, right?" I laughed awkwardly, already blabbing at this point and Lily merely nodded, walking away and I watched as she turned on the taps in the bathtub, filling it to the brim and squirting soap in it.

Walking back to where I stood, she helped me out of my shirt and when her hands touched my belt, I froze, grabbing her arm while raising her chin so she could see my confused eyes.

"I just want to take care of you. Please let me?"

The fact that I had wanted to hear her say those words since I remembered why she had left me was probably why I didn't even fight her, relenting when she helped me out of my clothes until I was standing naked in front of her. And then she did the last thing I would have expected. She started to get undressed too. If I wasn't so devastated by what had happened, I might have begged her to not do this except she was sure that she wanted to go all the way with me.

Right now, I was just grateful that she was here and would take her in whatever way she was offering.

She led me into the large tub and knelt behind me and just when I was about to ask her why she was behind me instead of where I could just sit and stare at her beautiful face, I felt her hands begin to massage the knots in my shoulders.

I immediately felt the knots in my back and shoulders relax as she worked her way through my tense muscles.

"Do you remember when you brought me up here when no one was around and how you made me a gourmet style meal?"

Oh yeah... A smile appeared on my lips as the memory came back to

me.

"And then we got drunk on one of your mother's expensive wines and she'd almost caught us?"

1 chuckled for the first time, my chest feeling a lot lighter as I remembered that particular night. It was one of the nights where I had seen a trace of the mother I had always wanted when she had come into my room and stared at me suspiciously when she didn't replace Lily who was hiding in the bathroom and just smiled and told me that she'd ground me if she didn't replace her wine by the next night. I had rushed to get a brand new bottle the next day.

No matter how horrible she had been, she was my mother and I had to accept that it was okay to miss her. To mourn her.

"It's okay to mourn her, Cade. It doesn't make you a terrible person for loving her. It won't change how I see you. You're not a robot. I understand perfectly how it feels to lose a parent and I would never hold it against you for feeling sad that Cynthia is gone." Lily whispered in my ear and held me close, resting her cheek against my back.

This time when I cried, it wasn't alone or in shame and when I was ready to leave the bath, Lily led me to my bed and got in with me, wrapping the covers around us, pulling me close to her and holding together all my broken pieces together.