The Alpha's Prisoner

Violet didn’t know what to say to that.

Now more than ever, she could never think about getting married to Lance.

She had Jack and she wasn’t going to give up on him to fulfill another one of Arden’s wishes. Especially not one that involved marriage.

“Lance, I don’t think we could ever work together. I mean… You’re basically my brother. We were raised together and I consider you the same way I consider Gwen.” Violet tried to explain without sounding rude or hurting his feelings.

She didn’t know exactly how he felt about her, but she could have an idea by the way he always treated her.

But at that moment, all she wanted to tell him was how it felt to find your mate.. He could never know how good that was, because as far as she knew, his mate wasn’t from the Diamond Pack.

Or maybe she was, but Lance hand’t met her yet.

Either way, Violet couldn’t risk telling Lance that she had found hers.

But she was really curious to know his opinion about that subject.

“Have you ever thought about… how it would be like to find your mate and be with her?” Violet asked him.

But his response wasn’t exactly what she was expecting.

His expression became really serious and mysterious all of a sudden.

“You shouldn’t be talking about that, Violet.” he said with a firm voice.

He really looked like a guard at that moment, with his uniform and his intimidating expression.

“Why not? We are just talking, and it’s you. I’m not talking about that with a stranger.” she tried to minimize the problem.

Indeed that was a very sensitive subject, one that the members from the Diamond Pack shouldn’t bring in a casual conversation.

In fact, they treated mates as taboos. But Violet really wanted to find someone that had the same opinion as her inside those walls.

“It doesn’t matter who you’re talking to. You shouldn’t bring this matter ever.” Lance repeated getting up from the bed, clearly a bit annoyed.

“You know we are not allowed to be with our mates, Violet, so why think about that? I mean… It would only make us suffer, right?”

Violet didn’t have an answer to that.

Because she had the opportunity to find her mate and be with him, so she knew what it was like. Lance never had, and would probably never be able to find his, so he was right.

There was no reason to torment himself with that.

“You know you don’t really have a choice about this, don’t you? I figured it would be better if we could try to make things work instead of just marrying because Arden wants us to. Maybe we could be happy after all.”

Violet was really moved and thankful for Lance’s initiative.

It would be much better to try that, and maybe if she hadn’t had the chance to meet Jack and discover how things worked outside of the walls, she would probably accept that offer.

But now she couldn’t even consider it.

She had a plan and would do everything in her power to fulfill it.

“I’m sorry, Lance. I don’t really wanna talk about this now. I’m tired and want to be alone.”

Lance nodded realizing that maybe he was being a little inconvenient.

“Yes, sure. I just got excited that you were back. I shouldn’t have talked… about this today. Sorry.”

“It's okay.” Violet said with a gentle smile.

“I’m gonna go now. You should definitely rest. Call me if you need anything.” he said leaving the bedroom.

Violet was left with more things to think about.

She wanted Jack there to comfort her so badly.

She didn’t feel well rejecting Lance like that. She never wanted to hurt his feelings, but she couldn’t think of a way to escape from that without telling him the truth.

And now she could never learn how to love him the way he wanted to.

It wouldn’t be fair with him.

***

The next days passed really slowly for Violet.

She was anxious just thinking about how she would enter Arden’s office on Saturday during the party.

She wandered around the palace trying to occupy herself for the time being, but there was nothing that she wanted to do.

And something really surprised her. She didn’t remember the members from the Diamond Pack that lived inside the palace being so cold to her.

Of course they were polite, after all, she was the daughter of the Alpha, but they weren’t warm people.

Each one of them kind of minded their own business. It was different from the Rebels’ members.

At Jack’s mansion, they were always caring for each other, helping each other and doing things together.

Gwen wasn’t around most of the time, so Violet was alone during the whole day.

She only met Gwen at dinner, when the whole family gathered to eat.

“I already prepared everything for the party. It is going to be amazing.” Gwen said while serving herself with some mashed potatoes.

“That must be a really hard work for you, right?” Lance mocked her with a smirk.

“Yeah, well, each people has their own talent. Mine is obviously organizing events. I’m actually pretty good.” Gwen answered with her head up.

She hated to be criticized, but always tried to sound polite when she answered the teasings, especially from Lance.

“That is true.” Arden said, agreeing with his daughter.

Violet just nodded, not really in the mood to participate in that conversation.

Gwen was indeed really talented when it came to parties and events on the pack. She was always in charge of organizing everything, from guests to decoration.

“By the way, dad, I bumped with Mr. Anderson this morning, and he said he was really excited to see you on Saturday. He wanted to show you some ideas he had for tax collection.”

Arden seemed very delighted.

“Great! I will take him to my office once everyone is entertained in the party. No one will notice I’m absent for a few minutes.”

Violet almost dropped her fork on the table.

Shit.

How was she going to get into Arden’s office now?