Mated To The Crippled Alpha-Chapter 230: The Answer

We went upstairs together. The moment we reached the door, the doctor stepped out, face tight.

Jeffrey rushed forward. "How is she? Is the baby okay?"

The doctor’s expression softened with regret. "Mr. Hale... I’m sorry. We couldn’t save the baby. We need to perform a D&C on Ms. Morrigan now."

Jeffrey’s face went gray.

"No..." he whispered. "We couldn’t save it..."

I reached for him, even though comfort felt useless in moments like this. "Jeffrey... it’s okay."

But his voice cracked anyway. "It’s karma. This is the punishment for what we did to Oliver. If revenge is coming, let it come for me. Adam is innocent... and so was his grandson."

I still didn’t understand what the Hales had done to Oliver, or why Jeffrey kept saying those strange, guilty things like he was paying for a debt no one else could see.

But one thing was clear Camilla’s loss couldn’t be undone. There was no fixing it. No bargaining with it.

I walked into the operating room anyway.

Camilla lay on the table, limp and barely present. Her face was a sickly white, and cold sweat glazed her forehead like she’d been running from death and still couldn’t outrun it. She looked like she was holding on by a single thread, and even that thread was fraying.

The doctor spoke in a low, urgent tone. "Ma’am, she’s resistant to anesthesia. We can’t risk giving her more. The procedure has to be done without it."

My stomach tightened.

They had already tried so hard to save her. By the time the baby was gone, it felt like the fight had taken everything else from her too. She had lost Silas, and now she had lost her child. Grief was swallowing her whole.

When I stepped closer, her eyes dragged toward me. They were unfocused, glassy, like she was staring through a fog. For a second, I wondered if she even knew where she was.

Then her lips parted and her voice came out thin, terrified.

"You’re back..." she whispered, staring at me like I wasn’t Riley at all. "Is this your revenge?"

Before I could respond, her expression crumpled, and she grabbed at my sleeve with weak fingers.

"Please... give me Silas back," she begged. "And my baby don’t take him. He’s innocent. If you have to take someone, take me instead."

I opened my mouth to press her about what she knew, about what she’d been hiding, about Silas

But the doctor stepped in immediately. "Ma’am, we need to begin now. Please step outside."

I swallowed the questions and nodded. "Okay."

Then I turned and walked out.

I’d been here before. I knew how brutal that kind of pain could be, how it carved itself into you. My own child hadn’t even fully formed when I lost it.

Camilla’s baby had been real. Fully alive. With a heartbeat.

Outside the room, the smell of blood clung to me like it had found a place to live. I went to the terrace and let the cold air slap my face, hoping it would clear my head.

Daisy came out quietly with a cup of hot milk. "Ma’am, you should eat something. Please. You need strength."

"I’m fine," I said softly. "Go. I just need a moment."

She hesitated, then nodded and left me alone.

Not long after, Lewis appeared with a box of food. He set it down in front of me with the kind of calm he used when everything inside him was sharp.

"Eat something," he said.

I let out a breath. "Carl, I can’t. Not right now."

Silas’s death was sitting on my chest heavier than I expected. We’d gotten nothing useful from him not the truth, not the name, not the key we needed. And now he was gone. It felt like someone had slammed a door in my face and laughed on the other side.

Lewis’s voice cut through my thoughts. "We confirmed how Silas died."

My head snapped up. "Who poisoned him?"

He pushed the fish soup closer to me. "Eat, and I’ll tell you."

I stared at him, irritated despite myself. "Wow. What a cliffhanger."

But my body betrayed me. My hands moved on their own, and I ate fast, barely tasting it. When I finished, I set the container down and looked at him.

"Alright. I’ve eaten. Now talk."

Lewis drew in a slow breath. "No one slipped poison into his food. He hid it in his teeth. A capsule. All he had to do was bite down at the right moment, crack the outer layer, and it would leak out."

For a second, I just sat there, stunned. I’d seen tricks like that in movies, but hearing it said out loud like it was normal made my skin crawl.

"Then why didn’t he do it from the start?" I asked. "Why bite his tongue off first?"

Lewis’s eyes shifted toward the operating room. Even out here, I could still hear it faint, broken sounds through the walls. Camilla’s screams. The kind that came from deep inside a person, where pride and control couldn’t reach.

"She’s awake," I whispered, more to myself than to him.

Lewis nodded once. "Silas bit his tongue so we couldn’t get answers from him. He wanted to stay alive long enough to see Camilla one last time."

I remembered the look in Silas’s eyes before he did it. Not fear. Not regret.

Choice.

"He saw her last night," Lewis continued. "That was all he needed. After that, he was ready to die."

My jaw tightened. Anger rose like heat.

"He got out easy," I muttered.

Lewis reached for my hand, his fingers closing around mine, steady and warm. "Don’t waste your rage on him. He wasn’t the one behind everything. The real person is still out there."

His gaze sharpened, cold in a way that promised violence.

"And when we catch them," he said quietly, "they won’t get to escape. Alive or dead. Okay?"

I squeezed his hand back, but my chest still felt tight. "Carl... these people are careful. They don’t leave evidence. If we wait too long, the Morrigans and the Hales will keep dancing to their tune."

"I know," he said. "That’s why we act now. Even if it warns them."

I frowned. "Act how?"

"There was a dispute at the garage," he replied. "The police are already on their way."

His grip tightened slightly, and his eyes turned hard and certain.

"Today," Lewis said, "we finally get answers."