From Betrayed Luna to Wolf Queen (Lillian) novel Chapter 2

Lillian's POV:

The air in the foyer grew thick, heavy with a tension that made every breath feel labored.

My eyes remained locked on Julian. I kicked the heavy wooden chair beside me, sending it skidding across the marble floor with a jarring crash. "Explain it to your mother," I said slowly, each word honed to a sharp, icy point. "What 'healing gift' do I supposedly have? Iris is asking for something I don't possess. Is that not painfully clear, or have you forgotten what your own mate is even capable of?"

I had just lost my child. My nerves were raw, and in that moment, I was a live wire—anyone who touched me would get burned.

Eleanor looked like she was about to explode. "You... you insolent little—"

"You can't do it, ok, fine!" Julian barked, cutting off his mother's tirade. His voice was tight with frustration. "Send one of the pack healers! Must you turn everything into a scene over such a small thing?"

A small thing. That dismissive, nothing-ever-matters tone again. A final, frozen calm settled over my heart.

Eleanor found her voice, laced with venom. "What curse has befallen this pack? To have a Luna who can't carry her own pup to term, and now, when another woman brings new life into the family, she's the one making a spectacle—"

"That's enough!" Julian's voice was a low growl, a clear Alpha warning.

"You coddle her too much!" Eleanor snapped back, then turned on her heel with a furious swish of her coat.

"You've had it wrong all along, Mrs. Graves," I said, my voice cutting through her dramatic exit. The formal title felt like a weapon. "It's not that I can't have children. It's that the child I was carrying two years ago was lost when Iris ran me down with her car. So don't dress your malice up as 'infertility' and pin that label on me."

I refused to wear the shameful tag she'd tried to stick on me for two years.

Hearing me address her so coldly, Eleanor knew what I meant—I intended to draw a line with these hypocritical ones in this house. She looked as if she might actually faint from rage. "How dare you speak to me that way! This is beyond disrespectful!"

She wheeled on Julian, her fury redirected. "And this is the creature you made your Luna? Get her in line!" With a final, shrill command, she stormed out into the night.

Julian's eyes held a tempest of displeasure, all of it aimed at me. But he said nothing. He simply turned and followed his mother out, his destination undoubtedly the hospital.

Watching him walk away, the bitterness tasted particularly sharp. Even now, after everything, his footsteps still led away from me.

Was it out of some twisted sense of duty to his dead brother? Or was it something else—something he wanted to do?

Helen approached cautiously from the hallway, seeming to sense the raw pain radiating from me. "Lillian, you really don't look well. Should I call for the pack physician?"

Even the housekeeper could see I was unwell. But Julian?

"No. Just attend to your duties," I said, waving a dismissive hand.

Helen hesitated, conflict in her eyes, but finally gave a small nod and retreated.

Alone again, the silence was broken by the buzz of my phone. Chloe Bennett, my best friend.

"Chloe," I answered, some of the brittle anger leaching from my voice.

"Lillian, I've been calling all afternoon! Where were you? Have you heard? Iris had twins. A boy and a girl. The entire werewolf social scene in the city is buzzing."

"I know. Julian was with her."

"You knew? And you just... let him go? What is he, her personal doula? The Graves Pack has dozens of ranked members! Did it have to be Julian holding his brother's mate's hand through delivery?" Chloe's anger on my behalf was a hot, comforting thing.

My laugh was thin and cold. "What choice did I have? Julian's face, identical to Ethan's, is a 'comfort to her grieving heart'." I threw the family's favorite excuse back at her.

For six months—since Ethan's death—the main estate had used that line every single time to pull Julian away from me, no matter how I protested.

The second Iris flew off the rails, the manor was on the phone to Julian, no delay, no exception.

Chloe snorted in disgust. "Those people need their heads examined." Iris couldn't accept Ethan was gone, so they kept parading his living mirror in front of her.

Julian had his own mate. Using him to emotionally prop up another woman? His brother's widow, no less? It made no sense.

"I lost the baby this afternoon," I stated flatly. "You couldn't reach me because I was on the operating table."

Silence. Then a sharp, heartfelt curse. "You miscarried... and he knows?

"Is he out of his mind? His own mate needs his energy during something like that, and he's off playing nursemaid?"

"Come get me," I said, exhaustion seeping into my very bones. "I can't breathe in this house." Every corner, every scent, even the air itself, felt toxic.

After hanging up, I went upstairs and packed my personal belongings as quickly as my weakened body allowed. I also gathered every gift I had ever given Julian, and every trivial token he had ever given me.

When Iris shoved me today, I knew it was intentional.

Chloe's voice was tight. "Back then, I didn't connect the dots. But seeing how she's clung to Julian these past six months... it makes me wonder if she hit you on purpose back then."

The words on purpose wrapped around me like a deeper chill. Two years ago... and today...

"She pushed me today, too," I said, the memory cold and clear.

That dismissive, patronizing look Julian had given me flashed through my mind—as he carried Iris away, flashed before my eyes again. Fury, hot and bright, reignited in my chest.

Chloe's knuckles whitened on the steering wheel. "So three years ago... that was no accident either. She was eyeing her mate's twin brother while her own mate was still breathing? That's sick."

Sick. Yes. Her relentless, possessive behavior these past months proved it.

"So what's your move?" Chloe asked, her voice gentler now. "Are you just going to walk away and let it go?"

Let it go? I stared out at the sheets of rain, the world beyond the window blurred and indistinct. I was not the letting-go type. "I'm going to sever the mate bond with Julian. And then..." I let the sentence hang.

"And then what?" she pressed, glancing at me.

I pulled my gaze from the storm. "Margaret... Her business exporting raw gemstones has been incredibly successful all these years, hasn't it?"

Margaret Hayes. Iris' mother. The Alpha of the Hayes Pack. A formidable she-wolf who moved effortlessly in both the legitimate and shadowed circles of werewolf society.

Chloe frowned. "Yeah. That woman is a force of nature. Her claws are in deep, and her network is extensive. She's not someone you cross lightly."

"What if her gemstone business... collapsed?" The question was barely a whisper.

Chloe drew in a sharp breath. "Collapsed? That would ruin her. It's the foundation of everything she has. But, listen to me, sweetie. I love you, but I don't have that kind of reach. Neither of us can touch the Hayes Pack's Alpha."

I didn't reply. I knew the depth of Margaret's power and connections. She was an institution, not a foe to be taken down on a whim.

Seeing my silence, Chloe reached over and squeezed my cold hand. "Don't do anything reckless."

Then, unbidden, the image of the man who had sought me out a month ago surfaced in my mind—a Draenei.