Chloe’s POV

“She is seventeen!” Mum yelled at David.

“And that was the Alpha she was refusing so boldly,” he countered, pinching the bridge of his nose.

The consequences of my two-day-old refusal were instant and brutal.

Alpha Paulo removed every Omega servant from our household and beefed up pack patrols alongside border security.

It was his typical management tactic, left David’s Beta rank intact, yet sent us a tangible warning through daily life to hammer home that our standing and standard of living were entirely granted by the pack’s Alpha.

David shot me a look full of rage.

I shrugged in reply to him. “I couldn’t accept Axel right there at the party. Everyone could tell Axel and I barely knew each other. Agreeing straight away would’ve been lying to the Alpha.”

He resented how I’d spoken to Alpha Paulo at the party two days prior and was convinced my attitude was the reason their household had lost all its staff, leaving him to handle every chore alone.

While my stepsister Hannah was the only one thrilled by the whole mess in this house. She stayed overjoyed the whole day, as if she would officially become the new Luna the very next day.

The front door slammed open, and Hannah trundled inside, loaded with shopping bags.

“We’re struggling to get by, and you still splurge on all this junk!” David snapped at her, nothing like his usual gentle self. Yet his eyes kept darting toward me. It was clear the scolding was meant for my ears, a cheap attempt to make me feel guilty.

I paid him no mind. I had to figure out fast how to break off my engagement with Axel within the next four days.

Re-entering my room as quietly as possible, I climbed out of the window, using the dark of night to escape into the forest.

The path to the lake was burned into my mind. Since the moment I discovered it when I was ten, it had became my thinking spot.

As my legs slipped into the water, a chill crawled over my body.

Unable to help it, my mind started to slowly revisit my past life, from the mistresses Jason kept and the abuse I endured.

I spent ten years wed to Jax, yet my marriage was nothing like the glamorous life everyone pictured.

The first two years of our marriage went smoothly. But after I miscarried our first child unexpectedly in the third year, Jax’s true nature slowly came to light.

He started fooling around with other women, hiding his affairs discreetly. Overwhelmed by shame, I never publicly accused my wolf mate of betrayal once I learned the truth. I covered for him instead.

“Ten years. Twelve different women,” I muttered, laughing at how foolish I was to still keep giving him chances to repent. As at the third one who I found in our master bedroom with him, I should have realized that he was too far gone.

To spare my mother worry, I only shared joyful stories about my life every time I visited home, burying all the ugly realities deep down inside me.

I supposed that was exactly why Hannah always believed I had a perfect marriage.

Every single time, my wolf would go through the heart wrenching pain of mourning the purity of the mate bond. Just when she would finally heal, he would do it again.

Until my wolf was reduced to a muted state and I was left unable to shift or use my wolf senses for years.

As my hands wrapped into fists, they cut on the rockery on the ground beside me but I did not care.

How had I sacrificed my wolf, the one being that would always be in my corner, on the altar of love?

A familiar presence stirred in my chest.

My hand flew above my heart. There was…she was here. I was sure of it.

Before I could celebrate for long, an intense pain swept through my body. I keeled over, nearly falling into the pool but caught myself at the last minute.

I curled up in the fetal position as the pain intensified.

What was happening to me? Was I shifting?

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