To ruin an Omega novel Chapter 3

Chapter 3: The Better Sister

FIA

The silence stretched like a taut wire ready to snap. Every face in the hall turned toward me, their expressions shifting from celebration to confusion to something darker. I stood there with my face exposed, the wedding veil crumpled in Cian’s hands, feeling like a deer caught in headlights.

"You are not my bride."

Those five words hit me like a physical blow. Cian’s voice carried across the entire hall, cold and sharp as a blade. His eyes, which had been warm moments before, now looked at me like I was something dirty he’d found on the bottom of his shoe.

Then the voices started.

"Wait, that’s Fia, isn’t it?"

"Where’s Hazel? What happened to Hazel?"

"Is this some kind of joke?"

"What the hell is going on here?"

The whispers grew louder, multiplying and spreading through the crowd like wildfire. I heard my name repeated over and over, each time sounding more accusatory than the last.

Cian stepped closer to me, his presence suddenly threatening instead of comforting. The mate bond I’d felt forming between us twisted into something painful, like a rope being pulled too tight.

"Again, I ask, what is this deception?" he demanded, loud enough for everyone to hear.

I opened my mouth but no words came out. My throat felt like sandpaper. What could I possibly say? That my sister ran away with my fated mate and left me to clean up the mess? That this whole thing was my stepmother’s idea? That I was trying to save our pack from destruction?

"Answer me!" Cian’s voice boomed through the hall. "Is this a declaration of war against my pack?"

War. The word hit me like ice water. I looked frantically around the open space and saw the Skollrend wolves rising from their seats, their faces dark with anger. Some had their hands on their weapons. This was exactly what I’d been trying to prevent, and somehow I’d made it worse.

"I... I can explain..." I stammered.

"You will explain." Cian’s eyes blazed with fury. "Where is my actual bride? Where is Hazel?"

Before I could answer, my stepmother pushed through the crowd. Isobel’s face was white as bone, her eyes wild with what looked like genuine shock and horror. She walked straight up to me and slapped me across the face so hard my ears rang.

The sound echoed through the silent hall like a gunshot.

"What the fuck, Fia?" she screamed. "What is going on? Where is your sister?"

I stared at her in complete bewilderment. My cheek burned from the slap, and my head spun from the force of it. This was the same woman who had dressed me in this gown. The same woman who had told me to save our pack.

"Mother, what is going on?" I said, my voice barely a whisper.

She slapped me again, even harder this time. Stars burst across my vision.

"You have always been like this but this is too far!" Isobel shrieked. Her voice carried a hysteria that made my blood run cold. "I will only ask this once. Where is Hazel?"

The world tilted on its axis. She was acting like she had no idea what was happening. Like she hadn’t been the one to come up with this plan in the first place.

"Mother, you’re scaring me," I said, my voice shaking. "Did Hazel not run away and this is why I had to..."

I couldn’t finish the sentence. The words died in my throat when I saw the look on her face. Pure, convincing confusion mixed with rage.

She raised her hand to slap me again, but suddenly Cian’s fingers wrapped around her wrist, stopping her mid-swing.

"You had no idea," he said slowly, his eyes fixed on Isobel’s face, "that the girl you walked here with was not your daughter Hazel?"

Isobel dropped to her knees like her strings had been cut. Tears streamed down her face as she looked up at Cian with desperate pleading eyes.

The hall erupted in angry voices. People were shouting, some calling for my blood, others demanding answers. The sound crashed over me like a wave, but I couldn’t focus on any individual words. Everything blurred together into a roar of accusation and rage.

My head spun like I was on a carousel going too fast. Nothing made sense anymore. I remembered Milo calling me and rejecting our mate bond. I remembered the letter in Hazel’s handwriting. I remembered Isobel putting the wedding dress on me and telling me to save the pack.

But looking at Hazel now, bruised and beaten, and hearing her story, I started to doubt everything I thought I knew.

Had I attacked her? Had I somehow blocked out doing something so horrible? The mate bond rejection had been agony. Maybe the pain had driven me temporarily insane. Maybe I’d done something I couldn’t remember.

"I would never..." I tried to speak, but the words came out weak and unconvincing even to my own ears.

"Look at her," Hazel said, pointing at me. "Look at the guilt on her face. She knows what she did."

Did I? I touched my own face, wondering what expression I was wearing. My hands were shaking so badly I could barely control them.

Cian stepped closer to me, and the mate bond between us pulsed with his anger and disgust.

"Is this true?" he asked, his voice low and dangerous. "Did you attack your own sister to steal her place at the altar?"

"I... I don’t..." My voice failed me completely.

The crowd pressed closer, their faces twisted with outrage. I saw my father pushing through the crowd, his face gray with horror and shame. When our eyes met, he looked at me like he’d never seen me before.

"Fia," he said, his voice breaking. "Please tell me this isn’t true." 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

But I couldn’t tell him anything. My mind felt like it was fracturing into pieces. Everything I thought I remembered was being rewritten before my eyes.

Hazel moved to stand beside Isobel, who wrapped protective arms around her injured daughter.

"She always resented me," Hazel said quietly, just loud enough for the crowd to hear. "She couldn’t stand that I was chosen to marry an Alpha while she was stuck with a sentinel."