To ruin an Omega novel Chapter 427

Chapter 427: Athena’s curse

PAULINE

I sat on the cold stone floor, my body curled tight around itself, the dampness seeping through my dress and into my bones.

Time felt meaningless down here. There was no light except the thin shaft filtering through the barred window high above, no sound except my own ragged breathing and the occasional drip of water somewhere in the darkness.

I was the third daughter of a nothing pack.

The thought came unbidden, sharp and bitter. My father had ruled a territory so small you could walk its borders in an afternoon. Three daughters, no sons, and a dwindling influence that hemorrhaged away with each passing year.

My eldest sister had been beautiful in that delicate, porcelain way men claimed to prefer. Soft-spoken. Gentle. Everything a Luna was supposed to be.

She never stood a chance at the ball, where eligible wolves gathered like vultures circling fresh meat.

My second sister had been clever, sharp-tongued, and quick-witted, armed with enough political savvy to make our father proud.

Marcus had barely looked at her.

But me?

I had been a freak in the sheets and a master strategist in every other room. I studied him the way generals studied battlefields, learned every weakness, every desire, every vulnerability he tried to hide beneath that carefully constructed facade of control.

I made myself indispensable.

The night I seduced him, I wore red. Not the soft blush of innocence but the deep crimson of blood and power. I whispered things in his ear that made him forget himself, made him crave me in ways that had nothing to do with love and everything to do with obsession.

When he chose me over both my sisters, I thought I had won.

I thought I had proved my worth in every way that mattered. That my cunning and my willingness to do whatever it took had secured my future in a way beauty and breeding never could.

I had been so far from the fucking truth.

The laugh that bubbled up from my chest was hollow and bitter.

All those years of fighting. Of scheming. Of breaking myself into the perfect shape to fit the hole he needed filled. And for what?

How you get them is how you lose them.

My mother had whispered that once, back when I was still young enough to think love mattered more than strategy. I had ignored her, dismissed it as the bitter ramblings of a woman whose own marriage had crumbled under the weight of disappointed expectations.

But she had been right.

If I could seduce Marcus away from better options through sheer force of will and sexual prowess, what made me think another woman could not do the same to me?

Athena had not even tried.

That was the worst part. She had simply existed, all wide eyes and genuine smiles and that nauseating purity that made grown men stupid.

And Marcus had looked at her the way he never looked at me.

I had resisted it. Fought against the inevitable with everything I had. Bent the rules until they snapped. Destroyed her before she could destroy me.

But maybe it had always been going to happen regardless.

Maybe this ending had been written the moment I clawed my way into a position I had no right to hold, secured through manipulation instead of genuine connection.

I wondered if today was the day it all finally caught up with me.

The sound of footsteps on the stairs jerked me from my spiraling thoughts.

Heavy boots. Multiple sets.

The sentinels.

My heart hammered against my ribs. I scrambled backward until my spine hit the wall, my hands scrabbling uselessly against the damp stone.

The cell door swung open.

"No." The word came out small and pathetic. "No, I am not going."

"Alpha’s orders," one of them said, his voice flat and professional. "Come quietly or we drag you."

I shook my head, pressing harder against the wall as though I could somehow meld with the stone and disappear.

They moved forward.

I kicked out, my foot connecting with something solid. That grunt of pain was quickly followed by hands closing around my arms with brutal efficiency.

"Let me go!"

I thrashed against their grip, nails raking across fabric, teeth bared like a feral thing.

"Alpha Dimitri said to do what it takes if she resists," one of them muttered.

The slap came fast and hard, snapping my head to the side.

Pain exploded across my already bruised cheek. The fight drained out of me in an instant, leaving only hollow exhaustion in its wake.

They dragged me from the cell.

My feet scraped uselessly against the stone steps as they hauled me upward, back toward the world I had tried so desperately to control. The corridor stretched endlessly before us, familiar and terrible in equal measure.

When we reached the study, they pushed the door open without ceremony.

Marcus stood behind his desk, his expression carved from ice. But it was the woman beside him who made my blood run cold.

She was young. Beautiful. Fashion-forward in a way that spoke of no true wealth and influence, and her dress was cut in elegant lines that hugged her frame. But it was the gloves that caught my attention. Red. Vibrant, arterial red that seemed to glow against her pale skin.

A delicate.

"This is wrong," I said, my voice cracking. "Marcus, this is wrong. You cannot do this."

He did not look at me when he spoke.

"I cannot trust your words." His jaw worked. "But this. This, I can trust."

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