Unmatched Wife: Not His To Claim Anymore novel Chapter 118

Chapter 118

Chapter 118

MIA

I sat in the coffee shop across from Theo’s school, nursing a latte that had gone cold twenty minutes ago, and watched the entrance with desperate focus.

He’d come. He had to come.

I’d seen the way his face had lit up when I showed him that photo of Bianca. The hunger in his eyes for connection to his dead mother. The need for something tangible, something real to hold onto.

He’d come for more pictures. For stories about Bianca. For the comfort of someone who’d known his mother and could share memories.

He had to.

Because if he didn’t, I was out of options.

The coven had given me three months to deliver Theo. Three months that were rapidly running out—I had maybe six weeks left, and I’d spent most of that time paralyzed by fear and indecision.

I’d tried everything I could think of to get close to him. Showing up at the pack house–blocked by guards Matthew had stationed after I moved out. Attempting to volunteer at his school–rejected due to “insufficient clearance.” Even trying to befriend other parents in the hopes of manufacturing a playdate–shut down when word spread about my role in Bianca’s death.

The pack had turned on me completely. The vandalism had escalated from spray paint to broken windows to threatening notes shoved under my door. Someone had slashed my tires three times in two weeks. The grocery store clerk had refused to serve me, claiming they had “the right to refuse service to homewreckers.”

I was a pariah. Isolated. Desperate.

And the coven’s deadline was approaching like an executioner’s blade.

So I’d taken a risk. A huge, potentially disastrous risk.

I’d shown up at Theo’s school during recess, claiming I needed to apologize to him, playing on the teacher’s sympathy and natural inclination to facilitate healing conversations.

It had almost worked.

Theo had been right there, within reach, looking at that photo with such desperate longing. I’d been so close to convincing him to come with me–just for a few minutes, just to see more pictures, just to talk somewhere private.

But then he’d pulled away. Said it felt wrong. And that teacher had started walking over with that suspicious look adults when they sensed something wasn’t right.

So I’d retreated. Planted the seed about the coffee shop. Given him the photo as bait.

And now I was waiting.

Any minute now, he’d appear. Would push through the school doors and cross the street, drawn by the promise of more memories of his mother.

Any minute.

I checked my phone: 2:47 PM. Recess had ended twenty minutes ago. School would let out in just over an hour

Maybe he couldn’t get away until then. Maybe he was planning to come after school, when he could move more freely

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Chapter 118

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I could wait. I had nothing but time.

My phone buzzed with a text from the blocked number I’d learned to dread:

*Time is running out. Have you made progress?*

I typed back with shaking hands: *Working on it. Very close.*

*Close isn’t good enough. We need the boy. Soon.*

*I understand. I’m handling it.*

*See that you do. The consequences of failure are not negotiable.*

I set down my phone before I threw it across the coffee shop.

The consequences of failure.

As if I needed reminding. As if I hadn’t spent every night for the past month imagining what those witches would do to me if I didn’t deliver Theo.

Dr. Hartwick’s body, twisted in death, his face frozen in agony.

That would be me if I failed. Or worse.

The coven didn’t make idle threats. They’d proven that when they’d tracked down Vera and left her for dead in a motel room. When they’d killed Dr. Hartwick for his role in the botched ritual.

They wanted Theo. Needed his bloodline–Bianca’s bloodline–for whatever dark purpose they’d been planning before Bianca’s supposed death had derailed their schemes.

And I was their only way to get him.

I pulled out my phone and scrolled through the photos I’d recovered from Matthew’s accounts. Pictures of Bianca and Theo. Evidence of the life they’d shared. The memories I was using as bait.

God, what had I become?

I’d started this wanting Matthew. Wanting the life Bianca had–the husband, the child, the pack position. I’d thought if I could just get Bianca out of the way, if I could take her place, everything would be perfect.

But nothing was perfect. Nothing had worked out the way I’d planned.

Bianca was dead, yes. But Matthew didn’t want me the way I’d thought he would. He looked at me with guilt and regret, not love. He’d sent me away, told me to get my own apartment, made it clear I was no longer welcome in his home or his life.

The pack hated me. Saw me as the woman who’d destroyed their beloved Luna. Blamed me for the fracturing happening in pack relationships.

And now I was sitting in a coffee shop planning to kidnap a four–year–old child to save myself from a coven of dark witches.

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