Stella’s POV
The night was ripe with secrets. I could smell it before I even stepped into his office.
My wolf stirred inside me, restless beneath my skin, as if she already sensed what my human heart was too naive to see. Tonight was supposed to be perfect, our sixth anniversary.
A night of surprises, of love, of renewal. I had gone to Alpha Travis Wolfe’s office, my mate and the leader of the Wolfe Pack, clutching two gifts,symbols of the life we were supposed to have built together.
In one hand, I carried a black velvet box. Inside was the key to a Lamborghini Revuelto, a car Travis had been obsessing over for months. It had taken every connection, every string I could pull within the pack to get it for him. But I had done it, because he was my mate, my husband, my world.
On the other hand was something far more precious. A pregnancy test with two faint pink lines. Proof of new life growing inside me. A promise. A second chance at joy after so much grief.
My lips curved into a wide smile as I pushed open his office door without knocking, eager to see the look on his face when I handed him both gifts.
I almost wished I hadn’t.
Because what I walked into changed everything.
Alpha Travis wasn’t alone.
Lorie Hale, my best friend, sat perched on his desk like she owned it, her blouse gaping open, her lips bruised and swollen. She moaned softly as his mouth devoured hers, his hands gripping her thighs possessively. His tie hung loose around his neck, the scent of lust thick in the air.
My wolf growled low in my chest, its claws pressing against my skin from the inside. My best friend. My mate. Together.
For a long, agonizing moment, I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. The keys dug into my palm, the test trembled in my fingers, but I was frozen, staring at the scene before me like it was some twisted nightmare.
Because it couldn’t be true.
Lorie, who had been with me in the delivery room when my daughter Joan was born. Lorie, who had sworn to be Joan’s godmother. Lorie, who held me when I cried after the endless nights of waiting for a miracle.
And now she sat there moaning beneath my husband’s touch.
The betrayal was a blade shoved straight into my chest. My breath hitched, my vision blurred with hot tears, and my wolf howled in anguish within me.
I wanted to scream, to shift, to rip Lorie away from him and tear her throat out. But my body was frozen in place, rooted to the doorway.
Then his phone rang.
Alpha Travis groaned in irritation and pulled away from Lorie’s lips. His hand, however, never left her thigh as he snatched up the phone.
“What the hell do you want now?” he snarled, his voice sharp and laced with menace. “I paid you to keep quiet. Don’t test me.”
Lorie pouted, her hand sliding over his chest, possessive and smug.
“I already gave you a huge amount for the transplant,” Alpha Travis hissed into the phone. “You know how much I’ve spent to make this disappear.”
The word froze my blood. Transplant.
My wolf went eerily still. My ears rang as I forced myself to listen, every instinct sharpening to predator’s focus.
I couldn’t hear the reply from the other end, but Travis’s voice cracked through the room, vicious and cold. “I already gave you the money so that you would give the heart to Lorie, not Joan. Joan is dead now, so why are you trying to threaten me?”
My knees buckled. The floor seemed to tilt beneath me.
My daughter’s heart… given to Lorie?
No. No, that wasn’t possible. My mind clawed against the thought, but Travis’s next words gutted me.
“Do not call me again, Doctor,” he spat. “If this leaks, I’ll ruin you.”
When he ended the call, Lorie smiled sweetly, brushing her fingers over his chest as if what I had just heard wasn’t enough to rip me in half.
“I still can’t believe you did all that for me,” she whispered. “You really gave me her heart.”
Alpha Travis kissed her wrist, his eyes filled with devotion that had never been mine. “I told you, Lorie. I’d do anything for you. Stella was too stupid to even notice. She signed the transplant papers herself. I told her it was a merger contract, and she didn’t even read it.”
A strangled gasp escaped me, muffled by Lorie’s soft giggle.
Two months ago, the call had come, a perfect heart for Joan, after three long years on the list. I had dropped to my knees, sobbing with joy, because finally, finally, my baby girl was going to live.
Two days later, Joan was dead. Travis had told me there were complications, and I had believed him.
But now I know.
He killed our daughter. He killed her for Lorie Hale.
The wolf inside me thrashed, her fury burning hotter than fire. The mate bond that had once bound us snapped and frayed in my chest, leaving only agony in its wake.
Lorie, my best friend, my daughter’s godmother, had let me cry on her shoulder while Joan’s heart beat inside her chest.
Bile rose in my throat. My hands trembled violently around the gifts I had brought. One symbolizes Travis’s greed, the other our lost innocence. Both are now meaningless.
I should have stormed into that room and torn them apart with fang and claw. But the shock anchored me to the spot, a silent witness to the depth of their betrayal.
I stood there in the doorway, clutching the pregnancy test so tightly my knuckles burned white, the plastic biting into my palm. Neither Alpha Travis nor Lorie even looked at me. They didn’t know I was there. They didn’t see the storm breaking in my chest, the fire tearing through my veins. Their laughter, their whispers, their touch, it was all for each other. Not for me. Not for the mate who carried his child. I pressed the test harder into my hand, as if the pain could anchor me, as if it could stop me from shattering. But nothing could drown out the truth; they had already erased me.
And then it hit me, sharp and undeniable.
I wasn’t just Stella Wolfe anymore. I was the mother of a murdered child. A betrayed mate. And a wolf scorned.
And wolves don’t forgive.
They thought I was the woman too weak to see, too blind to strike back.
They were wrong. The fire in my chest was a wolf’s hunger, hot, patient, and inevitable.
They hadn’t just betrayed me. They had woken the animal inside me, and she would tear them both apart.
