Ava POV:
The Pack House was suffocating. Every corner held a memory I wanted to incinerate.
I moved through the Alpha's suite- our suite, or so I had thought-with a trash bag in hand. I wasn't just cleaning; I was purging.
Harrison's shirts, the ones I used to wear when he was away on business? Trash. The necklace he gave me for my birthday, a cheap silver thing while he bought Brooke diamonds? Trash.
I reached the bedside table. There sat a framed photo of us from five years ago. We were smiling. I looked so young, so hopeful. So stupid.
I didn't put it in the bag. I threw it against the wall.
Crash.
The glass shattered, shards skittering across the hardwood floor.
"What do you think you are doing?"
The growl vibrated through the floorboards. Harrison stood in the doorway, his chest heaving. He had just returned from a run; he was shirtless, sweat glistening on his skin, smelling of ozone and pine.
Usually, that scent made my knees weak. Today, it made me nauseous.
"I'm redecorating," I said coldly, picking up another frame.
"Put that down," he ordered.
"No."
Harrison moved faster than a human eye could follow. He was across the room in a blur, gripping my wrist. His fingers dug into my skin, bruising instantly.
"I am your Alpha, Ava! You do not disobey me!"
"You forfeited that right when you left me to die!" I screamed back, wrenching my arm. I couldn't break his grip. He was too strong.
His eyes flashed amber. The Wolf was near the surface. To an Alpha, defiance from a mate-especially an Omega-triggered a primal, aggressive need to dominate.
"You need to learn your place," he snarled.
He shoved me backward. I stumbled, my legs hitting the edge of the bed, and I fell onto the mattress.
Before I could scramble away, he was on top of me. His weight was crushing. He wasn't hitting me, but he was pinning me, using his mass to force me into submission.
Submit, his wolf projected into my mind. A heavy, dark command.
"Get off me!" I gasped.
"You are mine, Ava. Unmarked or not, you belong to me. You exist because I allow it."
He grabbed a coil of rope from the bedside drawer-something he used for 'play'-but I saw the glint of metal woven into the fibers. Silver wire.
"Harrison, no! That has silver!" I panicked.
He didn't care. He grabbed my wrists and bound them to the headboard. The moment the wire touched my skin, smoke rose. The burning smell of my own flesh filled the room.
"Stop! It burns!" I screamed, tears leaking from my eyes.
"Pain brings clarity," he whispered, leaning down. He buried his face in my neck, inhaling deeply. "You smell like rebellion. I hate it."
He kissed my neck, rough and biting. It wasn't affection; it was a territorial claim. He was trying to mark me with his scent, to cover up the smell of my fear.
My wolf, usually dormant, snarled from the depths of her cage.
Fight him.
As he moved his hand down my shirt, trying to claim what he thought was his property, I lunged upward.
I sank my teeth into his lower lip. Hard.
I tasted copper. Blood.
Harrison roared and jerked back. He touched his mouth, his fingers coming away bloody. To be bitten by an Omega was the ultimate insult.
He raised his hand, his claws extending. For a second, I thought he was going to rip my throat out.
Ring. Ring. Ring.
His phone on the dresser buzzed.
The red haze in his eyes cleared instantly. He looked at the screen. Brooke.
"Brooke?" His voice shifted from a monster's growl to a gentle caress. "What's wrong?"
I lay there, my wrists searing in the silver binds, listening to him.
"A nightmare? I'm coming. Don't cry. I'll be right there."
He hung up. He looked at me, tied to the bed, bleeding from the silver burns, tears tracking through the dust on my face.
"Stay here," he said, wiping the blood from his lip. "Think about what you did."
He turned and walked out.
He left me. Again.
"Harrison!" I screamed, pulling at the ropes. The silver bit deeper, slicing into my wrists.
Silence was my only answer.
Hours passed. The sun went down. The room plunged into darkness. My wrists were raw, the poison pulsing up my arms, making my veins turn black.
I reached out through the bond, just to see. Just to know.
I felt him. He was calm. Happy. I felt the phantom sensation of soft sheets and the smell of vanilla.
He was in bed with her.
I stopped struggling. The physical pain was nothing compared to the hollow, rotting hole in my chest.
I lay in the dark, the smell of my own burnt flesh filling my nose, and I let the hate take root. It was a cold, hard thing. A weapon.
I will kill you, I promised the empty room. I will kill you both.
