CHAPTER 2

Clara pushes the door to their apart— his apartment open, heaving a sad sigh.

It's his house, not hers. A place where she lived for three years, but never felt like home. She thought she could finally feel that after today, but in the end, he failed her.

She was never meant to have a home in this house, she has been living in a fantasy, one she must now snap out of.

She slides off her wedding dress as she enters her room, her eyes red and puffy as she glares at it on the floor with a frown on her face.

She grabs a shirt from the wardrobe and the smell of Jace that hangs on it overwhelmingly comforts her, she sighs, sags her shoulders and stares at it for a moment before she presses it against her nose, inhaling his smell deeply and tears spill out of her eyes, her heart clenching in pain as she sobs into the shirt.

Why did he have to do this to her?

They belonged together, she gave him everything, her spirit, soul and body. If her feelings towards him before knowing she was his mate was a little girl’s silly crush, she fell in love with him in the past three years.

She swallows hard, trying to force herself not to cry anymore, she just has to let him go, but if he comes back and asks for her forgiveness, won’t she forgive him?

She doesn’t want to, they’ve been together for three years, yet he chose another woman over her, so easily.

What could be more painful than that?

Even her wolf feels hurt, sad, silent and recoiled to a far corner in her mind.

Jace and Luci were the perfect couple. Everyone envied their love, including herself. But she ruined it. She ruined it when her wolf recognised him as their mate.

She honestly thought he would reject her for Luci because of how loving their relationship was, so when he did the opposite, her joy knew no bounds and her love for him grew in bounds.

If only she realised quickly that his heart was still with Luci.

She tosses the shirt aside, trudges over to the large Bluetooth speaker on the table like a zombie and plays the music loud enough to drown out the sound of her tears as she begins to pack her belongings.

She keeps staring at the clock and at the door as if expecting someone as she randomly stuffs things into her boxes, wiping her teary eyes at intervals, her heart heavy with a sadness that she cannot fathom.

She loves him so freaking much that deciding to leave him hurt more than what he did to her. Her heart feels like it wants to explode from the pain.

She tried her best to measure up to him, she came out on top during her Luna training in every category, studied day and night, trained endlessly to make sure she can be on par with him, to become a Luna worthy of the Alpha that Jace is, a Luna he can be proud of but none of it matters, not when he is still in love with Luci.

The signs started showing a few months after their relationship began but she foolishly ignored it and now she has paid the ultimate price for that foolishness.

When Jace skipped a dinner date with her to pick Luci from the airport upon Luci’s return, it became clear to her but he had already proposed, she was going to be his wife, nothing else mattered, she thought.

How naive of her.

After a while, she stops and stares at her open boxes. Her hands are either packing slower than her brain thinks or she is unconsciously stalling in hope that Jace walks in on her.

She wants an explanation.

She knows deep in her heart that she wants to see his sexy amber eyes and that she really wants to pour out her heart and pain to him.

Would he apologise? Would he tell her that it was just a pack issue? Would he laugh at her silliness and tell her that he loves her and only her?

She crouches to zip one of her boxes close when her phone rings on the bed and she leaps for it, instantly her heart racing, thinking it’s Jace but she frowns when she sees it’s an image text from an unknown number.

She reluctantly clicks on the thumbnail to open the text and her heart sinks when she sees what it is, her hands vibrate with a tremor and her heart beats with a brutal pang as she stares at the picture.

It is Luci hugging Jace, his back turned to the camera, a cheeky smile on Luci’s face but it is the caption Luci added that burns Clara the most.

[See how easy it is to take him from you? Just one text and he comes rushing to me on your freaking WEDDING day.]