CHAPTER 2

MALLORY:

"Let me go!" I screamed as my stepmother dragged me by my left wrist and led me outside my room door.

I was nàked, and yet she didn't care—she wanted to report me to my father.

"Leave me alone!" I bit her right hand hard, and she flinched and let go of me. I ran back into my bedroom to get dressed asap.

"Mallory! Mallory!" She banged on my room door, and I knew I would be reported.

It was already 1 a.m., and after I finished dressing, I looked at the door and went to pull it open. I had donned a red dress that came past my knee length.

However, as I pulled the door open, my father, Alpha Bruce Adonis stood there and smacked me across the face the moment I did.

"Mallory, what were you doing in your room? And why does this place smell like sex? Who was he?" Dad walked into my room, went up to my bedsheets, picked them up angrily, and sniffed them.

"Tell me, Mallory! Who did you mate with?" my father demanded. His eyes looked at me disappointingly.

"Dad, I wasn't mating with anyone," I lied, lowering my gaze as my father marched up to me and grabbed my left arm.

"Mallory, I already promised your mother that I would protect you, and yet you couldn't wait to find your real mate and foolishly slept with someone. Speak now! If I find out from the cameras who you slept with, you both will be banished!" my father threatened, his blue eyes narrowing at me.

I didn't want Ace Lennox to be banished. He was the pack's future Alpha since my father had no son. Ace was very skilled in combat and fought well. He had defeated some packs that wanted to destroy ours.

I looked away from my father's face, hesitating to tell him who I had had sex with.

"Speak now, or forever hold your peace!" my father threatened as he donned a black garment.

My stepsister Sonia came into my room, dressed in a white nightdress that shone because she always bought the best quality.

"Dad, Ace and I did it," I announced, and my father's eyes widened in shock before he looked at me angrily.

"You're lying about Ace. Why couldn't I detect his scent here? Has it gotten to the point where you have to lie about Ace Lennox?" my father yelled, glaring at me, and I lowered my head.

"Dad, Ace is the one who came here to meet me," I told him, and he yelled at me.

"Shut up! I'm going to ask you for the last time. Who did you mate with?" my father demanded, not wanting to believe me.

"It was Ace Lennox. He was here. He left through the window," I said, and my father went to the window and looked out.

"Ace can't fly from this window. You don't want to tell me who the man you slept with was. As much as you have no scent, Ace has a pinewood scent, and you think I don't know what my pack members smell like—much less the future beta of my pack?" Dad said to me angrily, and Sonia cried.

"Mallory is lying, Father. Let us call Ace and ask him. She wants to force him to become her mate just because she sees us together," Sonia said, crying, and I looked at her with disbelief.

Even though she was taller than me and believed she would become the next Luna, I was her older sister.

"I'm not lying. Ace was here and he used me. Maybe he used a scent suppressant," I said, and my stepmother came into the room and smacked me hard across my left cheek.

"Shut up, Mallory! I can't continue to stand and watch you slander the pack's future Beta. Alpha Bruce, Mallory needs to be punished, so she can learn her lesson. Maybe it's because she knows Sonia is bound to become the future Luna and marry Ace. She wants to destroy their future together," my stepmother, Luna Lily, said as she looked at my father's face.

"Alpha, if you cannot punish Mallory, allow me to punish her. She's worthless and of no value to this pack," Luna Lily added as my father stood there silently.

"Take Mallory downstairs, and Sonia, call Ace. He needs to answer to Mallory's accusations before I decide on her punishment," my father said as he turned and walked away from the room angrily.

"Father, I'm not lying. Ace and I are true mates! You all have to believe me!" I cried as my stepmother ordered the guards to drag me out of my room. I was taken downstairs to the first floor.

I was forced to kneel down while my father waited for Ace's arrival.

A few minutes later, Ace came in, looking like he had just taken a bath. His brown hair was wet, and he wore a yellow shirt and black shorts. He was very tall, and he looked from me to my parents.

"Greetings, Alpha Bruce. You sent for me," Ace said, bowing before my father, who was standing by the Alpha's chair.

"Yes, Ace Lennox. I need you to tell me the truth before I decide on your punishment with my first daughter. You should know that lying to your alpha warrants banishment. I hope you're aware," my father said to Ace, looking at him angrily.

"Yes, Alpha. I'm aware," Ace replied with a bow of his head as he avoided looking at me. His parents rushed into the hall to find out what was happening.