Chapter 3

（Isabella‘s pov）

It took time to make it home. I shifted and let my wolf stretch her legs for most of it. The run was good for us.

Upon arriving home, I wasted no time looking for Jesse. I took my time getting back so that I could have the drugs completely out of my system. With a clear head I am now ready to confront him.

“Where is Alpha Jesse?” I ask our guards at the pack house entrance.

“Alpha Luna, Isabella,” they greet me with bowed heads. “He’s in your room, but you should know…”

I don’t let them finish that sentence. I say thank you and head to our room. When I open the door, the scene in front of me stabs at my eyes.

Layla’s things are piled everywhere, and Jesse is helping her move in.

I walk right up to Jesse and slap his face. “You think you have the right to move her into our room, after fucking drugging me at our sham of a wedding anniversary party? Take your whore and all your stuff, get out.”

Layla snickers from across the room, then slithers to Jesse and kisses him like I’m not even standing there. He moans into Layla’s mouth as his arms wrap around her holding her against his body. When she pulls away, she winks at me before lounging in the bed.

“You drugged me,” I say flatly, refusing to acknowledge Layla in the slightest. “Why are you still trying to hurt me?”

“Well, if you must know, it has all been to ensure that you get nothing out of our divorce,” he says with a grin and wink.

Jesse pulls an envelope out of the top drawer of his dresser and throws it at me.

I open it to find photos, of me…being intimate with a strange man. The man’s face was not visible, but by the look of the situation, the photos paint me as the cheater.

I close my eyes as the realization of what he has done hits me. I remember the sound of the camera shutter that night.

The whole thing was designed to frame me for cheating and to kick me out.

Jesse’s voice pulls me out of my thoughts. “The evidence is right in front of you. I’m afraid after the private investigator I hired showed me these, I had no choice but submit them to the Elder Council. I believe they will be making a ruling soon, according to the law.”

My entire property will belong to him, not only the pack house, but the pack I inherited from my parents…my pack. He’ll even have the power to cast me out and make me a rogue if he chooses to.

Tears spill out despite how tight my eyes closed.

“Yes, and it is your own fault, Isabella. Seeing you climb that man, offering him your body with your lips pressed to his broke my heart,” Jesse says with perfect delivery. Clearly, he has rehearsed this.

“I loved you,” my voice cracks at the last word. “How can you be so selfish and cruel? How can you be so…ruthless?”

He just shrugs his shoulders.

He didn’t deserve any of the love I gave him or the sacrifices and pain I endured for him.

“I’ll never let you take away what rightfully belongs to me, Jesse. The truth will come out, I promise you that.”

I turn to leave, wishing I had given the guards the opportunity to warn me what I was walking into.

I decide to return to my own pack house on the other side of our combined territory.

After we got married, I never came back to live here. I just moved in with Jesse. My room is pretty much the way I left it, but very dusty. I decide to clean up a little.

I thought the self-imposed distraction was working to keep my mind off things when out of nowhere, I collapse to the floor. The tears sting my eyes as they rush out in waves and run down my cheeks.

The image of Jesse and Layla together in our bed fills my mind’s eye in technicolor high definition with the sound on max volume. It hits me out of nowhere.

The pain in my chest feels as if a dagger has plunged into me, ripping through my heart on descent to my stomach with the entire length of the blade gutting me like a fish.

A knock at the door startles me. I inhale deeply, hold it and pull my shirt up quickly to wipe away the dust and tears from my face.

Ariana didn’t wait to hear permission to come in before throwing the door open. Upon seeing me on the floor, she rushes in and drops to her knees in front of me.

Ariana always reminded me of a pixie fairy. She’s petite, but athletic. Her skin is fair. She keeps her black hair cut just below her chin and wears it straight.

Her eyes are the same shade of green as the fields of grass in the forest in late Spring. Her personality also reminds me of Spring as she is the most cheerful person I have ever met.

We’ve been best friends since we were babies. We were always together growing up as her parents were my parents’ pack Betas and best friends.

“Oh sweetie, I came to check on you,” Ariana says cupping my face in her hands.

“Jesse has been cheating on me with Layla the whole time we’ve been mated and married,” I say. “And, they drugged me, framed me as the cheater.”

“Both packs know the truth, Isabella. You do know Layla was married to Santiago Morales and he divorced her the second he found out about her betrayal.”

Santiago is the Alpha of the largest pack in our region. I’ve never actually met him, but from what I understand, he is the Alpha of all Alphas.

“I should go pay him a visit,” I tell her. “He’s been burned by the same betrayal, maybe he will be willing to team up…if nothing else, to get revenge.”

Ariana smiles, “There’s my Alpha bestie. First things first though. For the love of the Moon Goddess, take a shower and doll up a bit before you head over to Santiagos’s territory. That man is gorgeous.”

I agree, since I have not had a shower or change of clothes in three days, I am not exactly presentable.

After Ariana leaves. I take a shower and get dressed. No make up, jeans, crop top, and sneakers. His territory isn’t that far. I can walk there but opt not to shift so I can be dressed when I arrive.

As I reach the border of Santiago’s pack territory, I pull my hair up into a messy bun so it is out of my face.

There are at least a dozen guards manning the border entrance. I ask one of them to report my presence to their Alpha.

“The Alpha only sees people who have an appointment,” the guard says firmly while staring out straight ahead and refusing to look at me directly.

I plead repeatedly, “This is a special circumstance. I must speak with your Alpha.”

I keep hoping they will help me and report my presence to their Alpha. But, each time, they refuse.

I decide to ask just one more time, “Please, your Alpha has been betrayed by his mate. I must speak to him, please?”

At that moment, a man appears from behind the stone gate. “What is all this nose about,” he asks.

The guards immediately line up and salute him with bowed heads, “Alpha!” they say in unison.

My eyes widen at the sight of him. Two heads taller than me, black wavy hair, icy blue eyes, tattoos down his neck that extend into a full sleeve, and the body of a Greek freaking god.

“You…you’re Alpha Santiago Morales,” I whisper.

“Glad to see you know who I am this time around, Alpha Isabella.”