one

"I'm pregnant, Cecelia. And it's your husband's baby."

I looked up at her stunned. The crystal wine glass slipped from my fingers, shattering against the marble floor of the pack house dining room. Red wine spread on the floor, soaking my shoes and hers.

"What did you just say?" My voice shook. I was not understanding. How? Why?

Layla, my beautiful, perfect sister, stood across from me, the definition of everything that I thought I was not. She was graceful, could get anything she wanted, men worshipped the ground that she walked on. Why my husband? Even as she delivered the news that rocked my world, she looked like a goddess. Her hand rested protectively over her still-flat stomach, and tears glistened in her blue eyes.

"I'm so sorry, Cecelia. I never meant for this to happen."

"You're lying." I gripped the edge of the dining table until my knuckles went white. "Zeke wouldn't... he wouldn't do that to me."

"Wouldn't he?" Layla's voice was soft and full of pity. "Be honest with yourself, sister. Has he ever truly been yours?"

The mate mark on my neck ignited at her words and my hands flew to the pain point in an attempt to soothe it. I struggled to stand up, as I glared at her with all the hate in me.

She always had everything. Why couldn’t she let this one thing I was happy with be? She just had to ruin it. Six months ago, Alpha Zeke Brooke had shocked everyone by choosing me, the plain, adopted Cecelia over my stunning sister for the peace treaty marriage. At first, I did not like Zeke. I felt too bare in his gorgeous world. But he made me feel loved, and perfect. Six months since I'd foolishly started believing in fairy tales.

"He chose me," I said, hating how desperate I sounded. "At the betrothal ceremony, he chose me over you."

"Did he?" Layla walked over to me with graceful steps. "Or did he choose the path that would let him have us both?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Think about it, Cecelia. If he'd married me, you would have left the territory. Gone to find your own pack, your own life. But by marrying you..." She paused, letting the implication hang in the air. "By marrying you, he ensured I'd stay close. Family always stays close."

My legs gave out, and I collapsed into the nearest chair. "No. No, you're wrong. Zeke and I... we've been happy. He's been kind to me, gentle—"

"Kind?" Layla laughed, but there was no humor in it. "Cecelia, when was the last time he told you he loved you?"

The question hit me like an arrow to my chest. My world spun as I considered it. Six months of marriage, and those three words had never passed his lips. Not once.

"When was the last time he looked at you the way a mate should look at his chosen?" she continued relentlessly. "When was the last time he came to your bed without you having to initiate it?"

"Stop." Tears burned my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. "Just stop talking."

"I can't stop, because I can't keep lying to you anymore." Layla sank into the chair across from me, reaching across the table to take my hands. I yanked them away. "Cecelia, he's been meeting with me in secret since the week after your mating ceremony. At first, it was just to apologize, to explain why he'd chosen you. But then..."

"But then what?"

"Then we remembered why we fell in love in the first place."

My eyes burned, my hands shook with rage. "You were enemies. After the war, after Father's betrayal, you hated each other."

"We were never enemies." Layla's voice dropped to a whisper. "We were heartbroken children forced apart by our fathers' pride. The hate was easier than admitting we still loved each other."

I stood up so fast my chair toppled backward. "Get out."

"Cecelia—"

"I said get out!"

"Listen to me!" Layla shot to her feet as well, her own temper flaring. "Do you think this is easy for me? Do you think I wanted to fall pregnant with a married man's child?"

"You should have thought about that before you spread your legs for my husband!"

The slap came so fast I didn't see it coming. My cheek stung, but the physical pain was nothing compared to the agony tearing through my chest.

Layla's hand flew to her mouth in horror. "Oh goddess, Cecelia, I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"

"Yes, you did." I touched my burning cheek, tasting blood where my teeth had cut my lip. "You've always meant it, haven't you? Every cruel word, every moment you made me feel small and worthless. You've always resented that Father chose to adopt me instead of giving you a brother."

"That's not true—"

"Isn't it?" I laughed bitterly. "Tell me, Layla, wasn’t sleeping with Zeke always part of your plan? Ever since we got married, you have not been happy. You always wanted to destroy it.’

"It wasn't like that!" Tears streamed down her perfect face now. "I came here to make peace with you, to try to be the sister I should have been. But when I saw Zeke again..."

"The mate bond you thought you had came flooding back?"

"Yes," she whispered.

"Well, here's something you might have forgotten in your reunion," I snarled, letting every ounce of hurt and rage filter Into my voice. "Zeke and I are actually mated. He marked me. We completed the bond in front of the Moon Goddess herself."

"Cecelia—"

"Which means that whatever you think you have with him, whatever pretty lies he's been whispering in your ear, you're nothing but his whore."

This time, I was ready for the slap. I caught her wrist before her hand could connect, my adoptive father's Alpha blood lending me strength I rarely used.

"Don't," I warned, my wolf rising to the surface. "Don't you dare hit me again."

Layla tried to wrench her arm free, but I held tight. For the first time in our lives, I was the one with power over her.

"Let me go," she hissed.

"Not until you tell me the truth. All of it."

"I already told you—"

"No, you told me what happened. I want to know why. Why now, Layla? Why come here and confess? What do you want from me?"

She stopped struggling, her blue eyes meeting mine with an expression I couldn't read. "Zeke asked me to tell you."

The words hit me like ice water. "What?"

"He said... he said it wasn't fair to keep lying to you. That you deserved to know the truth about who he really loves."

I released her wrist so suddenly she stumbled backward. "He wants a divorce." The words scratched my throat.

"He wants you to choose," she corrected quietly. "He won't break the mate bond against your will, but if you release him..."

"He'll marry you instead."

"Yes."

I turned away from her, walking to the massive windows that overlooked the pack's territory. In the distance, I could see the sea cliffs where I'd spent so many hours dreaming of a future that would never come.

"And the baby?"

"He wants to claim it officially. He wants the baby to be his heir."

His heir. The child I'd never been able to give him, despite six months of trying.

"Get out, Layla."

"Cecelia, please—"

"Get out before I do something we'll both regret."

I heard her footsteps on the marble, then the soft click of the door closing. Only then did I let myself break down, sliding down the window until I was sitting on the floor, sobbing like my heart was being torn from my chest.

Because it was.