Chapter 2

The maid nodded and immediately headed upstairs.

I stood where I was, making no attempt to stop her. There was nothing in my room anyway.

I had left the orphanage empty-handed, and after bringing me home, my family had completely forgotten to furnish my room.

Mia, however, looked uneasy.

"Dad, Layla just came home. We should respect her!"

She looked at me, tears streaming down her face.

"Layla, as long as you promise not to sneak those scary notes into my room in the middle of the night, I'll pretend none of this ever happened.

"Or… I can just move out."

Mom immediately took her hand.

"Silly pup, what are you talking about? The werewolf who hurt you is the one who should leave!!"

"She needs to be respected?" Noah snorted from the side. "Mia, don't make me laugh. She grew up in an orphanage. Does she even know what respect is?"

I froze, staring at them as they defended the werewolf who wasn't related to them by blood, as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

Ten minutes later, the maid came back downstairs. She was holding a red ink pen in her hand, her expression grim.

"Alpha," she said, placing the pen on the table. "We found this in Ms. Layla's wardrobe. Traces of her pheromones are still lingering on it."

A deathly silence fell over the living room.

The next second, Noah snatched up the pen and stormed toward me.

"A red ink pen reeking of your pheromones? What else do you have to say, Layla?"

I stared at the pen, utterly bewildered.

It was long and slender, and I had never seen anything like it before. I didn't even know what it was used for.

"I've never seen this before."

I shrugged, looking completely innocent.

"You're still denying it!" Noah roared.

In a fit of rage, he hurled the pen to the floor and barked, "I brought this custom-made pen back as a gift for Mia's awakening when I was traveling through other packs.

"Mia said she'd treasure it for the rest of her life and kept it locked away in her bookshelf. So why did it suddenly turn up in your wardrobe?"

"You actually stole Mia's things?" Mom gasped, covering her mouth.

Her whole body trembled with rage as she pointed at me and shrieked, "I can't believe you learned to steal at the orphanage! That's the kind of thing filthy rogues do!

"You're nothing but a disgrace to our pack. You're an embarrassment!!"

"Layla…" Mia said, her voice full of hurt. "If you wanted this pen, you could've just asked me.

"Even though I would've been reluctant to part with it, I would've given it to you if you'd asked.

"Why did you have to steal it?"

Their condescending expressions dragged me back to a painful memory from when I was ten.

It was the middle of winter, and heavy snow blanketed the orphanage. I had been playing in the yard when I spotted an abandoned crayon half-buried in the snow.

I was ten years old, but it was the first time I'd ever seen something that could produce such beautiful colors simply by drawing with it.

But an older werewolf from the orphanage had his eye on the crayon too.

He kicked me into the snow and stomped on my right hand. The crayon shattered beneath his boot, along with the bones in my fingers.

"You think you deserve something nice like this?" he snarled as he crushed my fingers beneath his boot.

I rolled across the ground, screaming in pain, but he wasn't punished at all.

To make matters worse, no one treated my broken fingers because the orphanage was too poor to hire a healer. In the end, the bones healed on their own, but my fingers were left crooked and deformed.

From then on, I never touched anything that even vaguely resembled a crayon. The sight of one brought back the excruciating pain of having my bones crushed—and the feeling of utter despair.

"I didn't steal it," I said, hiding my deformed fingers behind my back. "And I've never seen this thing before."

A deafening crash rang through the room as Dad smashed the table to pieces. He rose to his feet and looked at me with undisguised contempt.

"All the evidence is right in front of us, and you're still denying it. Our family and pack will never tolerate a liar and a thief!"

He turned to the maid.

"Go find the chief warrior. Tell him that we've caught a thief in our house who has been threatening us.

"Have the warriors take her away and put her through the Trial Ceremony. Let them decide whether she should be expelled from the pack. "