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POV: DYLAN VOLKOV

When I let go of Harper's chin in that cold room and walked toward the exit, I felt like I was ripping my heart out of my chest with my own hands.

The pain of having had to verbally reject Harper in front of the entire pack was a torture that almost made me lose my temper.

Lying to my own mate's face, humiliating her publicly to maintain a farce before my father, was like driving a silver dagger straight into my heart.

The Moon Goddess was playing the greatest and most twisted of her jokes on me.

"What the hell did you do?!" the roar of my wolf raged against the walls of my mind. "She is our mate! You treated her like she was fucking trash in front of everyone!"

"Shut up!" I answered internally, clenching my fists inside my jacket pockets as I walked down the hallway. "I had to break her heart to save her life. I had no other damn choice."

The truth burned my insides. I was tied to Vanessa by a damn agreement my father had signed years ago.

Vanessa's father controlled the largest army of warriors in the north; troops that our pack urgently needed to defend our borders.

If I accepted Harper as my mate, I would immediately break the clauses of the engagement, and my father would have never allowed that.

He would have blamed Harper, accusing her of treason, and would have banished or executed her just to not lose the alliance with Vanessa's father.

"We have the option to mark her right now, break the pact, and kill that damn bitch Vanessa!" my wolf replied, bloodthirsty and possessive.

I didn't have time to answer him. As soon as I crossed the threshold back into the main hall, Vanessa ran toward me with tearful eyes.

"Dylan, my love! That was horrible!" she shrieked, trying to hang onto my arm and raise her face to kiss me on the lips. "That starving stray wanted to ruin our night. Tell me you are going to punish her."

I brushed her away with a cutting coldness, removing her hands from my suit as if they were insects.

"Let go of me, Vanessa. I am not in the mood," I snapped in a husky voice.

The reality was that the mere scent of Vanessa made me nauseous.

In contrast, the scent of bitter hot chocolate that the little pup had left embedded on my fingers... God, it made me howl with pure arousal.

My own cock reacted hard at the simple memory of her skin, straining against my pants.

I felt like a damn fool for what I had to do. But as the future Royal Alpha, I had to look out for the interests of my pack, completely ignoring my carnal desires and my own happiness.

"The party is over. Get everyone out."

Immediately, the pack guards began to escort the guests toward the exit.

My father approached me with a rigid face. "To the private dining room. Now. The whole family."

Minutes later, we were in the imposing dining room of the mansion.

Vanessa sat to my left, arms crossed and scoffing. Michael sat across from her, unusually pale and nervous.

But just as Harper's mother was about to take a seat, she stopped, looking toward the door with her face distorted.

We walked in a deathly silence toward the VIP dining room. It was Darius, Vanessa, my younger brother Michael, and me. However, before crossing the door, Harper's mother, my father's new Luna, stopped us with her face bathed in tears.

"Darius... I will go see Harper," the woman said, trembling with anguish. "She is hurt, her ankle…"

Darius frowned, stopping her with a firm arm.

"Sit down, Anny," my father growled, impassive. "Your daughter has already caused enough of a spectacle."

"Let her go, father," I intervened. "The little pup needs support so she understands her place once and for all."

Darius huffed, but nodded reluctantly, allowing Anny to run out of the dining room.

I knew Harper needed her mother, but a part of me cursed having to let her go without being the one to comfort her.

"That starving beggar ruined my grand presentation before the court," Vanessa spat, tapping the table with her acrylic nails. "She should be whipped for daring to call you her mate to my face!"

"Excuse my stepdaughter, Vanessa," Darius intervened, bowing his head toward her. "She is an uneducated Omega. She doesn't know how to control her delusions before a Royal Alpha."

I let out a husky huff, taking the glass of whiskey a maid had just poured for me, downing the burning liquid to scorch the urge I had to rip my own father's head off.

"Let's forget the matter for tonight," Darius sentenced. "In fact, to make you comfortable, I prepared the largest room in the east wing for you and Vanessa... Right in Harper's old room."

My fingers tightened around the glass of my cup. I had to use all my Alpha strength not to smash the table at that very instant.

Taking Vanessa to the room that smelled like my true mate?

What absolute piece of shit!

Beside me, Michael, who had been strangely quiet, let out a chuckle between his teeth while playing with his utensil.

"That stupid girl doesn't know when to shut up..." he whispered, thinking no one could hear him.

I leaned forward subtly, letting out a dangerous sigh that no one else at the table could decipher.

"So... do you know the little pup well, Michael?" I asked in a deceptively soft voice.

Michael looked up, letting out a mocking, self-satisfied smirk that twisted my insides.

"Know her? Please, Dylan..." he dropped the bomb, shrugging his shoulders. "We've been together for three years in this mansion. But today we had a little fight and the stupid girl went crazy making up the bond thing. Surely it was a pathetic tantrum to make me feel jealous."

My brother's words caused a murderous fury to overflow every corner of my body.

In that fucking second, everything clicked in my mind like a bloody puzzle.

The idiot boyfriend who betrayed her that Harper had told me about... the one who had made her run and cry with a broken heart... was my own brother.

The rage blinded me. I squeezed my hand around the crystal glass with so much force that the glass cracked into a thousand pieces.

The red liquid spilled onto the table, immediately mixing with the thick blood that began to pour from the cuts on my palm.

"My God, Dylan! Your hand!" Vanessa shrieked, moving away so as not to stain her dress.

"It's nothing," I said with complete indifference.

I took a cloth napkin and wiped the mixture of blood and wine from my palm while locking my eyes directly onto Michael's face, who suddenly swallowed hard.

"Tell me, Michael... what exactly did you argue about? What did you do to your... girlfriend?" I asked him, my voice dropping to a lethal hiss.

Michael swallowed, his pupils dilating slightly, and he began to stammer, trying to regain his Alpha male posture.

"Well... you know how it is, brother..." he stammered, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "A man has needs. It was just a small slip-up with a Beta from the pack. It doesn't mean anything. Tomorrow I'll go to her room, give her a couple of gifts, and I'm going to win her back immediately."

I was a millisecond away from leaping across the table and tearing out my own brother's trachea when the double doors of the private dining room opened subtly.

Everyone at the table turned their gaze toward the entrance. It was Anny, followed by Harper.

She had taken off the dress and was now wearing tight denim shorts that exposed her shapely legs and a snug white shirt that overflowed the contour of her breasts with every breath.

Damn it! She looked so fucking beautiful and so provocative that I felt my cock give a violent jump under the table, hardening instantly.

Harper walked with a slight limp, stopping a few meters from the table.

She looked toward me with a coldness that froze my blood, and then shifted her gaze toward Vanessa.

"I offer an apology to Alpha Dylan and future Luna Vanessa," Harper said. "What happened was a mistake. I got carried away by the intensity of the moment and the aura of the new Royal Alpha. My wolf is young and misinterpreted submission before Alpha Dylan's rank. It won't happen again."

Vanessa let out a huff of superiority, crossing her arms and looking toward the ceiling with disdain.

However, I couldn't help but turn my gaze toward Michael, whose face lit up before he smirked, making a move to stand up from the table to go directly toward her.

"If that bastard touches her, I'll kill him!" my wolf roared.

Before Michael could take a single step forward, my body reacted out of pure possessive instinct.

I stood up from the chair first and took a step forward, physically interposing myself in my brother's path, blocking his way completely and forcing him to slam back down into his chair.

"It's good that you recognize your place, little pup," Vanessa said, rising from the table with a triumphant smile.

She walked toward me, grabbed my arm possessively, and stood on her tiptoes to give me a half-hearted kiss right on the lips, right in front of Harper.

"We accept your apologies. My fiancé is a very imposing man; it's normal for low-ranking Omegas to get confused when breathing the same air. But he is completely in love with me, right, Dylan?"

I immediately noticed how Harper clenched her jaw while a flash of pain crossed her eyes for a fraction of a second.

I expected to see her break. I expected to see tears in her eyes.

But Harper did not break; instead, she locked her eyes directly into mine while the corners of her lips curved into a cold smile.

"You are absolutely right, future Luna Vanessa," Harper replied. "It is clear that Alpha Dylan loves you very much."

The venom in her words hit my chest like a physical punch, leaving me breathless.

Immediately, Harper took her eyes off me, turned her back on my brother and me, and walked with a limp, her head held high, to sit at the opposite end of the table, next to her mother.

The visual rejection from my mate hit my Alpha pride dead-on.My wolf roared mortally wounded inside my head, clawing at my temples to get out, driven mad because our mate had just completely ignored us.