the exit

Chapter 2: The Exit

I didn't pack much. Just enough to fill one suitcase.

My clothes hung in the closet like remnants of a person I didn't want to be anymore. Shapeless dresses. Cardigans that swallowed my frame. Everything in beige and gray because Damien said bright colors didn't suit a Luna's dignity.

I left all of it.

The only things I took were my laptop, some basic toiletries, and the emergency cash I'd been hiding in a tampon box for three years. Twelve thousand dollars. Money I'd skimmed from my personal allowance, a little bit each month, though I'd never admitted to myself why I was saving it.

Somewhere deep down, I'd always known this day would come.

I was zipping up the suitcase when Damien walked in. He didn't knock. He never did.

"What are you doing?" His voice was flat, but his eyes narrowed when he saw the luggage.

"Leaving."

He actually laughed. The sound was sharp and ugly. "Leaving? To go where, Amara? You have nothing. You are nothing without this pack."

I kept my hands steady as I clicked the suitcase locks into place. "I'll manage."

"No." He crossed the room in three strides and grabbed my wrist. His grip was tight enough to bruise. "You're not leaving. You're Kai's mother. You have responsibilities."

"Responsibilities?" I looked up at him, and something in my expression made him blink. "You just told me Sera is better suited to raise him. You've been fucking her for three months. You said I was inadequate. So I'm doing us both a favor."

His jaw clenched. "You're being dramatic. So I have a mistress. Most Alphas do. You should have expected this."

"Expected it? Yes. Accepted it?" I yanked my wrist free. "No."

"You're not taking Kai." His voice dropped to that Alpha tone, the one that made pack members bare their necks in submission.

But my wolf was too broken to respond to it anymore. The silver had damaged that part of me too.

"I'm not taking him," I said quietly. "You've made it clear he prefers Sera anyway. He told her she's prettier than me. That I smell like medicine."

Damien had the decency to look uncomfortable for half a second. "He's five. He doesn't understand—"

"He understands enough to want a new mother." I picked up my suitcase. "So give him one. You were planning to anyway."

I started toward the door, but Damien moved to block it. His face was red now, anger finally breaking through that cold mask.

"You think you can just walk away? You're my wife. My Luna. You belong to this pack."

"I belong to myself." The words felt foreign on my tongue. "I should have realized that years ago."

"If you leave, you'll be omega. Packless. You know what happens to lone wolves." He stepped closer, using his height to intimidate me. "You'll be hunted. Rogues will tear you apart. You're too weak to survive on your own."

He was probably right. My wolf could barely shift anymore. I had no pack bonds to fall back on, no family since my parents died in a car accident six years ago. I was damaged goods in every way that mattered to wolf society.

But staying here would kill me slower. I could feel it eating away at whatever was left of my soul.

"Then I'll die free," I said.

I pushed past him, and he let me go. Maybe he was too shocked. Maybe he just didn't care enough to stop me.

I walked down the hallway, past Kai's room. The door was still open. I could see Sera sitting on his bed, reading him a story. My son was curled up against her side, his dark hair so much like Damien's falling across his forehead.

He looked happy.

I forced myself to keep walking.

The pack house was massive, filled with two dozen wolves loyal to Damien. I passed several of them on my way out. None of them tried to stop me. Most didn't even look at me. I'd been invisible to them for years anyway.

Only Maya, one of the younger pack members, caught my eye as I reached the front door. She opened her mouth like she wanted to say something, then closed it again. Her expression was pitying.

I didn't want pity.

The night air hit me as I stepped outside, and I realized it was raining. Of course it was. Because this moment needed to be more miserable.

I didn't have a car. Damien had always insisted I didn't need one since pack drivers could take me anywhere. Control disguised as care.

I pulled out my phone and ordered a rideshare. The app said it would be twelve minutes.

I stood there in the rain, suitcase at my feet, and waited.

The door opened behind me. I didn't turn around.

"Mommy?"

Kai's small voice cracked something in my chest.

I turned. He was standing in the doorway in his pajamas, his brown eyes wide and confused. Sera was behind him, her hand on his shoulder, but he'd pulled away from her.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

I crouched down, ignoring the rain soaking through my clothes. "I have to go away for a while, baby."

"But why?" His lower lip trembled. "Did I do something bad?"

God, he thought this was his fault.

"No, sweetheart. You didn't do anything wrong." I reached out to touch his face, but he stepped back.

"Then why are you leaving?" His voice got louder, more upset. "Daddies don't leave. Mommies don't leave. That's what you always say."

I had said that. Every time he had nightmares about us disappearing. Every time he clung to me afraid I'd vanish.

"Sometimes mommies have to go take care of themselves," I said, hating how weak the excuse sounded. "So they can be better."

"But you're fine now." Tears started rolling down his cheeks. "Please don't go. I'll be good. I promise I'll be good."

Sera pulled him back gently. "Sweetie, your mother needs to do this. But you'll still have me. And your father. We'll take care of you."

Kai looked up at her, then back at me. I saw the moment he made his choice. The moment he decided I was the one abandoning him, and she was the one staying.

"Fine," he said, his voice cold in a way that sounded exactly like Damien. "Go then. I don't care."

He ran back inside. Sera gave me a smile that was pure victory before following him and closing the door.

The rideshare pulled up.

I grabbed my suitcase and got in, and I didn't let myself look back at the house. At the life I was leaving. At the son who'd just told me he didn't care.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

I gave him the address of a cheap motel on the edge of town. The kind of place where no one asked questions.

As we pulled away, my phone buzzed with a text from Damien.

"Don't bother coming back. You're dead to this pack."

I stared at those words until they blurred.

Then I deleted the message and blocked his number.

I had three days until my job at TitanTech started. Three days to figure out who I was going to become.

The broken Luna was dead.

It was time to build something new from the ashes.