Chapter 30

My Cheating Mate

Jeremy pov

The house was too quiet.

I sat in my car in the driveway, staring at the dark windows of the home Emma and I had shared for six months. The home she'd fled from. The home that still smelled faintly of her vanilla and honey scent even though she hadn't lived here in over four months.

I should go inside. Should eat something, shower, sleep. Basic human—wolf—functions that Dr. Chen kept reminding me were important for healing.

But the idea of walking through that door, of being surrounded by reminders of what I'd destroyed, made my chest tight with anxiety.

So I sat. Like I'd been sitting for the past twenty minutes. Paralyzed by the weight of my own guilt and loneliness.

My phone buzzed. A text from my father: "Council meeting tomorrow at 9 AM. Don't be late."

I typed back: "I'll be there."

Another buzz. This time from Dr. Chen: "Reminder: Your individual session is tomorrow at 2 PM. Please complete the journal exercises we discussed."

The journal. Right. She'd asked me to write about my feelings, about my triggers, about the moments when I felt the guilt becoming overwhelming.

I'd managed maybe three sentences in the past week. Each time I tried to write more, I'd just stare at the blank page, overwhelmed by the enormity of what I'd done.

How do you journal about destroying the best thing in your life? How do you put into words the self-loathing that consumed you every time you saw the hurt in Emma's eyes?

I finally forced myself out of the car and into the house. The kitchen was exactly as I'd left it this morning—dishes in the sink, coffee mug on the counter, the overwhelming silence of a space meant for two people occupied by only one.

I'd been staying at my office more and more lately. Working late into the night on pack business, sleeping on the couch in my office rather than in the bed where Emma should be.

The bed where I'd promised her forever and then systematically destroyed that promise.

My phone buzzed again. Emma this time: "Did you do your journal exercises?"

Despite everything, a small smile crossed my face. Even when she was angry at me, even when she looked at me with that mixture of hurt and disgust, she was checking in. Making sure I was doing the work.

"Working on them now," I typed back, which was technically true even if "working on them" meant staring at a blank page.

"Good. See you at couples therapy on Thursday."

Thursday. Two days away. Two days until I'd sit across from Emma and Dr. Chen and talk about all the ways I was failing at healing, at moving forward, at becoming someone worthy of a second chance.

Two months. We'd been in therapy for two months, and some days it felt like we were making progress. Emma could look at me without flinching. We could have conversations that didn't end in tears. She'd even laughed at something I said last week—a genuine laugh that made my heart soar.

But other days, like today, she'd looked at me with such disgust that I'd wanted to disappear. Had wanted to stop existing just so she wouldn't have to see the face of the man who'd hurt her.

It had been during our session. Dr. Chen had asked me about Vanessa, about what I'd found attractive about her, about how the affair had made me feel.

I'd answered honestly. Too honestly, maybe. Talked about the familiarity, the comfort, the fantasy I'd built up over years.

And Emma's face had transformed. The careful neutrality she'd been maintaining had cracked, replaced by pure disgust and pain.

"You loved her," she'd said, not a question. "All those months, you loved her, not me."

"No," I'd tried to argue. "What I felt for Vanessa wasn't love—"

"It was close enough," she'd interrupted, her voice cold. "Close enough that you chose her over me every single day for six months."

She was right. The realization had hit me hard then and was hitting me again now as I stared at the blank journal page.

I had chosen Vanessa. Not because I loved her, but because she was easy. Familiar. Didn't challenge me to be better or different or honest with myself.

Emma had challenged me from the beginning. Her presence, her goodness, her patient attempts to build a real partnership—all of it had been a mirror showing me who I really was. And I'd hated what I saw.

So I'd run to Vanessa. To the comfortable lie. To the fantasy where I was still the person I'd imagined myself to be instead of the cruel, selfish bastard I actually was.

I finally picked up my pen and started writing:

*Today Emma looked at me with disgust. We were talking about Vanessa in therapy, and I saw the exact moment Emma realized how much I'd chosen someone else over her. Not just physically, but emotionally. Mentally. In every way that mattered.*

*I want to make excuses. Want to explain that I was confused, that I didn't understand what I was doing. But that would be a lie. I knew exactly what I was doing. I chose comfort over growth. Chose fantasy over reality. Chose selfishness over the mate the Moon Goddess gave me.*

*Dr. Chen asked me today if I'm stuck in self-punishment. If I'm using guilt as a way to avoid moving forward. I didn't have an answer. But sitting here now, alone in this house that should have been ours, I think maybe she's right.*

*I'm stuck. Stuck in the guilt. Stuck in the self-loathing. Stuck in this pattern of working late and avoiding home and sleeping on my office couch because facing the empty house feels like accepting that Emma might never come back.*

*And maybe she won't. Maybe I've destroyed something that can't be rebuilt. Maybe all the therapy and honesty and commitment in the world won't be enough to overcome the betrayal.*

*That thought terrifies me. But what terrifies me more is that I might be using that fear as an excuse to not fully engage in healing. If I'm stuck in the guilt, stuck in the self-punishment, I don't have to risk really trying and failing.*

*Dr. Chen says I need to forgive myself. But how do I forgive myself for the unforgivable? How do I move forward when Emma still looks at me like that sometimes—like I'm something disgusting she has to tolerate?*

I stopped writing, my hand cramping. Three paragraphs. More than I'd managed in weeks.

It wasn't insight. Wasn't breakthrough. But it was honest.

And Dr. Chen said honesty was where healing began.

My phone rang. Emma's name on the screen.

I answered immediately. "Hey. Everything okay?"

"I'm sorry." Her voice was thick, like she'd been crying. "For today. For looking at you like that."

"Emma, you don't have to apologize. You have every right to be disgusted with me."

"But it's not helping," she said. "Dr. Chen says we both have patterns we're stuck in. Mine is punishing you with my anger. Yours is punishing yourself with guilt. And we're just—we're stuck, Jeremy. We're not moving forward."

She was right. I knew she was right.

"So what do we do?" I asked.

"I don't know. But I think—" She paused. "I think maybe we need to try something different. The separate houses, the carefully maintained distance, only seeing each other in therapy—maybe it's making it harder instead of easier."

My heart started pounding. "What are you suggesting?"

"I don't know. Maybe we try spending time together outside of therapy? Not dates or anything romantic. Just—existing in the same space. Remembering how to be around each other without it being this huge, heavy thing."

"I'd like that," I said carefully, not wanting to push. "What did you have in mind?"

"Coffee? Tomorrow morning? At that place near the pack house."

"I'll be there. What time?"

"Seven. Before your council meeting."

"Okay." I paused. "Emma? Thank you. For calling. For—for trying."

"We're both trying," she said. "Even when it's hard. Even when we're stuck. We're both still trying."

After we hung up, I looked at my journal entry. At the words about being stuck, about using guilt as armor, about being too afraid to really try.

Maybe Emma was right. Maybe we needed to stop hiding behind therapy and distance and carefully controlled interactions.

Maybe we needed to actually spend time together. Remember why the Moon Goddess chose us. Remember who we could be to each other when we weren't both drowning in trauma and guilt.

It was terrifying. The idea of sitting across from Emma in a coffee shop, trying to make conversation, risking another one of those disgusted looks.

But it was also necessary.

Because we couldn't heal in isolation. Couldn't rebuild trust without actually being in each other's presence.

I looked around the empty house one more time, then made a decision.

I grabbed my laptop, some clothes, and headed back to my office. Not to hide. Not to sleep on the couch.

But to work. To focus. To actually engage with pack business instead of going through the motions.

If I was going to meet Emma for coffee tomorrow, if we were going to try something different, then I needed to be present. Actually present, not drowning in guilt and self-loathing.

Dr. Chen had given me exercises for that too. Mindfulness techniques, grounding exercises, ways to pull myself out of the spiral when it started.

I'd been ignoring them, convinced that I deserved to spiral.

But Emma was right. The self-punishment wasn't helping. Wasn't moving us forward.

So maybe it was time to actually try. To do the work not because I thought I deserved healing, but because Emma deserved a partner who was healthy enough to meet her halfway.

Even if halfway felt impossibly far away right now.

Even if I was terrified of failing.

I had to try.

For her. For us. For the possibility that maybe, just maybe, we could build something real from the wreckage.

One coffee at a time.

One honest conversation at a time.

One day at a time.

It wasn't much. But it was something.

And right now, something was all I had.