Chapter Two- His Rejection

I wake up to sunlight burning through my eyelids.

My head is pounding like someone’s taking a hammer to the inside of my skull, and my mouth tastes like something crawled inside and died. My body feels heavy and wrong, like it doesn’t belong to me anymore.

When I force my eyes open, everything is too bright. I squint against the light coming through thin curtains and realize immediately that this isn’t the cabin.

Panic hits me like ice water.

I sit up too fast and the room spins violently. I’m going to be sick.

I’m in a cheap motel bed with scratchy sheets. There’s a painting of a lighthouse bolted to the wall, a TV on a dresser, and a door leading to what looks like a bathroom.

Why am I in a motel room?

I look down at myself and my stomach drops.

I’m naked.

There’s someone next to me in the bed.

I turn my head slowly even though everything in me is screaming not to look.

Marcus.

He’s asleep, also naked, his arm stretched across the space where I was lying.

No. No, no, no, no, no.

I scramble out of bed with legs that barely hold me and grab the sheet, wrapping it around myself with hands that won’t stop shaking.

There’s blood on the sheets.

I stumble to the bathroom and barely make it to the toilet before everything comes up. My stomach heaves until there’s nothing left, until I’m just dry heaving and crying.

What happened?

I went to Riley’s Bar. Marcus was already there with drinks waiting. We toasted to new beginnings. We drank.

The drink tasted weird, bitter, and I remember starting to say something.

Then… nothing.

Everything after that first drink is just gone.

I look down at my body and bile rises in my throat again. There are bruises on my thighs, my breasts, finger marks on my hips like someone grabbed me hard.

I didn’t want this. I know I didn’t want this.

He drugged me.

My best friend drugged me.

I grab the sink and pull myself up to look in the mirror. My makeup is smeared down my face, my hair is a disaster, and there’s a bruise on my neck that looks like teeth marks.

Then I see it on the floor, half hidden under the sink.

The wolf necklace.

I drop to my knees and grab it with trembling hands. The chain is broken, like someone yanked it off my neck, but I have it.

I clutch it so hard the edges cut into my palm.

My phone. I find it in my jeans pocket on the floor. The screen is cracked but it still works.

5:34 AM.

Midnight was five and a half hours ago.

Oh god, Nick.

I was supposed to meet him at midnight at the east border. We were supposed to run away together, and I was here instead.

“You’re awake.”

I spin around so fast I almost fall.

Marcus is sitting up in bed, watching me with an expression I’ve never seen on his face before. It’s not concern or confusion, it’s satisfaction.

“What did you do to me?” My voice comes out raw and broken.

“I saved you from making the biggest mistake of your life.” He says it calmly, like we’re discussing the weather. “You were going to run away with Nick and throw your life away for some Alpha who would have gotten bored with you in six months.”

“You drugged me.” The words shake with rage. “You raped me.”

“I loved you.” He stands up and pulls on his boxers, completely unbothered by my tears or my shaking or the horror on my face. “I’ve loved you since we were kids, Emily, and I had to watch you throw yourself at Nick fucking Blackwood like you weren’t worth anything more.”

“So you drugged me? Took my phone? Sent texts pretending to be me?”

His expression doesn’t change. “Nick was never going to choose you over being Alpha. He was already scheduled to bond with Jessica this morning. The whole running away thing? It was a fantasy. He was going to break your heart eventually, so I just sped up the timeline.”

“You’re lying.” But even as I say it, doubt creeps in. “Nick loves me. We were leaving together.”

“Were you?” Marcus tilts his head. “Then why did I get a wedding invitation three weeks ago? Why has Jessica been planning a Christmas morning bonding ceremony for the past month?”

No. That can’t be true.

“I sent Nick pictures of us in bed,” he continues casually. “Very convincing ones. And I sent him texts from your phone telling him you chose me, that you couldn’t go through with running away.”

“You bastard.” I’m shaking so hard I can barely stand. “You destroyed everything.”

“I saved you from making a mistake, and honestly, even if you tried to tell Nick the truth now, do you really think he’d believe you? After the pictures? After the texts from your own phone? After he came to this motel himself and saw you in bed with me?”

My blood runs cold. “What?”

“He was here, Emily. Around one in the morning. Knocked on the door after getting your texts. I answered, and he saw you in that bed, unconscious and naked next to me.” Marcus’s smile is gentle, almost pitying. “I told him you chose me, and he left. Didn’t even try to wake you up. Just looked at you for a few seconds and walked away.”

Oh god. Oh god, oh god, oh god.

“So even if you run to him now with some story about being drugged, he’s already made his decision based on what he saw with his own eyes.”

“He’s bonding with Jessica this morning,” Marcus continues. “The ceremony probably already started. So even if you tried to stop it, you’d be too late.”

I don’t wait to hear anything else. I grab my clothes and run.

I pull up to the Silver Moon pack house just after six in the morning. The gates are open and there are cars everywhere, too many for this early on Christmas morning.

I park and run toward the main house. The front door is unlocked, and when I push through it, the entrance hall is packed with wolves in formal clothes. Christmas decorations are everywhere, garland and lights and a massive tree.

Everyone turns to look at me.

I’m still wearing last night’s clothes, my makeup is smeared, and my hair is a disaster. The crowd parts slowly, and I can see through to the main hall where a bonding arch is set up with white flowers and red ribbons and Christmas greenery.

Nick is standing under the arch in a tuxedo, looking devastating and perfect and completely unreachable.

Jessica is next to him in a white dress.

The pack elder stands between them. “We gather this Christmas morning to witness the bonding of Alpha Nicholas Blackwood and Jessica Winters…”

“No!” The word rips out of me before I can stop it.

Every head turns. Nick’s eyes find mine across the crowded room, and something flashes across his face before it goes completely blank.

Cold. Empty. Dead.

“Nick—” I start pushing through the crowd.

“No.” His voice cuts through the room like a blade.

“Please, just let me explain—”

“I saw you.” Three words. That’s all he gives me. His face is stone. “I saw you in that bed with Marcus. There’s nothing to explain.”

“But I was drugged! Marcus put something in my drink and I—”

“Stop.” The Alpha command in his voice makes my mouth snap shut involuntarily. “I’m not interested in excuses.”

“It’s not an excuse, it’s the truth! If you just listen—”

“I already told you. I saw you with my own eyes.” His voice is flat, final. “That’s all I need to know.”

“Nick, please—”

“You weren’t at the east border at midnight. You were in bed with him. Naked. That’s the only fact that matters.” He turns away from me, back toward Jessica. “Now leave before I have you removed.”

“But Marcus confessed! He told me he drugged me and used my phone to send those texts—”

“Enough.” He doesn’t even look at me. “Elder, continue the ceremony.”

“Nick, I’m begging you—”

“I said enough!” His voice thunders through the hall. “I don’t want to hear another word. I don’t want your excuses or your stories. I saw what I saw, and that’s the end of it.”

“You won’t even let me speak?”

“Why would I?” He finally glances back at me, and his eyes are empty. “So you can come up with more lies? So you can make more excuses for why you were naked in a motel bed with another man? I saw you, Emily. I saw you, and that’s all the truth I need.”

“I didn’t choose that! I was unconscious!”

“Convenient that you don’t remember anything.” His voice drips with sarcasm. “How very convenient.”

“Because he drugged me!”

“Get out of my territory.” He turns his back to me completely. “I don’t want to see you again.”

“Nick, please, just five minutes to—”

“NOW.” The Alpha command slams into me like a physical blow.

My body moves before my mind can process it, taking a step back and then another.

“Do you, Nicholas Blackwood, accept Jessica Winters as your bonded mate?” the elder asks, her voice uncertain.

Nick doesn’t hesitate. Doesn’t pause. Doesn’t look at me.

“I do.”

The words follow me as I turn and run through the crowd, through the entrance hall, out into the Christmas morning snow.

I get to my car and sit there staring at the broken necklace in my hand.

Nick wouldn’t listen. Wouldn’t even let me speak. He saw me in that bed and that was enough for him to throw away everything we had without hearing a single word of explanation.

Marcus drugged me. Raped me. Used my phone. Staged everything.

And Nick saw the result and decided I wasn’t worth listening to.

I start the car and drive away from Silver Moon territory, away from Nick, away from everything I thought we were going to be.

When I’m far enough away that I can’t see the pack house anymore, I pull over and let myself break down completely.

It’s Christmas morning. The sun is shining. Everything is beautiful.

And I’ve lost everything.