Chapter 9: Betrayal Confirmed

Devlin’s POV

The estate was silent. Not a peaceful stillness, but a strange, heavy quiet that made every tiny sound echo through the halls.

I lay awake beside Jason, staring into the dark bedroom while his breathing remained slow and rhythmic. He was completely at peace. I was drowning.

My mind kept drifting back to the old Luna records I had combed through earlier that evening. The pack laws were clear. The Council’s authority had limits, and they could not simply dethrone me because they had decided another woman was more suitable. For the first time in years, I had uncovered something solid that belonged to me outside of my title, and it was grounded in truth.

My throat eventually grew dry, and I slipped out of bed, pulling my robe tightly around my waist before cracking open the bedroom door.

I had barely reached the top of the stairs when hushed voices drifted up from the floor below.

“Chloe can't hide the pregnancy much longer,” Isabelle said, her tone sharp with urgency.

My hand clamped around the banister.

Charles answered in a low, measured voice. “She won't need to. Once the Council knows, Jason will have no choice but to move forward with the annulment.”

My heart gave one hard, sickening thud against my ribs. I leaned closer to the railing, straining to catch every word while barely daring to breathe.

“If Chloe is carrying Jason's child,” Isabelle continued coldly, “the Council will demand an heir. They won't allow a wolfless Luna to remain beside him when his child is growing inside another woman.”

Ice flooded my veins.

Charles sighed with quiet calculation. “The Solstice Gala is the perfect opportunity. The entire pack will be there. Once Jason announces the annulment publicly, there will be no room for Devlin to fight it.”

Something inside me went completely still.

I had always known that Chloe was Jason's obsessed ex, and while I had suspected there was something lingering between them, I never thought it would reach this irreversible point. Chloe had spent years coveting my place beside him, and now she had orchestrated the ultimate leverage, backed by a family that was actively plotting to discard me before the entire pack.

A floorboard creaked beneath my foot.

Below, the voices stopped dead.

I took an instinctive step back, but it was already too late. Jason appeared at the top of the stairs, his hair disheveled and sleep lingering in his eyes until he registered the raw devastation on my face.

“Devlin?” His gaze flickered toward the dark staircase, then snapped back to me. “Why are you awake?”

I stared at him, refusing to blink. “Is Chloe pregnant?”

His expression shattered. It was a brief flicker of panic, but I saw every trace of it.

“Devlin…”

“Is she? Answer me!”

He looked away, dropping his gaze to the floor. The silence hit harder than a physical blow.

“How long have you known?” I asked, my voice dangerously level.

“She told me last night.”

“Last night,” I repeated, hollow. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“I was going to tell you.”

“When?”

He didn't answer. The heavy silence between us answered for him.

I took a trembling step down the staircase. “And the baby?”

Jason's jaw tightened. “Devlin, please.”

“Whose child is it?”

He finally forced his eyes up to meet mine.

“Mine.”

The word landed with crushing weight. I stood frozen on the steps, staring at him as my mind struggled to process what I had just heard.

*Mine.*

Chloe was carrying his child.

Just a few days ago, this same man had gently asked me to visit a fertility doctor with him. He had shown convincing concern, sitting beside me, listening to my deepest fears, and promising that whatever we discovered, we would face it together as a team.

Even though I had kept my guard up, some naive part of me had wanted to grant him the benefit of the doubt. I had questioned whether I was wrong to pull away, foolishly hoping he was trying to change and still cared about our marriage.

Instead, the reality arrived in the form of him impregnating my own stepsister.

A suffocating band tightened across my chest. “This is too much.”

Jason took a step toward me, reaching out. “Devlin—”

“No!” My voice cracked as I pressed a trembling hand against my chest, desperate to steady my erratic breathing. “Just a few days ago, you were asking me to see a doctor with you. You were pretending to be concerned about why we hadn't been able to have a child. You made me believe you wanted to face it with me.”

“I did,” he pleaded, “and honestly, that was the truth.”

I stared at him in sheer disbelief. “Then how could you sleep with Chloe?”

His face crumpled in shame. “Devlin, I'm sorry. It only happened once, and I was drunk. Everything happened so fast.”

A bitter, humorless laugh nearly broke from my lips. *Once.* As if minimizing the number of times somehow softened the impact of such a devastating betrayal.

“Once was enough.”

He stepped closer. “Baby, I'm sorry.”

“Don't come any closer! I can't even stand to look at you right now!”

He froze where he stood.

Tears burned behind my eyelids as the agonizing reality poured out of me. “I have spent years wondering if something was broken inside me. I blamed myself for every single month that passed empty. I stood there and listened to the pack question my worth because I couldn't give you an heir. And all this time, you were sleeping with another woman.”

“It was a mistake,” he whispered.

“A mistake?” My voice broke with fury. “You didn't accidentally stumble into her bed, Jason.”

He had no defense.

I looked down past him toward Isabelle and Charles, who remained standing at the bottom of the stairs. They had heard every word, but neither of them stepped in. Why would they? They had already decided what my future was supposed to look like.

I turned my attention back to Jason. “You wanted to play the concerned husband while another woman was carrying your bloodline?”

“I didn't know what to do.”

“You could have given me the truth!”

“I was afraid.”

I wiped away the tear that finally escaped my eye. “Afraid of what, Jason?”

“Because I was afraid of losing you!” The words finally tore out of his chest. “Letting her touch me was painful enough. I couldn't bring myself to face you and explain what I'd done.”

I turned my face away from him.

The pain arrived in crushing waves. First, he had signed the annulment papers behind my back. Then came the physical betrayal. Now, the pregnancy, coupled with the realization that his family and the Council already knew and were coordinating to publicly discard me at the Solstice Gala.

It was one calculated blow after another, leaving me no time to recover before the next knife struck.

“When will it ever stop?” I whispered to the empty air.

Jason took a small step forward. “Devlin…”

“I am tired,” I choked out, my voice fracturing under the weight of it all. “I am so exhausted from finding out that the one person I trusted with my life has been hiding secrets from me. How could you do this to me?”

“I never wanted to hurt you,” he pleaded.

“But you did.” I locked my eyes onto his, refusing to let him look away. “And you didn't just hurt me, Jason. You destroyed the very last thing I was still trying to believe could be saved.”

His eyes reddened with unshed tears. “I still love you.”

Hearing those words now felt like a deliberate cruelty.

“If you truly loved me, Jason, you would have remembered who Chloe was before you ever laid a hand on her.”

He visibly flinched.

“She is my stepsister,” I said, every syllable laced with venom. “She grew up under the same roof as me. You knew how deeply she despised me, and you knew how relentless she was about taking you.”

“I know,” he rasped, looking down. “And I regret it every single day.”

“Regret doesn't undo the damage.”

He reached out a hand to touch my arm, but I recoiled instantly before his fingers could graze my skin.

“Don't touch me.”

His arm fell limply to his side.

I turned my back on him and walked toward the bedroom door.

“Devlin, wait!”

I stopped on the threshold, not turning around. “What?”

His voice was barely a whisper, thick with dread. “Are you leaving me?”

I stood there in the doorway for a long moment, staring into the dark room.

I thought about the naive young woman I had been when I first exchanged vows with him. The girl who had foolishly believed love could endure every trial, spending years exhausting herself trying to prove she was worthy of standing at his side.

That girl would have fallen to her knees, wept, and begged him to choose her over everything else.

I wasn't sure who I was anymore. But standing on the other side of this ruin, I knew with absolute certainty that I could never be that weak girl again.

“I suppose you finally got the heir your parents and the Council have been craving.” I looked back over my shoulder, meeting his gaze one final time. “Congratulations, Jason.”

I stepped into the bedroom and walked away, closing the door behind me.

In the hallway, Jason called my name, but I didn't turn back.