CHAPTER SEVEN

(SZE’S POV)

The slam of the car door was like a gunshot, the final note in the symphony of my humiliation. I stood on the cracked pavement, the weight of the envelope in my hand feeling like a lead brick. Pocket money.

The words echoed in my head, each repetition a fresh lash against my soul. He didn’t simply insult me as a woman; he’d desecrated my motherhood, reducing my desperate fight for our daughter’s life to a cheap ploy for his attention and cash.

The scent of him—sandalwood and frost—still clung to my clothes, a sickening reminder of the Mate bond’s treacherous pull. 

My body still hummed from his touch, a traitorous echo of the desire he could so easily ignite, even as he shattered my heart. 

I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, trying to erase the feel of his punishing kiss, the taste of his betrayal.

I took a deep, shuddering breath of the cool evening air, trying to anchor myself. The money. It was tainted, filthy with his condescension. But it was also Elisse’s lifeline. That thought alone kept me from tearing the envelope into a thousand pieces and scattering it to the wind.

I turned and practically ran up the stairs to our apartment, my hands trembling so badly I could barely fit the key in the lock.

“Mommy?” A small, sleepy voice called from the bedroom.

I froze, closing my eyes for a second. I had to put on the mask. I had to be her rock.

“I’m home, my love!” I called back, forcing a brightness into my tone that felt like shards of glass in my throat. I shoved the envelope deep into my bag, hiding the evidence of her father’s charity.

I pushed the bedroom door open. Elisse was sitting up in bed, her favorite worn stuffie—a little grey wolf—clutched in her arms. Her big, dark eyes, so like his, looked up at me. She was pale, the faint shadows under her eyes a constant, heart-wrenching reminder of the sickness she fought so bravely.

“Did you have a good time with Grandma?” I asked, sitting on the edge of her bed and smoothing her hair back from her forehead. It was damp with a faint sheen of sweat.

She shrugged a little shoulder. “It was okay. Grandma said I looked tired. Jack said I was being fussy.” Her lower lip trembled just a fraction.

A fresh wave of rage toward my stepfather washed over me, but I swallowed it down, pasting on a smile. “Well, Jack doesn’t know anything, does he? You’re my strong, brave girl. Maybe you’re just getting ready for a big growth spurt. All the best wolves need extra rest before they grow.”

She gave me a small, skeptical smile. “You always say that.”

“Because it’s always true,” I said, leaning down to kiss her nose. “Now, how about a story? The one about the clever moon wolf who outsmarted the mountain bear?”

As I read, putting on voices for the different characters, my mind was screaming. It replayed every awful moment at my mother’s house. Kairi’s cold dismissal. His instant, vicious defense of Riri. 

The way his entire being had shifted at the mere mention of Bianca’s name—from an irritated lover to a ruthless, political Alpha, his focus absolute, his warning deadly serious. ‘No mistakes. No gossip. No hysterics.’ He’d looked right at me when he’d said it, as if I were a problem to be managed.

But I kept my voice steady and warm for my daughter. I tucked her in, singing the soft lullaby my own mother had never sung to me, until her breathing evened out into sleep. 

The moment her eyes closed, the mask crumbled. Silent tears streamed down my face as I watched her sleep, the fear and the fury a toxic mix in my veins.

The next morning, my first and only stop was the pack hospital’s billing office. The woman behind the glass partition, Beta Gina, had given me that pitying look one too many times.

“I’m here to settle Elisse Untalan’s account,” I said, my voice flat. I pulled the envelope from my bag and slid it through the slot.

Beta Gina’s eyebrows nearly disappeared into her hairline. She took the envelope, her fingers quickly counting the large bills. “This… this covers the next two rounds of treatment and the outstanding balance,” she stammered, her demeanor shifting from pity to outright shock. “I’ll process this immediately, Luna Sze.”

“It’s just Sze,” I corrected her softly, but firmly. The title was another one of Kairi’s lies. “And please, see that her treatment is scheduled without delay.”

“Of course! Right away!” she said, suddenly all efficiency.

An hour later, I was holding my daughter’s hand as a nurse hooked her up to the dialysis machine. The gentle whirring sound, usually a source of dread, today sounded like a hymn of relief. The money had worked. The system, frozen by debt, was now moving. Elisse was getting the care she needed. A tangible weight lifted from my shoulders. For this, I would endure a thousand humiliations.

But the relief was a shallow pool, and beneath it ran a deep, dark current of pain. I watched the machine do its work, filtering the poison from my child’s blood, and I couldn’t stop my own blood from boiling with the memory of Kairi’s words. ‘I knew you were doing it for the money.’

He saw my every action through a lens of greed and manipulation, blind to the love and desperation that truly motivated me. He trusted a conniving she-wolf like Riri over the mother of his child. And he was ready to publicly shackle himself to a princess whose very name made him stand taller, his voice taking on a reverent tone he’d never used with me.

The rest of the day passed in a blur of hospital routines. It was evening when we finally returned home, both of us exhausted. I was tucking a sleepy Elisse into bed when a sharp knock echoed through the small apartment.

My heart leapt into my throat. Kairi? Had he come to check on her? To maybe, finally, see the truth?

I hurried to the door and pulled it open.

It wasn’t Kairi.

Riri stood there, a vision of calculated elegance in a tailored dress, her smile as sharp as a knife. She didn’t wait for an invitation; she simply stepped inside, her eyes scanning our modest home with barely concealed disdain.

“Sze,” she said, her voice a syrupy poison. “I heard you had a little windfall. Paid off the hospital bill all at once. How… fortunate.”

I crossed my arms, my body going rigid. “What do you want, Riri?”

“Oh, I’m just here as a friend,” she purred, stepping closer. “And as a friend, I thought you should hear it from me first, before the official pack announcement tomorrow.”

She paused, her eyes gleaming with malicious delight. “The Cresendo Pack and the Moonrise Pack are celebrating their new alliance. There’s a grand ball tomorrow night. And Alpha Kairi will be officially announcing his engagement to Princess Bianca.”

The world tilted. I reached out a hand to steady myself against the wall.

Riri’s smile widened. “And as a token of his… gratitude… for your service,” she said, her eyes flicking meaningfully toward Elisse’s bedroom door, “he’s asked me to personally deliver your invitation. He insists you be there. After all, you’re the mother of his child. He wants you to see his future.”

She held out a thick, cream-colored envelope, sealed with the crescent moon wax seal of the Moonrise Pack.

It felt like a death warrant in my hand.

"Make sure you wear something nice," Riri whispered, her voice dripping with false sympathy. "It would be such a shame if the mother of the Alpha's only child looked like... well, like what she really is. A stunt double trying to crash the main event."