Chapter 5: Meeting Derek

I should have taken a different route home.

Should have avoided the east side of the city where the nicer apartments were, where wolves with money and status lived in buildings with actual security and working elevators.

Where I used to live, back when Dad was alive and we could afford more than a shoebox studio.

Where Derek lived with his perfect mate.

But my feet carried me there anyway, some masochistic part of me needing to see what I'd lost. Needing to remind myself why tonight didn't matter, why giving myself to three monsters for gold wasn't really a betrayal of anything, because there was nothing left to betray.

The apartment building loomed ahead....red brick, clean windows, a doorman who actually gave a shit. I slowed my pace, told myself to turn around, walk away.

Then I saw him.

Derek stood outside the entrance, his arm around a woman who glowed with that unmistakable radiance of a freshly marked mate. She was beautiful....long auburn hair, perfect skin, curves in all the right places. Everything I wasn't.

My feet stopped moving.

Derek's head turned, and our eyes met.

For a second, neither of us moved. Then his expression shifted.....surprise, discomfort, something that might have been guilt if he were capable of feeling it.

"Lilith?" His voice carried across the distance between us.

I should have kept walking. Should have pretended I didn't hear him. But my legs wouldn't cooperate.

His mate....I refused to learn her name....looked at me with curiosity, then recognition, then pity. That fucking pity that everyone gave me now.

Derek said something to her, and she nodded, stepping back toward the building entrance but not going inside. Staying close. Protecting what was hers.

He walked toward me, and I watched him come, this man I'd spent three years with, this man who'd promised me forever.

He looked good. Better than good. The mate bond agreed with him....his skin had a healthy glow, his eyes were bright, his whole body radiated satisfaction and contentment.

Being with me had never made him look like that.

"Hey," he said when he reached me, shoving his hands in his pockets. "I didn't expect to see you here."

"I didn't expect to see you either." My voice came out flat, dead. "I'm just passing through."

"Right." He shifted his weight, uncomfortable. "How have you been?"

How had I been? Was he seriously asking me that?

"Great," I said. "Just great. Lost both my jobs, about to lose my apartment, Mom's still in a coma and the hospital is threatening to transfer her to county care. Living the dream."

He winced. "Lilith, I'm sorry...."

"Are you?" I cut him off. "Are you really sorry, Derek? Because you look pretty fucking happy to me."

His jaw tightened. "That's not fair."

"Fair?" I laughed, and it sounded unhinged even to my own ears. "You want to talk about fair? You spent three years telling me you didn't care that I was wolfless, that it didn't matter, that we'd figure it out together. Then the second you found your precious mate, I became nothing. Three years, Derek. Gone in one night."

"I didn't plan it....."

"No one plans it!" My voice rose, and I didn't care that his mate was watching, that people passing by were staring. "But you made a choice. You chose her over me, and I get it, I do. The mate bond is everything, right? Sacred and unbreakable and all that bullshit."

"It's not bullshit," he said quietly. "The bond is real, Lilith. You'd understand if you could feel it...."

"But I can't feel it, can I? Because I'm wolfless. Because I'm broken. Because I'm not worth a fucking mate bond."

The memory crashed over me, vivid and brutal.

Two months ago. Late at night. Derek showing up at my apartment, and I'd been so happy to see him because Dad had just died and I was drowning and I needed him.

But the look on his face.....distant, guilty, resigned.....told me everything before he even opened his mouth.

"I found her," he'd said. "My mate."

The world tilted. "What?"

"Tonight, at the pack gathering. I caught her scent and... Lilith, the bond snapped into place immediately. I couldn't ignore it. Can't ignore it."

"But what about us?" My voice was so small. "What about everything we planned?"

"You're not my mate." He said it so simply, like it explained everything. Like it erased three years in a single sentence. "I thought maybe I could fight it, thought maybe what we had was enough, but...."

"But I'm not enough." I finished for him.

"That's not what I meant...."

"Then what did you mean, Derek? Spell it out for me."

He ran a hand through his hair, frustrated. "The mate bond is everything, Lilith. It's biological, chemical, spiritual. Fighting it would be like fighting gravity. And you... you can't even shift. What kind of future could we have? What kind of life?"

"The life you promised me." Tears were streaming down my face now. "The forever you swore you wanted."

"I was wrong." His voice was cold now, like he'd already made peace with this, already moved on in his head. "I was wrong to think I could be happy with a wolfless girl when my real mate was out there waiting."

"Get out."

"Lilith....."

"Get the fuck out of my apartment. Now."

He'd left. Took his things that night....his clothes, his books, his toothbrush. Erased himself from my life in less than an hour.

And I'd sat on the floor of that apartment, surrounded by empty spaces where his things used to be, and realized I'd been living a lie.

He'd never loved me. Not really. I'd been a placeholder. A way to pass time until his real mate showed up.

Three years of my life, wasted on someone who saw me as temporary.

Standing here now, looking at him with his perfect mate waiting by the door, I felt that same hollowness.

"I did care about you," Derek said, and he had the audacity to sound sincere. "Those three years weren't a lie. I just...."

"You just found someone better." I smiled, and it felt like glass in my mouth. "I get it. She's everything I'm not. Wolf, beautiful, your mate. How could I possibly compete?"

"This isn't a competition...."

"Isn't it?" I stepped closer, dropping my voice. "Be honest, Derek. Did you ever really love me? Or was I just convenient until the real thing came along?"

He hesitated. That hesitation told me everything.

"I thought so," I said.

"I'm sorry," he said again, and maybe he even meant it. "I wish things had turned out differently."

"No you don't." I looked past him at his mate, who was watching us with possessive eyes. "You got exactly what you wanted. Don't insult me by pretending you wish things were different."

His mate called out: "Derek, we're going to be late."

"Yeah, I'm coming." He looked back at me. "Take care of yourself, Lilith."

"You too," I said, because what else was there to say?

He walked back to her, and I watched as she immediately pressed close to him, marking her territory. He put his arm around her, and they walked into the building without looking back.

Just like that. Erased.

I stood there on the sidewalk, watching the door close behind them, and felt absolutely nothing.

Maybe I'd already cried all my tears over Derek. Maybe I'd already processed the betrayal and come out the other side. Or maybe I was just too numb to feel anything anymore.

Three years.

Gone like they'd never happened.

And the worst part? He was happy. Genuinely, completely happy with his mate. The kind of happiness he'd never had with me, no matter how hard I tried.

Because I wasn't enough.

Would never be enough.

Not for him, not for anyone.

I was wolfless, broken, worthless...a reject that no one wanted, no one would ever choose.

The thought that used to devastate me now felt like simple fact.

I started walking again, leaving behind the building where I used to live, the man I used to love, the life I used to think I'd have.

All of it was gone.

But maybe that was okay.

Maybe it was easier this way.

Tonight, three Alphas would use my body. They wouldn't pretend to love me. Wouldn't make promises they couldn't keep. Wouldn't look at me with disappointment when they realized I wasn't enough.

They'd take what they wanted and pay me for it, and there would be no illusions, no false hope, no betrayal.

Just a transaction.

Honest. Simple. Clean.

Derek had taught me one valuable lesson: Love was a lie. Promises were meaningless. And the only thing I could count on was that everyone would eventually leave.

So why not get paid for it?

Why not take their gold and at least have something to show for being used?

The Alphas would fuck me and throw me away, but at least they'd be honest about it. At least they wouldn't spend three years pretending I mattered.

I walked faster, my hands clenched into fists, anger burning away the numbness.

Fuck Derek. Fuck his perfect mate. Fuck everyone who'd ever made me feel like I was less than nothing.

Tonight, I'd let three Cursed Alphas do whatever they wanted to me.

And I wouldn't feel guilty about it.

Wouldn't feel ashamed.

Because there was nothing left to protect, no dignity left to lose.

Derek had taken that when he walked away.

The world had taken it when it made me wolfless.

So let the Alphas take what was left.

At least they'd pay for it.

At least I'd get something in return.

I reached my shitty apartment building and climbed the stairs, my footsteps echoing in the stairwell.

Three hours until midnight.

Three hours until I stopped being the girl who got thrown away and became the girl who chose to sell herself.

It felt like power, in a fucked up way.

My choice. My terms. My body, but my decision.

Derek didn't get to dictate my worth anymore.

Tonight, three Alphas would pay fifteen thousand dollars for one night with me.

That's what I was worth.

That's all I needed to be.

And maybe that was enough.