7

LEAH’S POV 

In my past life, when Willow put on that grand performance, I let it break me. I let the raw, bleeding hurt show plain as day on my face. My lower lip had trembled. 

My eyes had filled with bitter tears. I had felt so thoroughly humiliated that I snapped at her in front of everyone, screaming that she was a thieving fake who had stolen my life.

And how did my family reward me for showing my pain?

Augustine and Leonardo tore into me without mercy. They shouted at me for being an ungrateful, jealous creature. Augustine had towered over me, his Beta dominance crashing down until my knees hit the floorboards, declaring that I was an ambitious little rat who had no right to crave things that belonged to Willow. 

They told me I should be satisfied that I was even allowed to set foot in Eclipse Academy, and that I ought to keep my miserable face out of polite society.

As punishment for daring to look hurt, they left me behind.

I spent that entire evening sitting alone in the dark house, staring at the cold walls while my family dined on fine food and drank sweet wine at the Alpha’s side. 

I sat on the hard kitchen stool, listening to the quiet ticking of the hall clock, nursing bruises on my wrists and knees from where Augustine had shoved me down. I had cried until my eyes were swollen shut, wondering why my years of devotion meant less than a few weeks of Willow's delicate sighs.

Present Leah will not make that mistake.

I will not give Willow the sick satisfaction of seeing me hurt. I will not let them leave me behind tonight.

I need to be in that room. Because in my past life, it was only a week after they returned from that dinner that I overheard the pack children playing near the stream, blabbering about how an engagement between Willow and Asher had been put up for formal discussion during the feast.

An engagement.

Back then, the pack had already been dropping subtle hints, but that specific night was when the idea transformed into a real, binding plan. I need to see who brought it up. 

I need to know whose mouth pushed for it, and how they laid the groundwork to replace me so effortlessly. Was it Alpha Lockwood, looking to solidify his ties with Captain Rosante? Was it Augustine, eager to marry his newly found blood daughter into the highest chair in the Eastern territory? 

“Or was it Asher himself, discarding me the moment a prettier, fragile option presented herself?”

I need to hear the words spoken with my own ears. Information is the only currency that matters to me now.

As I reach the foot of the stairs, I see Bea standing near the front coat rack, adjusting the soft collar of her lace shawl. She turns when she hears my footsteps, her soft brown eyes settling on me.

"Oh, Leah," Bea says, her tone hesitant. She clears her throat, shifting her weight from one foot to the other as she nervously adjusts the silver brooch pinned to her collar. "How are you feeling tonight?"

Compared to Augustine and Leonardo, who treat me like dirt wiped off their boots, Bea hasn't changed her outward demeanor toward me as aggressively. 

She doesn't scream at me. She doesn't flex aggressive physical pressure, which she doesn’t have, to crush me into submission. But the space between us has grown strained, dry, and beyond repair.

Past Leah would have begged for Bea's touch. Past Leah would have clung to her apron strings, weeping and calling her mother, desperate for the woman who had wiped her fevers to hold her just one more time. 

I used to stand near the kitchen door while she cooked, hoping she would ask me to chop herbs like we used to. I used to make her favorite lavender tea and leave it on her side table, only to find it cold and untouched hours later.

Present Leah knows the truth. Bea secretly looks at my face and sees her dead, traitor of a sister, Clara. She looks at me and feels a deep, quiet resentment, believing I am living proof of Clara’s ultimate victory over her happiness. 

Every time she looks at my green eyes, she isn't seeing the girl she raised for eighteen years. She is seeing the woman who tried to seduce her husband and stole her child out of spite.

It’s a shame that she, Clara, and I all have these green eyes, yet she looks at me, and can’t even see the girl she thought was once her child. 

I want nothing to do with this woman anymore. I don't need a mother, and I certainly don't need her.

I stop at the base of the stairs, keeping my hands folded neatly in front of my dress. My face remains completely calm, devoid of any lingering sadness.

"I am fine," I reply, my voice smooth, polite, and totally distant. "Thank you for asking, Aunt Bea."

Bea freezes.

The word hangs in the quiet hall like a sudden drop in temperature. Bea’s hands pause on her shawl, her eyes widening in genuine shock. Until this very second, I had stubbornly, desperately clung to calling her 'Mother', even when Augustine barked at me to shut my mouth and remember my place. 

I had fought for that title like a drowning person clutching at a floating plank of wood.

Hearing 'Aunt' fall so smoothly and cordially from my lips rocks her to her core.

Bea parts her lips, a look of confusion and sudden panic flitting across her face. "Leah... wait, why did you—"

Before she can finish her sentence, heavy footsteps echo down the upper hallway.

Augustine and Leonardo descend the stairs, walking on either side of Willow like a pair of royal guards protecting a fragile omega princess.

I internally snort at the sight. It is almost comical how carefully they escort her.