All Chapters of Rejected by My Mate, Married to The Alpha: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

The kitchen was already loud by the time Ava came down, and none of the noise was for her. “Mother, tell her to move the vases before the guests arrive,” Bree was saying, arms crossed over a robe that cost more than anything in Ava’s closet. “She always puts them where people trip.” “I didn’t put them anywhere,” Ava said. “I haven’t touched the front room since yesterday.” Bree didn’t look at her. She never looked at her when she talked about her, only around her, like Ava was furniture that occasionally made noise. “Well, someone did,” Bree said. “And it wasn’t me.” Their stepmother, Delia, came in wiping her hands on a towel, already dressed for the day though it wasn’t yet seven. She glanced at Ava the way she always did, quick and assessing, checking for something to correct. “Your hair,” Delia said. “Fix it before your father comes down. He has the Hendrick meeting this morning and I won’t have him distracted by you looking like you slept in a hedge.” “I did sleep fine,”

The ceremony hall had been transformed overnight into something Ava barely recognized, garlands of white flowers strung along every beam, the long central aisle lined with candles that made the whole room smell faintly of warm wax and crushed lavender. She’d helped set half of it up herself and still found herself startled by how different it looked full of people, every bench packed, every wall lined two deep with pack members who hadn’t managed to find seats. She’d claimed her spot near the back wall an hour early, tucked half behind a column, exactly where she intended to stay for the rest of the evening. From there she had a clear view of the raised platform at the front where the elders stood, and a clearer view still of her own family seated in the second row, close enough to the front to matter, the way she never was. The ceremony opened the way it always did, the eldest elder recounting the old story of the goddess and her first gift of bonded mates, the words worn smooth

By the third morning, the whispering had mostly stopped, which somehow felt worse than the whispering itself.Ava came down to breakfast the way she always did, expecting the usual noise, the usual jostle of Bree complaining about something and Delia issuing corrections and Colt eating standing up because sitting down felt like a commitment he wasn’t willing to make before noon. Instead she found the kitchen unnervingly normal, everyone going about their morning like Thursday night hadn’t happened at all, like she hadn’t stood in the center of the ceremony hall and been publicly discarded by a man who’d barely known her name.“You’re up,” Delia said, not looking up from the bread she was slicing. “Good. The linens from the ceremony still need washing before they’re returned to the hall. I want that done today.”“Okay,” Ava said, because there wasn’t anything else to say to that.“And someone needs to take the extra chairs back to the Council house. I told your father you’d handle it,

The formal welcome was held that same evening, hastily arranged but impressively assembled given the hours they'd had to prepare it, the great hall lit with the beeswax candles Delia had insisted on, long tables set with whatever finery the house still had from better years.Ava wasn't seated at the tables. She hadn't expected to be. She found her usual place near the kitchen doorway instead, close enough to help ferry dishes, far enough to stay out of the way of anyone who mattered, which tonight meant everyone except her.From there, she had a clear view of the head table, where her father sat beside Alpha Draven Voss in the seat of honor, and where Bree had somehow maneuvered herself into the chair directly across from their guest, laughing at something with the particular brightness she reserved for people worth impressing.Ava studied him properly for the first time, unhurried now that the chaos of arrival had settled into something more composed. He was younger than she'd expect

The Council chamber wasn't a room Ava was ever allowed inside, not even to deliver refreshments. She'd carried the trays as far as the heavy double doors, only to have one of the younger warriors posted outside take them directly from her hands."I'll carry them in," he said, not unkindly, just matter-of-fact. "Household staff don't go past this door during a sitting Council meeting. Especially not this one.""I wasn't planning to linger," Ava said, though she hadn't actually been given the chance to plan anything at all.He disappeared inside with the trays, and the door swung most of the way shut behind him, catching for just a moment on its hinge before settling into a narrow gap, not quite closed. Ava told herself she should walk away. She didn't. She set herself against the wall just beside the doorframe instead, close enough to hear, far enough, she reasoned, that it hardly counted as anything more than standing in a hallway that happened to have voices drifting through it."Thr