Who Are The Main Characters In How To Listen, Hear, And Validate?

Victoria, "Tori", a young lady fresh out of nursing school landed her dream job at the prestigious Hidden Falls Medical Center. Her boss asks her if she would work at a home with a young man injured in a house fire. When she learns he is the next Alpha to the Hidden Falls Pack and all of her fears and anxiety returns. Memories of her mother taking her away from her father, an Alpha himself, due to infidelities and growing up with twisted horror stories of werewolves told by her mother just to keep her away from her father. Learning at a young age that she has a Genesis wolf, or healer wolf, but unable to shift, she decided to use her abilities to help others. Little does she know that her father has been searching for his little girl for seventeen years. After looking for her in every town, city, and even a few other packs, his Beta, Victor, and his Gamma, Eric, have stumbled upon her by sheer chance. Having known Tori when she was a little girl, Victor is excited and impatient to find her and bring her home. He is so close until he learns from Eric, who happens to be Tori's best friend's fiancé and mate, that she will be going to another pack, just out of reach. As her friend comes along to the pack as her assistant, she works with the injured Alpha, who turns out to be her fated mate, but later rejects her, she learns more about her abilities, and the power she possesses, and desired by the greedy Alpha who will stop at nothing to have her, even after rejecting her. But a second chance mate is ultimately her savior and has been with her all along.

My sister was autistic. The doctors called it "severe sensory overload." The rule was simple: No sudden noises. Ever. So my whole life was set to mute. I never wore heels. I never raised my voice. I wasn't even allowed to laugh. It was all to keep her from having a meltdown. My father, Victor, the Don of the Castellano family, would grip my shoulder. His face was a mask of apology. "Sera, you're my good girl. Protecting your sister is our duty. You're healthy and strong. You can sacrifice a little for her, can't you?" That day, I was on the second-floor terrace and accidentally knocked over a pot of white roses. The sound of it shattering sent my sister, who was sunbathing in the garden below, into a meltdown. For the first time, Victor glared at me like I was the enemy. He roared, "Can't you just be quiet? Do you want to drive her insane?" My sister backed away in terror, right into a glass table, and let out a piercing scream. Victor charged past me, a blur of rage and panic. He slammed into me on the stairs as I was running down to help. I lost my footing and crashed chest-first into the sharp corner of a wrought-iron banister post. Pain exploded in my chest. I opened my mouth to scream, but only silence came out. My family swarmed around my shrieking sister. No one even glanced at me. My lungs filled with blood. I was drowning on the floor. They all thought my sister, the one with autism, needed the family's comfort. They thought I just took a fall. That I could wait. They were wrong.

I go deaf in an attempt to save James Duncan. He falls to his knees before my parents and begs them to let me marry him. He says he'll care for me for life. He finally passes his five-year test, but he sleeps with his lover before our wedding. He does it before my very eyes. He clamps a hand over her mouth and says, "Be quiet. Don't wake Layla up." His lover giggles and nibbles on his palm. "What's there to be afraid of? She's deaf; she can't hear us." James doesn't know that I've already regained my hearing. He and his lover are also unaware that their behavior is being livestreamed.

Everyone in the circle called me the chatty woman around Wilson Lewis, who had poor hearing and was notoriously aloof. I would stand up for him, take drinks on his behalf, and accompany him to the hospital. When he had to get his hearing aid adjusted, I would crouch beside the table to replace its batteries for him, yet he never so much as looked up at me. One time, I drank on his behalf until I was dead drunk at a wine party, but he only glanced down at me calmly. Another time, I spent the entire morning waiting with him on the day of his follow-up checkup, but he texted his unattainable love, Noelle Surrey, instead. Wilson: [Have you eaten lunch yet?] During our three years of marriage, I became a joke in the eyes of others. On the night of our wedding anniversary, he wanted to make things up for the birthday celebration he owed me. When I was being dragged away through the back alley of a convenience store, I saw him sitting in the Maybach parked at the alley entrance through the half-open car window, unboxing a cake. I screamed until my throat bled, my fingernails digging into the wall. He glanced up at the alleyway entrance, took off his hearing aid, and put it in his pocket. When I got home in the wee hours, he was still helping Noelle with her resume. Seeing my disheveled state, he just frowned and said, "Jaclyn Scott, can you please stop making such a scene every time?" Noelle chuckled on the other end of the phone. "Wilson, is she playing victim again?" I pushed the divorce papers and a USB drive in front of him. "Wilson, I'm done making a scene. This time, it's your turn to listen."

At the party, my daughter deliberately raises a question to my husband. "Daddy, since Ms. Lloyd is having your baby, does that mean we'll be living with her in the future?" He places the nicely cut steak onto my plate and answers softly, "Your mommy and I made a deal—whoever betrays first will disappear from the other's life. I can't afford for that to happen, darling, so this must stay a secret. Even when the baby is born, I will never let Mommy find out about them." Then, he signs to me, "I'll always love you." My eyes turn red-rimmed without him noticing. Little does he know, my hearing was restored a week ago. He doesn't realize I've learned about the mistress he's been hiding either. And he definitely doesn't know I've secretly bought a ticket to volunteer-teach in the Seru Plateau. All I have to do is wait for the paperwork to clear in seven days. Then, I'll disappear from his life for good.

Being a mute used to be simple before all the craziness started. I just can't talk and that's who I am. Mum has learned to accept that and I guess so have I. Everything was just fine in my high school in Shanghai. I had finally made it to year twelve and even though I was in China, I was actually being treated as a human being despite my disability. Things were definitely not perfect but I would give anything to go back to that, like it was before. I heard my first voice that year, right at the beginning of year 12. I didn’t really have any real friends, but I was used to it and before the voices started, I was fine with that. But it all changed when I first heard them. The voices inside their heads started then and my life was never the same. They weren't just thinking about school or they girls or guys they were into, no they were thinking about doing things, doing horrible things to each other and I was the only one that knew how messed up they really were.