After my secret crush was discovered, my adoptive uncle Kieran, who always loved me, completely became a different person.

He no longer smiled at me, and he began to stay far away from me.

I tried everything, even stripped naked and stood before him begging him to mark me.

All I got in return was his words of rejection: disgusting.

Three months later, he even brought my best friend Scarlett home and claimed her as his fiancée.

Looking at the deep wariness in his eyes toward me, I suddenly smiled with relief.

I agreed to my Alpha grandfather's tentative proposal for an arranged mating.

But when I finally gave up him and mated to another Alpha, why did he beg me to come back?

After my secret crush was discovered, my adoptive uncle Kieran, who always loved me, completely became a different person.

He even brought my best friend Scarlett home and claimed her as his fiancée.

Looking at the deep wariness in his eyes toward me, I suddenly smiled with relief.

I agreed to my Alpha grandfather's tentative proposal for an arranged mating.

"Sure, an arranged mating sounds good. I haven't found my mate anyway."

My calm words surprised everyone.

Grandmother teased me curiously.

"What’s wrong with you, little girl? Didn't our Aria always get angry whenever this topic came up?"

Yes, before, whenever anyone mentioned dating or arranged matings, I'd storm off and cause a scene.

But today, I agreed so calmly.

Grandfather was obviously surprised, but more relieved. The wrinkles at the corners of his eyes smoothed out happily.

"Our Aria has grown up! Kieran's having his mating ceremony next month, and now Aria has plans too. Double blessings from Moon Goddess!"

I smiled, but my gaze drifted to the man I'd loved for over ten years.

He didn't look up.

Only after he finished peeling the shrimp in his hands did he say flatly.

"Good for her. Aria's grown up."

Then his gaze swept over from above, heavy and dark, landing on my face.

Just one glance, emotionless, yet so heavy it made my chest feel tight.

I lowered my eyes, avoiding that stare.

The woman sitting on his other side laughed softly.

"It's good that Aria can accept arranged mating. We can have our mating ceremonies together. It'll be even more fun."

It was Scarlett, my former best friend.

She spoke as if she were my future aunt-in-law.

"What type does Aria like? I know quite a few great Alphas. I promise Aria will like them."

Kieran didn't respond to her suggestion about joint ceremonies.

He just turned to look at her, the corner of his mouth lifting in an extremely faint curve.

He raised his hand to gently brush away the stray hair by her cheek, his eyes showing a kind of loving tenderness I'd never possessed.

I gripped my hands tightly under the table, nails digging into my palms, desperately fighting back the burning heat rising to my eyes.

"Someone from a good family will do. Grandfather's choice can't be wrong."

The food on the table tasted like cardboard.

Listening to Scarlett's sweet laughter across from me, I couldn't help but think of the past.

Kieran was ten years older than me. After his parents died in the war, Grandfather adopted him as a son.

So, I had to call him uncle.

When I was five, in a border war, my parents both died in a rogue wolf attack.

Seven days after my parents' funeral.

I was clutching my worn rabbit toy, curled up inside a wardrobe.

He removed the wardrobe door and pulled me out.

The fifteen-year-old boy wrapped my frozen feet in his school jacket and carried me on his back to my parents' grave, limping all the way.

He twisted his ankle while looking for me, but he told me it didn't hurt.

How could it not hurt? His wolf hadn't awakened at that time.

"Don’t be afraid, Aria."

He tucked my cold little feet into his arms to warm them, his voice hoarse.

"Uncle's here."

From then on, he was incredibly gentle with me.

He understood what it felt like to have no parents, and he granted my every wish.

How does a teenage boy love someone?

He'd wrap me in his coat and run red lights when I had a fever. In the emergency room, his pale face looked more like the patient than me.

Just because I said one word about being scared, he flew back from European pack. When I opened my eyes again, I saw his gentle gaze.

At that time, I fell hopelessly in love with this man.

At eighteen, I didn’t find my mate after I shifted, so I decided to follow my heart.

Encouraged by Scarlett, I gathered my courage, put on lace lingerie, and slipped into his bed.

Even now, I still remember the shock and confusion on his face.

He panicked and threw me, bedding and all, into the bathtub, turned on hot water to wash my tear-streaked face, then turned and left without looking back.

For seven days I called him non-stop, finally getting only one text message.

I am your uncle.

When he came back, he'd become a different person.

Cups I'd touched needed cleaning, sofas I'd sat on got new covers. Once, just picking up a file he'd dropped earned me a sharp rebuke.

"Stay far away from me. Can't you understand?"

To make me give up completely, he even brought Scarlett home three months ago and announced their engagement.

I cried myself unconscious, demanding to know why.

Why would he rather be with my best friend than accept me.

Kieran's words chilled me to the bone. "To stop you from having those disgusting dreams."

He was right.

So now the dream was over.

I decided not to love him anymore.

Finally making it through dinner, Grandfather said.

"Kieran and Aria should stay here tonight. The rooms are all ready."

Staying here meant I'd have to watch them inseparable all night, loving and sweet.

I shot up from my chair, the legs scraping against the floor with a harsh screech.

"Grandfather, I just remembered there's some urgent business at the pack I need to handle. I have to go back."

Without waiting for their response, I practically fled.

Not until the night wind hit my face did I realize it was raining outside.

Heavy rain was pouring down.

Just as I gripped the car door handle, Kieran's voice caught up with me.

Through the sound of rushing rain, his voice carried a few notes of urgency.

"Aria!"

My heart jumped violently, and I turned around almost in panic.

I despised myself even as my heart pounded uncontrollably.

Through the rain mist, he stood on the estate steps holding a black umbrella.

But his gaze didn't land on me at all.

He looked at Scarlett beside him with concern and worry, his tone carrying indescribable anxiety.

"Scarlett isn't feeling well. I need to take her to the healing center first."

So it wasn't to keep me here.

He came for the car.

Scarlett let out a perfectly timed weak moan.

"Kieran, I'm so dizzy."

But her eyes glanced at me over his shoulder, her mouth curving in a triumphant smile.

Kieran was already walking over.

He reached out and pulled open the car door, rainwater streaming down the watch on his wrist.

It was the one I'd given him for his twentieth birthday.

Even though the face was cracked, he'd never thrown it away.

He used to be so careful with that watch, let alone getting it rained on - he wouldn't even let it get wet washing his hands.

Now he could let rainwater seep through the crack.

My nose stung, and I turned away awkwardly.

Before leaving, he pulled out his phone and tapped it a few times.

"I transferred fifty thousand to you. Take a taxi yourself."

But he'd forgotten - the estate was in the mountains. No taxis came here.

Even if he remembered, he probably wouldn't care. He'd just tell me to shift into wolf form and run back myself.

I watched the red taillights blur into a smudge in the rain curtain and smiled bitterly.

Aria, you really are pathetically cheap.

I turned and plunged into the overwhelming curtain of rain, the icy water instantly soaking me through.

The fabric clung to my skin, cold enough to pierce my bones.

The car I'd arrived in was still broken down three kilometers away on the mountain road. My phone screen flickered in my palm before dying completely.

I could have gone back to borrow an umbrella, or even swallowed my pride and asked the butler for a car.

But I didn't want to. I didn't even want to shift - I just wanted to walk the mountain road in human form.

The rainwater hit my face, stinging.

I suddenly remembered that summer when I was fifteen.

The same stormy night, the same broken-down car.

I'd just gotten my acceptance letter to the Royal Healer Academy, and I insisted Kieran take me to the mountaintop to watch the meteor shower.

Halfway there, the car died.

I was only fifteen then, wearing new canvas shoes, stomping my feet and refusing to step in the mud.

He'd stopped and looked at me thoughtfully.

Kieran was twenty-five then, had already established his own pack and was a powerful Alpha, yet he was still willing to play such childish games with me.

"Let Uncle take you to see it."

Then right there in the rain, he shifted.

His clothes tore away as his body expanded and changed, dark fur sprouting as he transformed into a massive black wolf.

The mountain path was dark, cicada songs scattered by the rain.

I climbed onto his broad back, my fingers tangling in his thick fur.

He moved steadily through the darkness, his powerful muscles rippling beneath me with each step.

Even with me on his back, he had energy to spare, occasionally shaking slightly when I started to slide.

You're heavier, his voice came through our mental link, warm with amusement. No more stealing my chocolate.

I deliberately let rainwater drip from my hair onto his ears. Are you going to throw me off then?

He suddenly crouched down as if to shake me off.

In panic, I grabbed fistfuls of his fur, and I heard his rumbling laugh in my mind.

Who would dare drop our Aria? Besides, if a certain little crybaby really started crying, I'd be the one hurting.

My heart raced like a startled deer.

I secretly leaned forward to press my face against his neck.

It felt like all the stars in the sky had fallen into his dark eyes when he turned to look at me.

Later I fell asleep on his back.

When I woke up, I was in my own bed.

Dawn light leaked through the curtain gaps, and he sat on the carpet beside my bed, arms folded as a pillow, sleeping deeply in his human form again.

I reached out, my fingertips tracing the pale shape of his lips.

The rain suddenly grew fiercer.

I stumbled and caught myself against a roadside tree.

The rough bark scraped across the wounds on my palm, making me gasp from the pain.

Looking up through blurred, teary eyes, I realized this road wasn't even the way home.

Unconsciously, I'd walked toward the apartment where the man who once carried me through endless nights used to live.

After my confession, Kieran never set foot in this cabin again.

Afraid of triggering painful memories, I didn't dare stay here either.

Three years later, I stepped inside once more.

Just as I entered the foyer, I locked eyes with two figures in the living room.

I was soaked through, water dripping from my hem and spreading dark stains across the carpet. My hair stuck messily to both sides of my face, looking as messy as a wet dog.

In the center of the living room, Kieran's hand froze mid-air, gripping a glass of moonshine wine.

He shot to his feet, knocking over the bottle of elderberry wine on the table.

His Adam's apple bobbed once, his gaze falling on my soaked clothes.

"How did you... end up like this?"

Scarlett cried out, grabbing tissues to wipe the wine stains from her dress.

When she looked up again, she wore an expression of helpless tolerance.

"How did you get so drenched? Don't tell me you actually walked all the way back from the estate? Didn't we give you money for a taxi? Even if you wanted to make your uncle worry, you can't deliberately walk through the rain like this. What if you get sick?"

"I know you're hurting inside, but how can you not take care of yourself? I remember you weren't like this before."

The concern in Kieran's eyes instantly turned cold.

"Aria, I thought you had at least some self-respect."

The chandelier's glow cast soft edges around his silhouette.

I looked at this man who once carried me on his shoulders to see the stars, my vision beginning to blur.

"Sorry, I'll leave right now. But could I just..."

My body temperature was burning through my clear thinking. I could barely whisper my request.

"Borrow the bathroom for a quick hot shower? It'll be fast."

He stared at me silently.

Scarlett tugged on his arm with a drawn-out whine.

"Come on, Kieran, don't be mad at a kid. Aria's still young."

"She's a month older than you. You call that a kid?"

The wine glass was set down hard on the table.

Kieran grabbed his jacket from the sofa, and as he passed me, he brought a gust of cold air.

"Lock the door when you leave."

His voice brushed past my ear.

"And clean up the floor."

Outside, car headlights swept across the ceiling, bright as daylight for an instant before quickly returning to darkness.

The moment hot water hit my body, I slid down to sit on the shower floor.

How I stumbled and fell into the master bedroom bed afterward, I can't remember clearly.

I only remember the instant I sank into the soft blanket, my nostrils filled with his scent.

The high fever made time and space feel chaotic.

In a daze, someone pried open my clenched palm and fed me a round herbal tablet.

The moment the bitter moonshine herbs dissolved, I whimpered and bit down on that hand.

A suppressed sigh brushed past my ear.

"Little crybaby."

That nickname made me break down in tears.

How many years had it been since I heard it? So long it felt like a lifetime ago.

I sobbed incoherently, chasing after the cup's edge.

"Uncle, don't abandon me... I'll be good and listen..."

The glass cup fell to the floor with a muffled thud.

I sensed something.

Opening my eyes, I saw nothing.

Only half a glass of warm water sat quietly on the nightstand.

I hadn't expected him to avoid me like I was venomous.

I couldn't tell if my head hurt more or my heart.

I just pulled the blanket over my head and let the tears fall.