Natalia’s POV

The dream felt so real. In it, I let out a moan as he sensually placed his hands on me, breaking our kiss. His electrifying touch sent waves of desire coursing through my veins. He lowered his head, and his kiss caressed the tender spot on my neck. I closed my eyes, hoping his affections would continue.

His breath hungrily grazed my earlobe, sending shivers down my spine. But then, in a deep, chilling voice, he said, “Never.”

I gasped, and my eyes flung open. I was alone in the room.

It had been two years since I married Adrian Miller, the future alpha of the Crystal Blood Pack. During our two years together, I had tried and failed to win his love many times over. He hadn’t even marked me yet, despite that I was his wife. And as a werewolf, I couldn’t help but want my alpha to mark me as his. He also hadn’t been home in a long time, and I yearned for his touch.

I heaved a sigh, sat slowly, and yawned. Then I looked at the clock, and my mouth dropped open.

“Shit! I’m going to be late.” I hastily went to the bathroom to take a shower and get ready for my monthly checkup with Doctor Harold Reid at the pack hospital. After quickly putting myself together, I descended the stairs and headed to the main door, thinking about my marriage.

I loved my husband dearly, despite that our marriage wasn’t perfect. I always hoped that we could have a child, too, and that maybe, with a child, Adrian would come home more often.

****

At the hospital, nerves engulfed me as Doctor Reid completed his examination, drawing the blood for the test himself. He left the room afterward, saying he’d return with the results soon.

As I waited, I resolved to divorce Adrian and put an end to my loveless marriage if I wasn’t pregnant this time.

However, Dr. Reid returned with a smile. “Congratulations!” he exclaimed.

My mouth dropped. “Really?” I stroked my stomach before naively asking, “There’s a baby?”

“Babies,” he replied.

My eyebrows drew together, and I couldn’t contain my grin.

“Twins,” he confirmed.

Tears welled and then rolled down my cheeks as joyous slashes of happiness.

“But I advise you to be careful,” Dr. Reid said. “Your uterine walls that you have are extremely thin.”

His unexpected words sobered me completely taken aback. The realization hit me that he shouldn’t have said that, and suddenly, a wave of fear for my children crept into my mind. In that instant, I knew I had to be careful. The stakes were too high, and I couldn’t afford to lose them.

“I’ll take care of myself,” I said, then thanked him before leaving the hospital, wearing a smile once again.

At least until I returned home.

There, I found Adrian with his new lover, Lynda, seated together on a couch in the living room. I stopped short. Lynda as she was crying, and he was gently comforting her. Seeing him so gentle with her, I was consumed with hurt. I clenched my fists, trying to keep my the tears at bay.

Adrian’s anger-filled eyes shifted to me. He yelled, “How dare you come back! How dare you bully Lynda!”

“What? What are you talking about?”

His expression became more ferocious. “Oh, please. You make me sick.”

Unable to bear further humiliation any longer, and not wanting to shed tears in front of another woman, I covered my mouth and scurried to my bedroom. There, I opened my nightstand drawer and pulled out the divorce agreement I’d had prepared a few months ago, after the first time Adrian had mistreated me for Lynda. Back then, I had wanted to give our marriage a second chance. I had hoped I might get pregnant and that a child would help win his heart.

But I’d been wrong to hope. With my thumb, I stroked the bold characters on the divorce agreement and whispered to myself, “He will never mark me as his mate. He will always humiliate me for his lover, which means he won’t accept my babies, either. I have no choice but to go through with it for the sake of my children.”

I wiped my tears, signed the paper, then sat on the bed and stared blankly, trying to absorb what I’d just done.

After a few moments, Adrian threw the bedroom door open violently thrown open.

I shoved the agreement into the drawer and stood. “Ad-Adrian,” I said in alarm, while watching him turn the lock.

Before I could say anything more, he strode to me and pushed me onto the bed. “Do you think you’re going to be the luna of this pack?”

I tried to squirm away from me, but he locked my hands over my head.

“Don’t forget how you set me up to marry you in the first place.” He began to undress me. Despite being held by his powerful arms, I resisted and yelled.

“No!” I yelled, working to resist him. “Please stop!”

Roughly, he kissed my neck. “You stop! Stop pretending! This is what you asked for, and you ruined my life.”

As the weight of his accusation settled, I halted my movements and met his gaze. “Then let’s get a divorce.”

Adrian froze at the word divorce. Then he heard me. He moved his head away from my neck and peered at me. “Do you even know what you are saying?” he asked, releasing his grip on my hands.

As he did so, I brought my hands close to my front body.

He stared at me, waiting for my answer, I brought my hands to the front of my body, then looked for any sign of discomfort in his expression. His question had made me wonder whether or not he was at all hurt by it. But the look in his eyes said I was wrong to wonder. He was a mighty alpha within our pack, second only to his father. Our divorce would bring his life back to normal, which was exactly what he desired. So how could he feel upset by it?

I burst into tears and repeated, “Let’s get a divorce.”

Deep lines formed between his thick brows. “Boring,” dismissively as he moved away from my body and rose from the bed. “You’re nothing but a nuisance!”

I struggled to get up. “I’m not kidding. I’m serious.” To show him just how serious, I opened the drawer and pulled out the agreement.

“What’s are those?” he asked with a grimace.

I handed him the papers. “I’ve signed them, so I am no longer your wife.”

Adrian snatched them from me, took a quick glance, then threw them aside. Grabbing me by the neck.

With a clenched jaw, he glared at me with a clenched jaw.

I tried to get myself away from him, pulling at his arms, but he tightened his hold on my neck. In silence, we struggled, the tension between us escalating, the tight grip of his hand and the unyielding pressure on my neck intensifying.

He gritted his teeth and muttered, “What do you take me for?” he asked through gritted teeth. “Do you think you can do whatever you want?”

As I attempted to settle myself down. “I will leave the Crystal Blood Pack,” I said, my voice breaking.

His hand moved from my neck to my jaw, and the slash of his mouth morphed into a devilish smirk, one that had the power to shake people to their very core. “Are you kidding? Where would a wolfless werewolf such as yourself, where will you go if you leave my pack? Who would take you in?”

I looked into his hate-filled eyes. I was the only person he despised, and he had another woman, too. So why question me? If he wanted to remain with her, why not just release me from our entanglement?

I could see hatred in his eyes. I was the only person he despised. He had no feelings for me in his heart. These past two years were nightmare for me; I tried everything possible just to please him. But this man was cruel and never noticed my love for him.

Even though I was aware that he did not love me, I continued to harbor the hope that he would eventually return to his wife or at least understand her love for him.

“I-I was in this marriage because I thought one day we would have a happy family with our childr—”

“Children?” He glared at me. “How could you even think like this? I would allow you to carry my heir, you foolish woman? Quit your daydreaming about something that you will never be able to get.”

Shocked, I couldn’t help but gape. I knew then that I couldn’t let him know about my pregnancy. My babies would be mine alone. I would bring them up with pure love, not with his hatred.

“What? ?” he asked, pressing his fingers firmly against my jaw. “Cat caught your tongue?”

I gathered up courage and said, “Why don’t you sign the papers?”

His eyes grew shadowy, yet blazed at the same time. “You think I won’t sign?”

I stared at him, jutting my chin against his hand in defiance, though my heart raced so quickly that it quivered. Deep down, I wanted him to reconsider our marriage and tell me he didn’t want me to leave, tell me he wanted me and not another woman. I wanted him to tell me that he wanted our marriage to continue forever. Though he never loved me, he would not sign it for the sake of those moments when we were together.

Instead, he released his grip on my jaw and took a step back. Then he snorted and snatched up the papers he’d discarded. Grabbing the pen off my nightstand, he hurriedly signed his name on the divorce papers as though he couldn’t get rid of me fast enough.

My eyes moved from his hand to his face. There was no sign of regret there, only indifference.

Though I’d had the papers drafted, I never imagined such indifference or the emptiness I’d experience as a result. Pain seared through my heart as though he’d pierced it with needles. It was a searing pain.

How could he feel nothing while disconnecting someone from his life who had always shown so much care for him? Did I love him less? Was my love not more powerful than his lover?

As if his indifference weren’t enough, he casually tossed the divorce papers to the floor. He then reached into his wallet, he pulled out a bank card, and slammed it into my hand. “Take this. Consider it as your payment for the bed services you have provided over the past two years.”

My eyes welled, and a tear fell silently as he turned and left the room. I lowered my head.

I had been used. So utterly used. His words echoed in my mind, each syllable reminding me of his betrayal. I had given him my heart and trust. In return, he had treated me as nothing more than a convenience.

The sharp edge of the card cut into my palm. I stared at it and then the floor, unsure how long I had been lost in thought, every memory of the time we’d spent together flooding back into my mind. Slowly, I slowly placed my hand on my stomach and said, “I am sorry. I have to take you both away from your father to protect you.”

This time, I placed the bank card and placed it on the nightstand, then packed a suitcase, all the while wiping away tears.

He’d made fun of my love. He’d used me for “bed service.”

“I will never forget that, Adrian Miller,” I said as I closed the latch on the bag.

Adrian’s POV

I sat brooding amid loud bar music and colorful mist. “How dare she prepare the divorce papers?” I muttered to myself while staring at the drink before me. “And she thought I wouldn’t sign them?” My lips morphed into a twisted grin. “But I destroyed her little plan, didn’t I?”

I felt that Natalia was not only a really dull woman, but a wicked person. I could still vividly recalled the details of the events that led up to our marriage. She had been eighteen the night we “met.” It had been my twenty-first birthday, and she’d drugged me. I woke next to her in a hotel bed the following morning and I understood it must be Natalia who did that.

I hated her from that day forth, especially after my father demanded that I had to marry her.

She had to have begged my father to marry me, too. Seeing how she was the daughter of a gamma, she had no chance to be the pack’s luna otherwise. So she’d entrapped me. And my father, in his perfection and compassion for other pack members, didn’t give it a second thought before he sacrificed his own son’s life. Worse, he’d blackmailed me about my future position as alpha to force me into marrying that evil woman.

To think she set me up with the intention of sleeping with me. That evening was the night of my twenty-first birthday. At such a tender age, that woman could formulate plots and trap me like that at such a tender age.

Although I slept with Natalia, I never felt any bond with her either, despite that we’d slept together. It was why I had never marked her. Not to mention that she didn’t deserve my mark. Besides, she didn’t even have a wolf, so my mark would have been useless anyway. What was odd was that my wolf had surprising affection for Natalia, despite that she didn’t possess a wolf of her own.

Regardless, I’d been lucky. Fate had allowed me to meet another woman, one named Lynda, who was both sexy and beautiful. Even better, after asking about a scar on her arm.

One day, I had learned she was the little girl who’s saved me as a child. She was working on saving ne once again now. She had heard about the divorce, so she’d come with me to the bar, offering comfort.

I felt her hand on my lap and turned to her.

She pressed her body against mine and said, “Don’t worry. That woman doesn’t deserve you. Be with me. I’ll always stay beside you.” She moved back and offered her hand. “Come with me,” she invited seductively.

I took her offered hand and followed her way through the crowd until she stopped in front of a door that led to one of the bar’s private couch-filled rooms. She pulled me inside, shutting the door behind us.

Her alluring figure made me want to take her right then, so I shoved her onto a couch, getting ready to do just that. But my wolf frantically stopped me. ‘No! You’ll regret if you sleep with her!’ he yelled telepathically. ‘She’s not our mate.’

His insistence perplexed me. ‘If you don’t want Lynda because she is not our mate, then why do you want that wolfless woman?’ I asked him in anger.

He ignored my question, instead saying, ‘I will take control if you insist on doing this.’

That wasn’t something I could risk, so I sighed and lifted myself off of Lynda.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, frowning.

“You’re a pure woman,” I said, patting her hand. “I don’t want to ruin you. Wait for the right time.”

It was an excuse, but what else could I say?

***

A short while later, I left the bar, frustrated with my life being dictated by both my father and my wolf. After a ride home with my driver constantly glancing at me in fear, likely because of my angry demeanor, we arrived at my residence. Natalia, the reason for my distress, was leaving the house, carrying a heavy suitcase.

I was so badly wanted to take all my wrath out on her. So I launched myself out of the car, slammed the door, and stormed over to her. She noticed me and paused her steps.

“Where are you going?” I asked in demand, while eyeing her suitcase.

“I told you.”

“Told me what?” I roared at her.

She shuddered.

So feeble. If the sound of my human voice was too much for her to take, what would she do if I used my alpha voice?

“I’m leaving your house and your pack as well,” she said.

I snorted. Who was she kidding? How could she leave without the head Alpha and Luna’s permission from my father and mother, the head alpha and luna of the pack in shame.”? “Why? Staying in my pack too shameful for you?” I said, goading her.

She averted her gaze from me like a scaredy cat.

“Coward woman. You have nowhere to go. Who will dare to give shelter to their future alpha’s divorced wife? No one! You’re still a member of this pack. If you have the audacity to cross the boundary, you’ll be killed by wolves.”

She began crying false tears. With a snide look of derision, I brushed by her, heading for the house, intent on leaving her outside alone. But as I was about to cross the threshold, the sounds of sobbing stopped. Curious, I turned and saw her crumpled on the ground.