Chapter 3After I Lost Our Child, My Mate and Adopted Daughter Betrayed Me

At the restaurant in the canyon, Claire held me tight and refused to let go. "This is outrageous. You didn't let me visit you even once all year!"

Her eyes filled with tears as she shook my shoulders. "Do I really matter less to you than Ryan? Why was he allowed to visit you when I wasn't?"

Claire's expression darkened the instant she saw Ryan behind me. The warning in her next words was unmistakable.

"Lucian is negotiating with the Black Moon pack. He'll be back in a few days. Certain wolves had better keep their tails tucked in for the next few days."

The whole time, her eyes never left me. She didn't give Ryan so much as a glance.

My eyes stung. It was the first time since my discharge that anyone from my own pack had made me feel cared for.

The door to our private dining room opened, and Nina slipped inside cautiously.

Claire shot to her feet, bared her claws, and pointed at Nina. "Who told you to come?"

Ryan stepped in front of Nina, displeasure sharpening his voice. "Vera and I adopted her. What's wrong with her joining us for dinner? It happened a year ago, and Nina has spent all this time trying to atone. Why can't you give the girl a break?"

Claire snorted. "Is seducing Vera's mate while Vera is devastated how she makes amends?"

"Ryan, you keep claiming that you let her stay in the pack so she could pay for what she did. You know exactly what you've done! And you, Nina, Vera should have left you in the wilderness to starve. You shameless bitch, you have no right to call yourself her daughter!"

Claire did not hold back, and there was no stopping her. I never even got the chance to ask why she had left the pack.

Nina wept without stopping, and Ryan's expression darkened by the second.

Dinner ended in disaster. On the way home, Ryan tried to reassure me. "She was angry and talking nonsense. Don't take it seriously."

But Ryan drove distractedly the entire way home and nearly caused a crash.

His shoulders were still tight when we got home.

Before he had even taken off his coat, he pulled out his phone, his expression turning graver by the second.

He shut himself in the bathroom and took Nina's call.

Nina's anguished sobs carried through the door. "I know I have no right to compete with her. All I can do is beg for scraps of your love while she's away, but my heart hurts too...

"I wish I had been the one who was hurt a year ago. Would you have cared more about me then?

"Since I owe her a life, I'll finally be free once I give her mine, won't I?"

Ryan pushed open the bathroom door, his chest heaving and his face terrifyingly dark.

He said between ragged breaths, "Nina lives alone out there. Claire tore into her today, and I'm afraid she might hurt herself. She has no one else. I'm the only one who can protect her now..."

I knew that refusing him would not stop him anymore. I forced a thin smile. "Go check on her."

Ryan grabbed the car keys and hurried out the door.

For the second night since I came home, he chose not to stay with me.

The pain in my chest became so fierce that I ran to the bathroom and vomited until I was dizzy.

That night, I lay alone in bed, tossing and turning.

More than twenty years ago, my pack and Ryan's had gone to war, and both sets of parents died in the fighting.

But Ryan and I had been too young to know the war's cruelty, and we still found our way to each other.

Even though our bond was forbidden, we overcame every obstacle. In the end, even Lucian relented and welcomed Ryan into the pack.

Staring into the darkness around me, I sighed heavily and called Lucian.

"Lucian, I think I really was wrong."