Chapter 4After He Left Me to Freeze, I Rejected Him as My Mate

At ten o'clock sharp, I still had not arrived.

The Beta came rushing in, visibly rattled. "Alpha, the Luna has canceled the ceremony. The banquet will proceed as planned, and you're covering the cost."

At that, Theodore sat straight up out of the coffin in his suit.

A splinter had torn his cuff, leaving him looking both ridiculous and undignified.

Rowena Pierce, Westridge's former Luna, stormed into the venue and ripped down the memorial portrait.

She planted herself beside the coffin and demanded, "Tell me what you've done to Lyra this time!"

Eliana sat up in Theodore's arms.

"Luna Rowena... it was only a pre-wedding test, only a joke. Lyra loves Theodore so much, she would never take it to heart."

Rowena ignored her and turned on her son instead. "Then why is Lyra still not here? Beta Grayson said she went to the hospital!"

Theodore climbed out of the coffin, his expression icy.

"She's always been frail. A cold breeze is too much for her. Now she's canceled the ceremony and humiliated me in front of everyone!"

As he spoke, he dialed my number.

"You call half an hour locked in a freezer a little breeze? You forced me to kneel and had them broadcast the video to the whole pack, didn't you?"

I answered calmly, guessing Theodore would put me on speaker.

"Lyra, get here now! Or I really will reject you."

"Come watch you make an idiot of yourself pretending to be dead?"

Nobody there had imagined I would talk back to their Alpha.

Mocking laughter rippled through the venue, and a vein pulsed in Theodore's neck. "You know it was fake. What are you doing? Did you humiliate me in front of everyone on purpose?"

"I didn't know. But what new trick could an idiot like you possibly invent?"

My mockery caught him off guard, and his voice dropped. "I put on my formal clothes and waited for you in a coffin for an hour. Don't you feel anything for me?"

I laughed. "Theodore, yesterday I begged you for half an hour inside a freezer. Did you feel anything for me?"

My retort sent him into a humiliated rage. "I already tried to talk you down. What more do you want? Get here now and let me mark you. After the ceremony, I will make Eliana apologize to you."

Did he really think an apology from Eliana could erase everything that came before it?

"It was my fault..." Eliana coughed twice as she spoke and sagged weakly into Theodore's arms.

"What's wrong, Eliana?" Theodore steadied her, ignoring everyone watching.

"I am fine. It was too stuffy in the coffin. I just can't catch my breath."

His voice softened. "Why didn't you say something earlier?"

Then he hung up on me.

I thought that was the end of their fake-death game.

But forty minutes later, the pack doctor burst into my room, his face taut with urgency.

He handed me a body-identification form and said Theodore had been attacked by rogues on his way to the hospital. They needed me to identify his body!