Stella’s POV

I didn’t wait. As soon as I hung up with my father, I grabbed the first suitcase I could find and dragged it across the floor to the bedroom. My hands shook so violently I could barely grip the zipper, but I forced myself to move. There was no time to think. If I stopped, even for a second, I knew I would fall apart under the weight of everything I had just learned. I yanked open drawers, pulling out clothes without care, shoving them into the bag in messy handfuls. My wolf stirred beneath my skin, restless and prowling, as though sensing the storm closing in around me. She hated this weakness, hated the salt of my tears as they slipped down my cheeks. Then my hand froze. It had landed on a dress. The one Joan loved most. She had spun around me in the mirror once, clapping her tiny hands, saying, “Mommy, you look like a princess in this.” The fabric crumpled in my grip as my chest tightened, breath catching painfully. I swallowed hard, blinking against the tears burning in my eyes. Not now. Not when the enemy was so close. I shoved the dress into the suitcase and slammed the drawer shut. The door creaked open behind me. “Stella?” Alpha Travis’s voice slid into the room, smooth as poison. “What are you doing?” I snapped the suitcase shut and forced a smile onto my lips, the mask of a dutiful wife. My wolf snarled at the lie, but I silenced her with sheer will. “Just rearranging my closet,” I said lightly, turning to face him. His eyes narrowed, scanning the room. He didn’t believe me. He was too practiced at deceit not to recognize it in others. But before he could say another word, another voice pierced the air. “Hey, Stella.” I froze. Lorie. My stomach twisted violently, bile rising in my throat. I hadn’t realized Alpha Travis had dragged her here, into my territory, into my den. My eyes locked on her chest before I could stop myself, on the place where my daughter’s heart beat like a stolen jewel. My wolf slammed against my ribs, snarling, demanding I rip her open and take it back. I dug my claws into my palms until the skin split, grounding myself in the sting. She carried my child’s heart and dared to smile. I said nothing. If I spoke, it would be a howl that never ended. Then I saw the bags, two sleek designer suitcases glinting behind Alpha Travis. My brow furrowed. He followed my gaze, lips curling into what he thought was a reassuring smile. “Lorie is going to be staying with us for a while.” Ice licked through my veins. “What?” Before he could spin his web of lies, Lorie stepped forward with a little laugh, her hand dropping to her stomach. “Didn’t you hear? I’m pregnant.” She rubbed her belly, lips curling into a smile so wide my wolf wanted to shred it from her face. She waited for me to squeal, to embrace her, to weep in joy. Instead, I arched a brow. “And?” Her smile faltered. For a flicker of a second, the mask cracked, and I saw her true face. The manipulator beneath the innocence, the thief who had gutted my life and still dared to play saint. Her lower lip trembled as she quickly rearranged her features into something fragile. “I thought you would be happy for me, Stella. After everything we’ve been through.” Happy? The word burned through me like acid. What exactly was I supposed to be happy about? That she carried my husband’s child, with my daughter’s heart inside her chest? Before I could answer, Alpha Travis cut in, his tone laced with irritation. “Stella, what the hell is wrong with you? She’s your best friend. You should be happy for her. Instead, you’re acting jealous and bitter.” I turned to him slowly, a sneer curling across my lips. Jealous? Bitter? “Jealous?” My voice was cold, dripping with venom. “Why on earth would I be jealous?” His eyes flashed with something ugly, and then he said it. “Because she’s having a baby, and you-” He stopped himself, but it was too late. The words had already pierced me like daggers. Because I lost mine. Because he killed mine. My breath came sharp, but I forced calm into my voice. “Then tell me, Alpha Travis,” I said softly, pointing at Lorie. “Why is she moving in here? Why does she suddenly need to live in my house?” His jaw tightened, and he stepped closer. “Because she shouldn’t be alone right now. She needs us. She needs help. That baby needs support.” Us. “Yes,” Lorie chimed in, her voice soft and pitiful. “It’s just until things settle down. I thought you, of all people, would understand.” “Exactly,” Alpha Travis said firmly. “She’s family, Stella.” I laughed, sharp and bitter. “She’s not my family,” I spat. Lorie flinched, her fake innocence cracking, while Alpha Travis’s face hardened with disapproval. “Why are you jealous of her happiness, Stella? Instead of celebrating with her, you’re acting pathetic.” He pointed at me with disgust, his voice rising. “Pathetic.” The word sliced deep, but I didn’t flinch. I tilted my head, letting a bitter smile curve my lips as my wolf’s golden eyes flashed behind my gaze. “With the way you’re acting, I have to ask, Alpha Travis,” I murmured, my tone razor-sharp, “is it your child?” The room froze. Alpha Travis’s jaw ticked. Lorie’s eyes widened in mock shock, her hand tightening protectively over her stomach. “Don’t be ridiculous,” Alpha Travis snapped, too quickly. “Of course it’s not mine.” “Really?” I lifted an eyebrow. “Then why is she moving in with us? Why are you so defensive?” “She’s alone, Stella!” Alpha Travis barked, his voice rising with frustration. “She has no one else, and she’s carrying a child. What kind of monster would turn her away?” What kind of monster would kill his own daughter? The thought screamed in my head, but I swallowed it down before it could slip past my lips. Instead, I deliberately turned back to the suitcase, gripping the zipper with steady hands. “Now, if you’ll excuse me,” I said evenly, “I’d like to finish rearranging my closet.” For a moment, silence hung heavily in the room, tension thick enough to suffocate. Then Alpha Travis murmured something to Lorie, and together they walked out. The moment the door clicked shut, my smile dropped. My hands shook as I gripped the suitcase, and my wolf growled low in my chest, her fury rumbling through my veins. She wanted to go out. She wanted to hunt. She wanted revenge. And as I stood there, shaking with grief and rage, I realized something. The countdown had begun. Alpha Travis thought he had caged me. Lorie thought she had stolen everything that mattered. But they had no idea who I truly was or the pack I belonged to. They had awakened something ancient inside me. Something stronger than grief, stronger than betrayal. They awakened the wolf.

Stella’s POV

That night, sleep abandoned me like a fickle ghost, leaving me adrift in a darkness that pulsed with secrets. I lay on the edge of our bed, staring at the shadows on the ceiling, though my wolf painted the truth clearer than sight. The air reeked of betrayal, a sour tang beneath the sandalwood musk of my mate. Alpha Travis’s breathing was steady but shallow, and my wolf caught every tremor of his heartbeat. At midnight, like a predator, he slipped from the bed, the weight of his body lifting, cold emptiness spreading across the sheets.

I kept my eyes closed, breath even, as the door clicked shut. My claws threatened to pierce my palms where I gripped the blanket. Silence pressed in, broken only by the faint thrum of the Stormfang Pack’s heartbeats beyond the walls and, sharper still, his voice tangled with Lorie’s laugh down the corridor. It cut through me like silver.

My hand drifted to my stomach, pressing against the faint swell beneath my nightgown. Life pulsed there, our child. He would never know. He had forfeited that right the moment his loyalty turned elsewhere. A true Alpha protects, claims, and shields his mate. Travis had abandoned me in my own den, crawling to another like a thief.

The night dragged like an open wound, my wolf pacing beneath my skin. The moon hung fat and silver above the horizon, casting pale light through the window. It should have soothed me, but tonight it sharpened my isolation.

When dawn bled gray across the room, Alpha Travis returned wearing a smile unworthy of an Alpha. It was the smile of a traitor who thought his sins invisible. He smelled of her; Lorie’s perfume clung to him like a brand, and my wolf recoiled, snarling inside my chest.

“Stella,” he said carefully, the way a man might approach a sleeping beast, “we need to talk.”

The way his voice curled around those words twisted my gut. “What now?” I asked, my tone sharp as a clawed strike.

He hesitated before clearing his throat. “Lorie… she shouldn’t be cramped in the guest room. She’s pregnant. She needs space and comfort.”

For a moment, the room tilted around me, my wolf’s snarl rising in my chest like thunder. “Comfort?” I repeated the word tasting bitter.

He nodded, oblivious to the storm gathering behind my eyes. “Yes. The master bedroom is bigger and more comfortable. It makes sense for her to have it.”

I released a laugh that was half disbelief, half snarl. “You want me to give up my bedroom… to Lorie?”

His jaw tightened. “It’s not forever. Just until the baby is born.”

I stared at him, fighting the wild urge to rip into his throat. My wolf clawed at my insides, screaming to reveal the truth, that I, too, was pregnant. That my pup deserved protection, not Lorie’s bastard. But my human side kept the secret locked behind my teeth. Alpha Travis didn’t deserve to know. Not yet. Perhaps not ever.

He continued, as though speaking to a subordinate. “Stella, you’ve been enjoying the comfortable room for years. Lorie is pregnant. Shouldn’t she be the one most comfortable now? Don’t you think it’s time you made a little sacrifice for your best friend?”

I pressed my lips together until they bled, my claws digging crescents into my palms. What was the point of arguing? In a day, I would be gone from this cursed house, my scent erased from these halls.

“Okay,” I whispered, my voice shaking like leaves in a storm.

His shoulders relaxed with a sigh of relief. He leaned forward and brushed his lips across my forehead, but the touch felt like ash. The wolf inside me snarled so loudly it echoed in my skull, and I had to resist the urge to flinch.

“Alpha Travis?” Lorie’s voice floated down the hallway, dripping with false sweetness.

He turned to leave immediately.

“Hold on, Alpha Travis,” I said calmly, my voice a silk veil over steel. “I need your signature on something.”

I forced my hands to stay steady as I picked up the folder I had prepared the night before.

“It’s just some minor paperwork,” I said softly, cutting off his impatient protest.

He narrowed his eyes, but Lorie called again, and his resolve cracked. “Fine. Give it here,” he snapped.

He didn’t even glance at the words before scrawling his signature across the page. My heart pounded like a war drum as I accepted the folder back. He had no idea what he had just signed, our severance, our undoing.

“Is that all?” he grunted.

“Yes,” I whispered.

He was gone before I could even inhale again, his scent trailing behind him like a wound.

I dialed my lawyer immediately. “My divorce from Alpha Travis is finalized. Pull out all my support and investment from Stormfang Enterprise.”

For years, I had been his silent benefactor, the unseen she-wolf holding up his fragile empire. Now, all of it would collapse without me. A humorless laugh escaped me as I returned to packing.

Minutes later, Lorie appeared in the doorway, her aura slick with smugness, though her voice was coated in honey. “Stella, let me help,” she cooed.

Her smile didn’t reach her eyes; it never had. I had seen that same smile when she comforted me after Joan’s death, when she whispered lies into my grieving ear.

“Don’t worry, I’ve got it,” I said, forcing a smile.

She glided in anyway, a predator disguised as prey. Her gaze flicked to the dresser where Joan’s things still rested untouched.

“Careful, don’t go there,” I snapped, my wolf’s growl bleeding into my voice.

Her smile widened. She picked up the snow globe, a delicate thing with a tiny ballerina dancing inside, Joan’s favorite. It had soothed me through countless nights of grief, the only thing keeping my wolf’s rage at bay.

“This is pretty,” Lorie said softly, tilting it back and forth. “It belonged to Joan, right?”

My chest ached. “Yes. Put it down.”

Her eyes gleamed with malice. “Oops,” she said, and released it.

The globe shattered on the floor, water spilling like blood, the ballerina broken in two.

“Oh no,” Lorie gasped, pressing a hand to her chest in mock horror. “I’m so sorry, Stella. My fingers are so clumsy these days. Pregnancy brain, you know?”

Her eyes danced with glee as she watched me, waiting for the wolf to surface.

I dropped to my knees, gathering the pieces with shaking hands, shards slicing my skin as tears blurred my vision. “It was her favorite,” I whispered, the words a broken howl.

Lorie crouched beside me, her smile sharp as a fang. “Don’t worry, Stella. You’ll have more children. You’ll move on.”

My chest burned as I lifted my gaze to her. In that moment, the fragile restraint I had clung to all night splintered like the snow globe in my hands. My wolf rose, no longer willing to be caged.

And then, I snapped.

Stella’s POV

My hands trembled as I cradled the broken ballerina in my palms, blood from my cuts dripping over the shards. The scent of iron and grief mingled with Lorie’s perfume, and my wolf’s hackles bristled. Something split inside me, a fracture tearing through the fragile barrier between my human heart and the wolf’s fury. “You bitch,” I snarled, my voice guttural, laced with a growl that no longer belonged to a woman but to the beast beneath my skin. Lorie tilted her head, that sweet smile still painted on her lips, the same one that had once tricked me into calling her friend. “Stella, calm down. It was an accident-” The word seared like silver in my veins. My body moved before thought could catch it, claws half-sprung, my hand slashing across her face. The strike cracked through the room like thunder. Lorie staggered back, clutching her cheek, her mask slipping, disbelief widening her eyes. She had never expected me to bare my fangs. “You don’t touch her things!” I roared, voice torn raw, no longer human. My eyes burned molten gold as the wolf bled through, gaze fixed and unrelenting. “You don’t destroy the one piece of her I had left-” “Stella!” Alpha Travis’s voice boomed from the doorway like a command meant for a subordinate wolf. He stormed into the room, his face a mask of rage as he rushed to Lorie, pulling her into his arms like she was the victim. “She hit me,” Lorie whimpered, tears shimmering in her eyes as she pressed herself against his chest. Her voice trembled, but her scent betrayed her; there was no fear, only the sweet, sharp tang of victory. I stood there, chest heaving, clutching the broken ballerina as shards bit into my skin. The wolf inside me wanted blood. Alpha Travis’s face hardened, his eyes burning with fury. “What the hell is wrong with you, Stella?” “She broke Joan’s snow globe!” I cried, pointing at the shattered glass on the floor. “She did it on purpose, Travis. She-” “Stop it!” he barked, his Alpha voice cracking like a whip, full of venom and dominance. “Do you even hear yourself? You’re pathetic! Bitter! Jealous of a pregnant woman, jealous of your best friend who has what you don’t have!” His words sliced into me like claws. But he wasn’t finished. “It’s not her fault you don’t have a child, Stella. Joan is dead, and maybe if you had been a better mother, maybe if you had done more-” A scream tore out of my throat before he could finish. It was a sound so wild and unhinged it made even him flinch. “Don’t you dare blame me, you bastard!” He growled back at me, his own wolf surfacing, but before I could blink, his hand lashed out. The slap landed with such force that my head snapped to the side, a shockwave ringing in my ears. My knees buckled and I crumpled to the floor, my cheek burning, my wolf howling inside me. Tears stung my eyes, not from the pain, but from the humiliation, the betrayal, the primal insult of being struck by my own mate. Lorie gasped theatrically, pressing her hands against her mouth as if horrified, but only I could see the flicker of satisfaction in her eyes. She loved this. My hands trembled as I touched my burning cheek. The golden glow of my wolf shimmered at the edges of my vision. Alpha Travis stood frozen, breathing hard, his palm still half-raised. His eyes widened, regret flickering for a heartbeat before Lorie’s voice cut through. She broke into sobs, clutching her belly like an actress on stage. “Oh, Alpha Travis,” she cried, collapsing against his chest. “This is all my fault. I never should’ve come here. I’ve caused nothing but trouble. Stella was right… I don’t deserve to live.” Her sobs were dramatic, fake, but Alpha Travis was blind when it came to her. She buried her face into his chest, sobbing harder. “I should just die and take this baby with me. Then you’ll both be free.” Alpha Travis’s shock twisted into panic. He held her tightly, stroking her hair. “Don’t say that, Lorie. Don’t ever say that. You and the baby are everything. You hear me? Everything.” I stared from the floor, my heart breaking, my wolf’s growl building into a rumble in my chest. Lorie’s tears weren’t real. The triumph in her eyes glowed like coals, but Alpha Travis, my mate, my husband, the wolf who once swore to shield me from everything, who vowed never to leave my side, believed her. He glared down at me, his arms holding Lorie tighter. “Look what you’ve done, Stella. Look at her. She’s terrified, blaming herself, because of you.” “Because of me?” My voice cracked, my claws threatening to pierce my palms. “But-” “Enough!” Alpha Travis barked, his face hardening into stone, his eyes blazing with Alpha fury. “I can’t even recognize you anymore. You’re out of control.” I opened my mouth, but Lorie released another weak sob, clutching her stomach like she was in pain. “Travis,” she whispered, pale and trembling, “the baby… it hurts.” His panic deepened. He looked at Lorie, pale and shaking, then at me with venom. “You’re staying in here until you think about your actions,” he snapped. His voice was final, cold, Alpha-command strong. I froze. “What?” “You heard me.” He wrapped his arms around Lorie, guiding her toward the door. “I won’t let you hurt Lorie or this baby. Not again.” The door slammed shut, and I heard the lock click from outside. “No!” I screamed, throwing myself at the door. My fists pounded against it until my hands throbbed. “Travis! Don’t you dare leave me in here! Open this door!” Silence. I yanked at the handle, but it didn’t budge. “Travis!” I shouted again, my voice cracking. “Please! You can’t do this!” But he didn’t come back. I was on the top floor. No way out but the locked door and the barred window. Minutes bled into hours. I screamed until my voice was hoarse, called Alpha Travis’s phone again and again until he blocked my number, cutting me off entirely. My body ached, my stomach growled, my throat burned. No food, no water. This wasn’t a bedroom anymore. It was a cage. I clawed at the door until my nails broke, leaving bloody streaks on the wood. I begged, cursed, prayed, my voice collapsing into whispers. And somewhere in that endless silence, my wolf rose. I could feel her clawing against my ribcage, pressing against my skin, howling to the moon beyond the barred window. The bond between my human pain and my wolf’s fury began to snap like threads in a storm. They thought they could lock me away. They forgot what I was. A wolf cannot be caged.