Chapter 2
I stared at Damien, waiting for him to deny what I was thinking, but instead, he glanced toward the hallway where my mother had disappeared with Lila before looking back at me with irritation in his eyes.
"What exactly are you accusing me of?"
I almost laughed.
"You're standing outside the prenatal department with a pregnant woman while your own daughter was sick in this very same hospital. What do you think I'm accusing you of?"
"That doesn't answer my question." Damien growled, his eyes filled with hatred, but I didn’t back down. Instead, I met his gaze.
"It answers mine." I said with full conviction.
Selene moved closer to him, and my wolf snarled under my skin, baring its teeth as Damien’s eyes narrowed in immediate notice.
"Control yourself." I clenched my fists.
"I am controlling myself."
Barely.
The wolf inside me was furious. It could hear Selene's heartbeat. It could smell the faint trace of Damien's scent clinging to her clothes. It could feel the unfamiliar presence of another unborn wolf beneath her skin.
Worst of all, my wolf could sense another scent tangled with Damien’s familiar mate bond, Selene’s.
"How long has this been going on?" I asked, as casually as if I were asking about something as ordinary as Saturday's dinner plans.
Damien looked away.
"You're making assumptions."
"Then tell me I'm wrong."
Silence.
"Tell me the child isn't yours."
His jaw tightened, while Selene lowered her eyes as if she were uncomfortable, but I could see through the act, she wasn't embarrassed, she was enjoying every second of it.
“Elena,” Damien said coldly, “you should go home.”
“With my daughter?”
His eyes hardened. “Lila is being looked after.”
“By my mother.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean?”
He fell silent, refusing to answer.
I stepped closer, my wolf stirring under my skin as I held his gaze.
“Is the baby yours?” I asked again, this time more firmly, and Selene finally looked at me, her expression almost pitying.
"Elena..."
"Don't." Her lips parted.
"I never wanted to hurt you."
A bitter laugh escaped me. "You never wanted to hurt me?"
I looked at her stomach.
"You've been carrying my husband's child for five months."
She lowered her gaze, Damien stepped between us.
"That is enough, Elena. Do not cause a scene here. Just go and we will talk about this at home."
I stared at him, and something inside me finally cracked. He wasn't defending me or protecting our marriage. He was protecting her.
"Do you love her?" I asked, even knowing the answer will ruin me. Damien’s expression didn't change.
"That's not the point."
"Then what is?"
"You're making this unnecessarily difficult, Elena."
My hands trembled.
"I've spent years making things easy for you." He looked at me without emotion.
"I supported you," Damien said, his voice laced with anger. But I refused to back down.
"You tolerated me," I replied.
"I gave you a home." He said it, and I smiled bitterly at his words.
"No Alpha… You gave me a cage."
His eyes flashed, and for a second, I thought his wolf might surface, but he forced it back down.
"Don't rewrite our marriage because you're angry." I swallowed the pain rising in my throat.
"Then tell me the truth." Again, he remained silent.
"Was there ever a time when you wanted another child with me?” His eyes narrowed.
And that tiny movement told me everything as memories of discovering I was pregnant came rushing back, from the fear and happiness I had felt to Damien's cold insistence that it wasn't the right time, that the clan was under pressure and the elders were watching us, until he forced me to terminate the pregnancy, leaving me crying alone while my wolf whimpered inside me, staring at the healer's papers and warnings as Damien refused to meet my eyes and coldly insisted it was necessary.
I looked at him, finally seeing the truth I had spent years refusing to face.
“You made me do it.” His face remained unreadable, but I saw the tension in his jaw.
“You told me another pregnancy would weaken the clan.”
“At the time, things were complicated.”
“You told me the elders wouldn’t accept another child, Damien.”
“I was trying to protect our family.”
“No.” My voice trembled, but I refused to look away. “You were protecting yourself.”
Damien let out a heavy sigh.
“Elena, that was years ago.”
“But you remember.”
He fell silent.
My chest tightened as old pain came rushing back.
“Tell me why.”
“There’s no reason to discuss this here.”
“Tell me,” I demanded, my voice breaking with anger.
People were beginning to glance in our direction again, sensing the tension between us, while Damien's annoyance hardened his expression.
Selene touched his arm. Trembling as if she was the victim.
"Damien, maybe we should leave, please."
He immediately turned toward her, and that simple gesture hurt more than I expected. His wolf responded to her discomfort while mine snarled beneath my skin, reminding me that her feelings mattered to him while mine never seemed to. I looked at Selene.
"Did you know?"
She hesitated. "Know what?"
“About my pregnancy. Did you know Alpha Damien forced me to get an abortion?”
Her eyes flickered, and the sight cut deeper than I expected, reopening a wound I had spent years trying to bury. That was enough.
“You knew,” I said, a bitter smile escaping my lips.
“I heard about it,” Selene admitted. Her words made the pain in my chest twist deeper. I let out a quiet, humorless laugh.
“You heard about it from Damien?”
She said nothing. My wolf snarled.
“How convenient.”
Damien stepped forward, his expression hardening.
“Don’t involve Selene in this.”
“Why not?”
“Because she’s carrying my child.”
The words hit me like a physical blow, and my breath caught as he said it so naturally.
My child.
I looked down at Selene’s stomach, then slowly back at Damien.
"So that's what this is."
He frowned.
"What?"
"You wanted a different heir."
His expression changed. Only for a second but I saw it.
"You've been refusing to name Lila because you were waiting for this."
"Don't be ridiculous, Elena. Your daughter had nothing to do with this."
"You meant OUR daughter. And no… You have been refusing to name Lila because you wanted a son."
The silence made my stomach turn, a sickening feeling spreading through me as I looked between them. It felt like the silence itself was an answer, and I hated what it was telling me.
"That's why you never stood up for Lila."
"Lila is my daughter too, Elena."
"But not your heir." His jaw tightened.
"The council has not made a decision."
"Because you never let them."
Damien's eyes became colder. "You don't understand clan politics."
"I understand my daughter."
He scoffed. "You've always been too emotional."
I stared at him, remembering how every question I asked became an accusation, every demand for answers made me difficult, and every time I defended Lila, I was called overprotective. But today, I finally understood the truth.
He had never wanted another child with me because he had already decided that our family wasn't the family he wanted.
He wanted Selene.
And he wanted the child inside her.
I took a shaky breath. "Was that why?"
Damien said nothing.
“Was that why you forced me to terminate my pregnancy?” I asked, my voice breaking as I finally lost control, and Damien’s expression hardened.
“Lower your voice,” he warned, his tone cold and commanding.
"No." I stepped closer. "You owe me the truth."
"I don't owe you anything."
My heart broke all over again. Even after everything, some foolish part of me had hoped he would regret what he had done, but he didn't. Instead, he looked at me as though my pain were nothing more than an inconvenience.
"How dense could you be?"
I froze as Damien's voice became sharper.
"Can't you get it?" His eyes moved from mine to Selene's stomach.
"I don't want another kid with you!"
The corridor seemed to fall silent around me, and for a moment, I couldn't breathe as my wolf went completely still, leaving me painfully aware of every heartbeat nearby, the nurse behind the desk, the doctor passing by, Selene's steady pulse, Damien's, and finally my own, while his words echoed through my head until my vision blurred.
I had spent years believing there had been a reason, a sacrifice for the clan, blaming myself and carrying the guilt alone, only to realize the truth was far uglier.
Damien simply hadn't wanted my child.
I looked at Selene and saw the satisfaction in her eyes, and before I could stop myself, my hand moved, the slap cracking through the hallway as she stumbled sideways, clutching her cheek while several people gasped and Damien's expression turned murderous.
"Elena!"
I stood there trembling, my palm burning as tears filled my eyes, while Selene stared at me in shock and slowly raised a hand to her cheek.
Damien moved toward her immediately, not even sparing me a glance.
"Are you hurt?"
That question shattered the last piece of my heart because he had never looked at me like that when I cried, not once.
I swallowed hard as the pain settled deeper in my chest.
He turned toward me.
"You've lost your mind."
"No." I wiped the tears from my cheek.
"For the first time sine I married you, I think I've finally found it."
A low growl rumbled in my chest as my wolf finally broke through the restraint I had forced upon it for years, warning Damien that I would no longer submit to him.