The Alpha’s Biggest Regret: Begging For A Second Chance

Sara's POv The papers were already on his desk when I walked in. I looked at them, and back at him, "So you have decided." Caden stood at the window with his back to me. He didn't turn around. "Sera—" "You brought her into this house without explaining who she was. You gave her my room. You have been sleeping down the hall for two weeks and you have not once looked at me the way a husband looks at his wife." I pulled the chair out and sat down because my legs were not as steady as my voice. "And now there are divorce papers on your desk. So yes. You have decided." He turned then. His face is doing that thing — that careful, closed-off thing — where he looks like he is managing a political situation rather than talking to his wife. "I was going to explain everything—" "You brought your mistress home, Caden. You gave her my place in this house. What is there to explain?" "Isolde is not my mistress." "Then what is she?" He says nothing. I look at the papers at his name already signed at the bottom. "You didn't even wait," I scoffed. "You signed it before you called me in here. This was never a conversation." ********* My life went to ruins about four weeks earlier. I was in the kitchen with Marta, the pack house head maid, going through the menu for Caden's business dinner. She had her notebook out, pen moving, asking questions, and I had my tea at my elbow. "And for dessert, Luna?" "The peach cake," I said. "The good one with the cream filling." She grinned and wrote it down without hesitation. "I already put in the order for the peaches last week. Knew you'd want it." I laughed. The pack knew all about my obsessions with peaches. I was happy that morning even though Caden had been distant, wrapped up in pack business the way he sometimes gets, going quiet for days at a time, but that was not new. I knew how to wait him out. I told myself it would pass the way it always passed. Then a car pulled into the courtyard and Caden went to the window and froze. I had never seen him look like that. His whole body locked, shoulders rigid, hands flat on the windowsill, face draining of whatever expression had been there before. He stared into the courtyard and then without a single word he turned and walked out of the kitchen so fast he nearly took the door off its hinges. I went to the window. He was crossing the courtyard toward a woman I had never seen. Tall, dark-haired, wrapped in a coat too light for the weather. He reached her and stopped and they looked at each other and then he pulled her into his arms and held her with the kind of grip that comes from somewhere deep in a person. I stood at the window and I watched confused. ******* Her name was Isolde Crane. Marta told me. One of the omegas told me. Three different pack members told me before Caden said a single word. He brought her into our home and seated her at our table and walked the halls with her and did not once think to say to his wife. A week after she arrived I was lying in bed waiting for him and when he finally came in I sat up and asked, "Tell me who she is." He pulled his shirt off and didn't look at me. "An old friend." "Caden." "She's been unwell. She needed somewhere to recover. And so I offered." "You offered our home without telling me." "I'm the Alpha. This is my pack house." "It is also my home. I am your wife." I pushed the covers back and sat on the edge of the bed. "I watched you run across that courtyard like the world was ending and hold a woman I had never seen in my life. I want you to tell me who she is." He turned then and his eyes were cold in a way that made my stomach drop. "I told you. She's an old friend. She was hurt because of me and she needed help. That is all you need to know." "That is not all I need to know—" "Sera." His voice dropped into that Alpha register, the one that ends conversations. "I am not doing this tonight. Go to sleep." He got into bed and turned away from me and I sat there in the dark staring at the shape of his back and thinking. My husband just used his Alpha voice on me rather than answer a simple question. I laid down but I did not sleep. ******* Four days later he came to find me in the sitting room with his hands in his pockets. "Isolde needs a proper space," he said. "Somewhere comfortable, consistent. The guest rooms in the east wing don't have the right heating and her recovery requires—" "Where do you want to put her?" A pause. "Our room is the most suitable." I put my book down slowly. "Our room." "The layout, the heating, the size—" "You are standing in front of me asking me to give Isolde our room." "I've already arranged for the east suite to be cleaned out for you. It has a good—" "For me." I stood up. "You said for you. Why would the east suite be cleaned out for me, Caden. Why would I be moving to the east suite." I watched his face and I kept talking. "Where will you sleep?" He said nothing. "You are meant to sleep with me. So if I am in the east suite and Isolde is in our room, where exactly are you sleeping?" "Sera—" "Are you sleeping in our room? With her?" "It is not like that." "Then tell me what it is like because I am standing here and I am asking you and you are not answering me." His jaw tightened. "I will take one of the other rooms. I need you to stop making this into something and just be reasonable about the situation." I looked at him for a long time. He looked back and his eyes were flat and tired and certain. I wanted to scream. I wanted to grab him by the front of his shirt and make him hear me. Instead I said, "Fine," and I went upstairs and I packed my own things and I moved myself to the east suite and I hung my lamp on an unfamiliar hook and I told myself I was keeping the peace. I told myself it would still pass. **** The pack dinner was days after that. Long table, full attendance. I was dressed and seated and then Marta came out carrying the peach cake on the good serving plate and something in my chest just — lifted. Genuinely lifted. It had been a hard few weeks and it was my cake. Finally. Isolde looked at it and her face changed completely. "Oh," she said, and her voice went soft and wondering. She turned to Caden and she said, "I haven't seen a peach cake since I was a girl. My mother used to make one every autumn. I used to sit in the kitchen just to smell it." She smiled, small and nostalgic and perfectly pitched. "I always thought if I could smell peaches I was home." The table was very quiet. Caden looked at the cake. He looked at Isolde's face. He looked at Marta and said, "Give it to her." "Excuse me." My voice came out across the whole table. I looked at Caden directly. "You do not have the right to give that to her. Everyone at this table knows that cake is mine. That cake has been made for me every year that I have been Luna of this pack, and you do not hand it to someone else without asking me first." Caden's eyes went sharp. "Sera, this is not the time—" "Why didn't you ask me?" My voice stayed steady and I needed it to stay steady. "Why didn't you turn to your wife and say — Sera, would you mind? Why is the answer always that everything simply goes to her? The room, the table arrangement, and now this." Something shifted in his face. For one moment he looked almost — almost— Isolde pressed her fingers to her mouth. "Please," she said quietly, her eyes filling. "Please don't fight because of me. I don't want this. I never wanted to cause trouble in your home." She looked down at the table and her voice dropped even further. "I would never want anyone to question the Alpha's authority because of me. Please. She can have the cake." Caden's face hardened so fast I could see it happen. "This is my pack," he said, and the Alpha was fully in his voice now, cold and final. "That is my kitchen and my money and my table and I decide what is served and who receives it." He looked between us and he said, "You will share it. Marta will cut it and you will each have some. That is the end of this conversation." Share. I looked at the cake. I looked at Isolde carefully staring at her plate with her tears still shining. I looked at Caden, who was already reaching for his wine because as far as he was concerned, fairness had been restored. Share. First the cake. Then the room. Then him. I pushed my chair back from the table. "I'm not hungry," I said. I walked out as the dining room went silent behind me and I did not stop walking.