Unbonding the Ruthless Alpha

Chapter 4

Aria's POV

I huddled in the corner by the car door on the ride home.

Pain cramped through my abdomen in waves. My body still reeling from everything I'd bled away.

Suddenly, a phone rang, cutting through the silence.

"Claudia?" Damon picked up instantly.

The moment I heard his low voice, the cramping in my abdomen intensified. His devotion to another woman tortured me through our blood connection every single moment. I closed my eyes and pressed my hand hard against my stomach, trying to use physical pain to suppress the silent c***k splitting open in my chest.

The car sped along the dark mountain road, the rain hammering down. Primitive forest stood silent on both sides.

"Stop the car." Damon's voice cut through the silence, ice-cold.

The screech of brakes echoed through the valley.

"Get out." He turned his head slightly, not even sparing me a glance. "Claudia was bleeding. The baby might not make it. I need to get to her."

How devoted. What a responsible boyfriend and father-to-be. Just not to me. To someone else.

Did you know, Damon? I carried your child too. And our baby died today—because you wouldn't answer my mindlinks. Because you didn't care enough to come.

If you knew, would you have cried? Would you even care at all?

"Get out! Now!" Damon's impatient voice snapped in my ear.

I looked out the window. The streetlights were few and far between, their weak glow like candles in the wind, ready to blink out. The woods were deep and silent. The endless dark felt like a gaping maw waiting to swallow me whole.

"Damon... please." My pride shattered completely in that moment. "We're not far from the estate. Can you just take me home first? I really don't feel well."

That was all I could say. I couldn't tell him the truth about the miscarriage—that would only make me even more pathetic in this marriage.

"I don't have time for your games. Find your own way back."

Something inside me shattered. Then came the bitter laugh.

How could I have hoped he'd choose me over Claudia? For him, it was never a choice, was it?

"Alpha, I just checked with the doctor. Ms. Stone's bleeding is minor, likely stress-related. She just needs rest. It's not serious," the driver spoke up, trying to help.

I looked at Damon, my gaze pleading. He was unmoved.

"Out. Don't make me repeat myself."

How cruel. But staring at that cold, unfeeling face, I felt myself start to smile. It was the kind of smile that's worse than tears—hollow and desperate.

Damon's POV

I glanced in the rearview mirror.

Aria sat with her hands clasped tight in her lap. She stared straight ahead, her gaze distant, as if she'd already transported herself somewhere far away.

So she wasn't going to get out on her own.

"Throw her out," I ordered the driver.

He hesitated. "Alpha, we're deep in the forest. There's no—"

"Now." I pressed.

Are you crazy? Rhein roared in my mind.

Aria turned her head slowly. Her eyes met mine for half a second. Empty. That emptiness was more unsettling than fear would have been.

"Get out," I said.

She didn't move.

I didn't look at her again. I fixed my gaze on the rain-soaked darkness beyond the windshield.

"Claudia needs me," I added. "Remember your place."

Her lips parted slightly. "It's a mountain road," she said quietly. "No other cars. No lights. And it's raining."

She left the rest unspoken. Her voice held no dramatics. No accusation. Just a simple statement of fact. And the fact, unspoken, was that a woman left out here alone might not make it back at all.

It almost made me reconsider. Almost.

But Liam's face swam before me again. Cold. Accusing. A reminder I could never afford to forget.

"Not my problem. A competent wolf should be able to take care of herself," I replied.

I ordered the driver. "Open her door."

The man met my eyes in the mirror. Shock flashed across his face, then hesitation. Then he got out into the rain.

The rear door opened. Cold air flooded in. Rain spattered the leather seats.

At first, Aria didn't move. She sat there, shoulders rigid, as the rain dampened her hair and soaked through her thin clothes.

Then, slowly, she uncurled her fingers from where they gripped the armrest. One finger. Then another.

She stepped out. She closed the door herself.

The driver scrambled back into his seat. I didn't look back.

"Drive," I snapped. "To the hospital. Fast."

The car shot forward. The tires threw up huge sprays of water, leaving her frail white figure standing in the storm. I told myself not to think of her standing alone in the rain. I told myself it didn't matter. I told myself she's got Grayson blood—she deserved worse.

But then—

The second we hit 120 mph, Rhein went dead silent. And that silence unnerved me more than any of his snarling ever had.

Then it hit.

Something pulled taut, thinner and thinner, like a thread stretched to its last fiber—

And then, it snapped.

Pain detonated behind my ribs—white, blinding, wrong. I doubled over in the back seat, a choked, guttural sound I'd never made in my life tearing out of my throat.

Rhein finally screamed, a terrifying sound of a dying beast.

My hands were shaking. I couldn't make them stop.

"No——f**k——"