THE HOCKEY ALPHA'S REBORN MATE

Chapter 3

Kora's POV

Marcus's grip on my arm loosened as he walked me inside. I did not feel relieved. I felt sick.

Luna went in first as I followed. The apartment looked wrong and empty. All of Carter's hockey trophies were gone from the shelves where they used to be.

The walls were bare, no photos of him at nationals, none of those stupid candid shots of him and his teammates. Just nail holes and dust outlines where frames used to hang, and not to mention, some of his furniture had also been moved.

"Is Carter moving out?"

"Yes." Luna turned to face me, and her smile was cold. "Thanks to you."

"What do you mean?"

"Come on, Kora. You are not in a position to ask questions right now."

A door opened down the hallway. My head snapped toward the sound.

Mila Thompson walked out of Carter's bedroom.

She wore his jersey. The championship one from last year, number twelve, hanging off her bare shoulder.

"Oh!" Mila stopped when she saw me. "You brought her here?"

"She says she is pregnant," Luna explained casually like I wasn't the one they were discussing.

Mila let out a sarcastic chuckle. "Are you kidding? That is the most pathetic thing I have ever heard."

"It is true," I spoke out. "I am carrying Carter's baby."

"No, you are not." Mila walked closer, and I could smell his cologne on her skin. That expensive kind his dad bought him. "Carter told me he was always careful with you. Always used protection. So either you are lying, or you got knocked up by someone else, and you are trying to trap him."

The room tilted sideways. Carter told her. He talked to Mila about me, about what we did together, about how careful he was. Like I was some problem he had to manage.

"How long?" The words scraped out of my throat.

"What?"

"How long have you two been together?" It was all clear to me now what was going on, and I couldn't help but ask.

Mila's lips curled into a silly smirk. "Since sophomore year. We have been engaged for six months. Everyone who matters knows about it."

Two years. Carter and Mila had been together the entire time he was with me. Every late-night study session where he kissed me and told me I was special. Every time he said we had to keep it secret because people would not understand. Every promise he made about us having a future together.

All of it was all lies.

"You look surprised," Mila said. "Did you really think someone like Carter would actually want someone like you? You were homework help. That is all you ever were."

I felt my chest become heavy. I wanted to throw up or scream out loud, but none of it felt possible.

"Enough." Luna held up her hand. "We have a situation to handle."

She walked to the side table and picked up a folder. Inside was a single sheet of paper and a small silver knife.

"Sign this," Luna said, holding it out to me. "And I will give you fifty thousand dollars so you can leave and start up a new life for yourself and the bastard you are carrying."

Fifty thousand dollars. That was more money than I had ever seen in my life. More than my dad made in two years at the factory.

"What is it?"

"A simple agreement. You confirm that your relationship with Carter was consensual but misguided. That you are leaving Hilton of your own free will. That you will not make any claims about him or the pregnancy."

"You want me to lie."

"I want you to be smart." Luna's voice turned sharp. "You have no family anymore, Kora. No home, no money, or a future. This could change your life. You could go somewhere new, somewhere nobody knows what you did. Give that baby a real chance instead of dragging it through poverty because you are too proud to accept help."

My hand moved toward the paper before I could stop it. Fifty thousand dollars. I could leave this pack, go somewhere nobody had seen that video. Start over where nobody knew my name.

I picked up the paper.

The words blurred together. Legal language I barely understood. But the important parts were clear enough.

I would leave quietly. Never contact Carter again. Never claim the baby was his. And I would sign it in blood.

The binding way. The wolf way. The way that meant I could never break it without consequences I did not want to think about.

"Where do I sign?"

Luna's smile was victorious. She held out the silver knife.

Then I thought about my mom.

Mom, who worked three jobs to keep us fed rather than take handouts from the pack. Who told me the night before she died that the only thing we really owned in this world was our truth. Who taught me that your silence has a price, and sometimes that price is your soul.

I set the paper down.

"No."

Luna's smile disappeared. "Excuse me?"

"I said no." My hands were shaking, but my voice was steady. "Carter did this to me. He filmed us without asking. He released that video. He destroyed my entire life. And you want me to say it was all my fault for fifty thousand dollars?"

"You stupid little……"

"Maybe I am stupid." Tears burned behind my eyes, but I would not let them fall. Not in front of her. "But I am not a liar. And I am not going to help you cover up what your son did to me."

I turned toward the door. John was still there, but I did not care anymore. I would walk through him if I had to.

"Stop her!" Luna commanded

Hands grabbed my hair and yanked my head back. Through blurry vision, I saw Luna kneeling beside me with that silver knife. She grabbed my hand. I tried to pull away, but John held me still. The blade sliced across my palm.

Luna pressed my bleeding hand against the contract. I watched my own blood smear across the words I had refused to sign. Making them illegible but also binding in the way that only blood magic could be.

"There." Luna stood up and brushed off her pants like she had just finished something mundane. "Now there is a legally binding contract stating that Kora Gabriel left willingly and gave up all claims to Carter Ace and his bloodline."

"That is not legal," I tried to say, but John hit me again before I could finish.

"You should have taken the money," Mila said. She was on the couch now, looking at her phone like she was bored. "This is your own fault."

John hit me again, this time in the ribs. Something snapped. The air rushed out of my lungs and would not come back in.

"Please….." Blood bubbled out with the word. "Please, my baby….."

"That is the point, sweetheart," Luna said.

John kicked me directly in the stomach despite all my efforts to shield it with my hands.

The pain was not like the other hits. It was deeper. Tearing and feeling so wrong that I could barely breathe. I felt something give way inside me, felt warmth spreading between my legs that had nothing to do with the blood from my mouth.

No. No, no, no.

I curled around my stomach, trying to protect what was already lost. Tried to breathe through lungs that would not work.

"Make sure she is dead," Luna said. Her voice sounded far away now. "I do not want her coming back."

Another kick. Another. I stopped counting.

Lilly was quiet in my head. She had been quiet for a while now. Maybe she was already gone. Maybe I was the one leaving.

The last thing I thought about was not the baby.

It was Carter.

Not the Carter who smiled at me over textbooks. Not the one who kissed me like I mattered. Not the one who whispered promises in the dark.

The real Carter. The one who planned all of this. Who used me and threw me away and set every piece of this nightmare in motion.

I hoped he would never forget what he did to me.

“Moon goddess…… please….. save my baby…..” I cried out with my last voice, not sure why I made such requests at the point of death, and right there, I gave up the ghost as I took my last breath and my eyes shut.