Rejected by My Alpha, Chosen by His Father

Chapter Two: Public Humiliation

I woke up on a cold floor.

Not a bed. The floor.

Someone had thrown a blanket over me at some point, but hadn’t bothered to move me to the cot that was literally two steps away. I lay there for a second, staring at the ceiling and let that sink in.

This was my life now.

I sat up. My chest felt wrong. Hollow and heavy at the same time, like someone had scooped something out and left the space to ache. My wolf was quiet in a way she had never been quiet before. Not sleeping. Just gone somewhere I couldn’t reach her.

I pressed my hand to my chest.

Still beating. Okay. Fine.

I got up, smoothed my dress down, and looked in the mirror above the sink. Red eyes. Hair falling out of the pins. Grass stain on my knee from when I hit the ground in front of four hundred people.

Great. Perfect. Wonderful.

I should have stayed in that room. I know that. But my bag was in the main hall, and my house key was in my bag, and my mother locks the door at ten and doesn’t open it for anyone.

So I went out.

The noise in the main hall hit me first. Music. Voices. Laughter. The pack was celebrating like the ceremony had gone completely normally. Like nothing had happened.

Then I heard my name.

Not loud. Just whispered. But that’s the thing about wolf hearing. Whispers carry.

She thought he’d actually pick her. Can you imagine? What was she even thinking? That last one was from Petra, whom I had sat next to in school for four years. Four years.

I kept my eyes on the floor and moved toward the corner where I’d left my bag.

“Aria.”

Cora came cutting through the crowd with that look on her face. The jaw-set, eyes-hard look that meant she was about three seconds from saying something that would start a fight.

She grabbed both my hands.

“You’re standing up,” she said. “How are you standing up?”

“I don’t know.”

“We’re leaving.”

“I just need my bag.”

She got my bag. I stood against the wall and stared at nothing and listened to the room talk about me in low voices and counted the seconds until we could go.

Then Ryder walked in.

Clean shirt. Relaxed shoulders. He moved through the room like the last hour had not happened, nodding at people, accepting drinks, completely fine. Selene was at his side with her hand resting on his arm as she’d always belonged there.

Someone handed him a microphone.

Of course they did.

“I want to thank everyone for tonight.” His voice filled the room easily. No effort. “I’ll be beginning the formal selection process for a Luna within the month. Someone worthy of this pack.”

Applause.

Actual applause.

I stared at the floor and pressed my back teeth together and told myself do not cry, do not cry, do not cry, not here, not in front of all of them.

Cora reappeared with my bag. “Now,” she said. “We go now.”

We turned for the side door.

Selene was there.

She was standing near the drinks table with a group of women, and she turned when I walked past like she had a sensor for me specifically. Her eyes went straight to mine, and that smile came up slow.

“Still here,” she said. Conversational. Light. “Brave.”

Keep walking.

“Love that dress by the way.” Louder now. Making sure her whole group could hear. “The grass stain really adds something.”

Keep walking.

“Then again, it doesn’t matter much what you wear when you’re a wolfless nobody.”

I stopped.

I don’t know why. I knew exactly what she was doing. My brain was screaming at my feet to keep moving. My feet stopped anyway.

That half second was all she needed.

She picked up her glass and threw the wine directly at my chest.

Red. Cold. Immediate.

It soaked through the white fabric and spread, and I just stood there and watched it happen because my brain hadn’t caught up yet. The group around her went quiet for one second.

Then the laughing started.

I turned and walked. I don’t remember deciding to. My legs just went. Cora was beside me, grabbing my arm, steering me toward the side door, out into the corridor, through the service exit, and then the cold night air came in, and I stopped and just stood there.

Wine was dripping off the hem of my dress onto the dirt.

“Breathe,” Cora said.

I breathed.

She pulled her jacket off and wrapped it around my shoulders. I held it closed with both hands.

“I want to go home,” I said.

“I know.”

We took the back path. Darker out here. Quieter. The packhouse lights got smaller behind us, and the cold helped a little, and I was starting to think maybe I could actually survive this night when I heard his voice.

Low. Close. Coming from the gap between the packhouse wall and the tree line.

Ryder.

My feet stopped.

Cora looked at me. I held one finger up, and she went still.

His voice again. Quiet but clear. “The rejection is clean. She has no grounds to push back.”

Cole, his Beta. “The bond felt real, though. Everyone sensed it. Why not just?”

“Because I couldn’t.”

Pause.

“I never wanted her.” Ryder’s voice dropped. I pressed closer to the wall. “And the real reason I rejected her can never be revealed. Not to her. Not to anyone.”

My hand flattened against the stone.

Never revealed. There was a reason. A specific reason he was hiding. What does that even mean? The bond was real; Cole had basically just confirmed it, so what could be worth rejecting a real mate bond in front of your entire pack and then covering it up like a secret?

I leaned in closer.

Something grabbed me from behind.

Hard. Fast. One hand over my mouth and one arm around my waist, and I was yanked backwards into the dark before I could make a single sound.