The Bully Alpha’s Redemption

Three musketeers!

Scarlet

We used to be friends… actually best friends!

I hadn’t thought about the past in a long time. Maybe because remembering hurt too much. Or maybe because it felt like someone else’s life entirely—a beautiful illusion that had shattered too violently to piece back together.

But tonight, standing alone in my room with the ache of fresh humiliation from Damien’s latest cruelty still burning under my skin, I let myself remember. Not the cold, smug Alpha-to-be he was now, but the boy I’d once called my best friend.

We were ten. The three of us. Damien, Declan, and me—the most unlikely trio. The Alpha’s son, the Beta’s son, and me, the lowest-ranking Omega’s daughter. But back then, none of that mattered.

Rank, power, family expectations—they were just words we barely understood.

We were the Three Musketeers. Always together, always in trouble. If you saw one of us, the other two were never far behind.

I could still picture the long summer afternoons when we’d escape the packhouse after our lessons, racing through the woods until our legs burned. Damien always ran ahead, challenging us to catch him, but he’d slow down when I fell behind, circling back with that teasing grin he used to have. The one I hadn’t seen in years.

“Come on, Scarlet! You’re faster than that!” he’d call, tugging on my hand to pull me along.

Declan would roll his eyes, laughing as he lagged behind, pretending to trip over roots just to make us laugh. We’d end up sprawled in the dirt, breathless, sticky with sweat, but happier than I’d ever been.

It wasn’t just the games, though. It was the way they made me feel—like I belonged. Like I mattered.

There was the time Mrs. Langley, our tutor, had scolded me in front of the whole class for getting an answer wrong. My face had burned with shame, and I’d wanted to disappear. But Damien had spoken up before I could even blink.

“She just misunderstood the question. It wasn’t clear.” His voice had been so sure, so defiant, even though Mrs. Langley was the strictest teacher in the pack. I’d expected her to punish him too, but she hadn’t.

Because Damien wasn’t just anyone. Even back then, he carried authority in his voice. And when he spoke, people listened.

Later that day, as we sat on the swing set behind the packhouse, I whispered, “You didn’t have to do that.”

He shrugged, scuffing his sneakers in the dirt. “Yeah, I did. No one talks to you like that.”

And Declan, lounging lazily on the grass, had just nodded in agreement, as if protecting me was the most natural thing in the world.

They had protected me, always. When older kids teased me for my hand-me-down clothes or whispered about my father’s low rank, Damien was the one who got in their faces. Declan was the one who made jokes to distract me, even when his fists clenched with the effort of holding back.

I remembered winter nights too. How we’d build forts with woods and sticks so elaborate they stretched halfway across the training fields.

Damien had always been the strategist, planning sneak attacks on the other kids while Declan and I built the walls. And when my hands grew too numb from the cold, Damien had taken mine in his, rubbing them warm with his breath.

I’d had the biggest crush on him then. Silly, innocent. But even back then, there had been… something. A quiet connection, woven into the fabric of our friendship. I never said it out loud. I didn’t need to. I think, deep down, Damien had felt it too.

We used to whisper secrets late into the night sneaking from our parents to go to the woods. Lying side by side on the floor, Damien would talk about becoming Alpha one day, how he’d protect the whole pack, how he’d make sure everyone was safe.

He’d sworn that he would never be like the older wolves who judged people based on rank. He’d said it with so much conviction, that I’d believed him.

How naive of me!

And now… now he was the one making my life unbearable.

Why did things have to change?

I closed my eyes, trying to find the exact moment. But the truth was, it hadn’t been one moment. It had been a slow drift, like a boat slipping farther and farther from shore without anyone noticing until it was too late.

When we turned twelve, the training began. Real training. For future leaders and warriors. And suddenly, rank did matter. Damien was pulled aside for special Alpha mentorship. Declan too, since he’d be his Beta one day. And me? I wasn’t invited. I was left behind.

I told myself it was fine. I still saw them at school and still ate lunch with them. But they started to drift. Damien especially. He got quieter. More serious. He stopped waiting for me after lessons. Stopped standing up when others whispered about my family.

Then came the rumors. People started saying I was too close to the future Alpha. That it wasn’t appropriate. That I didn’t belong in his circle. And I heard them whispering to Damien too.

“Your father won’t approve of her hanging around you.”

“An omega like her? She’s beneath you.”

I hadn’t expected him to care. He never cared what people thought.

Until he did.

The final fracture had come when we were fourteen. I’d overheard him talking to some of the older trainees by the sparring grounds. They’d been teasing him, poking fun at our friendship.

“She’s just some pathetic omega, Damien. Is she your charity case or something?”

I’d waited for him to defend me. To tell them they were wrong.

But he hadn’t. He’d just shrugged. Shrugged. It didn’t matter. Like I didn’t matter.

I stopped trying to be his friend after that. And he… well, he hadn’t just let me go. He’d made it worse. Picking me apart. Finding ways to hurt me, humiliate me. Like he was proving something to the world—and to himself.

And yet, even now, even after all the pain he’d caused, I could still feel the echo of those summer days. The boy he’d once been. The boy I’d trusted with my whole heart.