What Belongs to the Alpha

Chapter Three: The Rejection

A noise brought me to a halt. Soft, breathy moans, too familiar to mistake. I pressed my ear to the door, stomach twisted, hoping — praying — that I was mistaken. Then came his voice, low and satisfied, and her gasp of pleasure.

Mia.

For a moment, I disallowed my mind the mental processing. My best friend. My only friend. No. It couldn’t be.

My heart pounding, hands shaking, I pushed open the door just enough to see inside.

And I wished I hadn’t.

Mia was leaning over his bed, her body arched against his. Lucas’s hands clamped around her waist, pulling her toward him as he moved, burying his face in her neck. They fit together like they had done this thousand times before.

Before I knew it, a pungent, shattered gasp slipped out.

They both froze.

Lucas’s head snapped up. His dark, unbothered eyes met mine. Mia turned her head slowly, the damp tendrils of her hair sticking to her scarlet cheeks. She didn’t look shocked. She didn’t even look guilty.

She smiled.

“Oh,” she said in a breath, her mouth curving, her finger trailing lazily down Lucas’s chest as if she were entirely comfortable in her nakedness. “You weren’t meant to see that.’

My ears throbbed with my pounding pulse. My stomach turned so violently I thought I would vomit. “Mia?” I barely noticed, though, because my voice cracked. “Why?”

Her smile stretched wider. “Why not?”

That brief, casual answer made my heart cave in. I turned to Lucas, expecting him to say something, anything to make this make sense for me, but all he did was sigh and run his hand through his hair as if I was an inconvenience.

“Sandra, you have the worst f*****g timing,” he muttered as he snatched a pair of pants from the floor like this was just another night in his life.

My heart clenched. “Mia, please. Tell me this isn’t real. Tell me you didn’t—”

She laughed. Laughed. Not nervously. Not apologetically. Mockingly.

“Oh, my God, you do look like you’re going to cry.” She laid back, forcing herself to stretch to instigated drama and, at the same time, to play to an audience — for him, for me. “God, Sandra, you’re so sad. What did you think, huh? That you really had a shot? That he’d ever choose you?” She snorted. “You actually believed I’m your friend?”

Something inside me cracked.

“We are friends,” I said softly, as if pleading.

Mia tilted her head as if considering. “I mean, I guess that’s what I allowed you to believe. It was amusing to see you pretend that we were peers, but please, Sandra. You were just entertainment.” She delivered a slow, mocking smile. “And honestly? Not even very good at that.”

I couldn’t breathe. My chest pain tightened in a vice, but the worst part wasn’t her. It was him.

Lucas.

He wasn’t saying anything. Just looking at me, like I was some bug under his shoe.

I swallowed hard, speaking barely above a whisper. “Lucas?”

He sighed, bored. “What do you want me to say? That I feel bad? That I’m sorry?” He laughed at that, shaking his head as he pulled his shirt overhead. “Grow up, Sandra. You were never hard enough for this.”

I took a shaky step back. “You—You’re my mate.”

Lucas’s jaw flicked, his body locking. “Don’t call me that.”

Mia rolled her eyes, caressed his bare chest, his muscles, ran her nails across it. “Ugh, Lucas, stop wasting your breath explaining. She’s not worth it. Go ahead and do what you planned to do.”

My stomach dropped. “What do you mean? Do what?”

Lucas sighed, stepping closer to me. I instinctively stepped back.

“You should’ve just kept playing it low. But no,” he said, shaking his head, as if I had let him down. “You guys always have to ruin things. Always gotta go where you don’t belong. And now? Well, now you’re going to pay for it.”

“I— I didn’t—”

Mia let out a dramatic sigh. “She’s going to cry again. You needed him to want you so badly. It was painful to watch.”

I dug my nails into my palms as I forced myself to look at her, really look at her. The girl I had given my entire heart to. The girl I had defended, comforted, loved. “I didn’t ever mean anything to you, did I?”

Her smile made me want to gag. “Aw, honey, you were fun. You were useful. And you were so gullible.” She rested her head on Lucas’s shoulder and pressed a kiss to his neck as if I wasn’t even there. “But you? His mate? Come on. You thought you were special?”

Something darker flickered in Lucas’s eyes. The stare he was giving me, and suddenly I wasn’t looking at the boy I loved. I was gazing at a monster that was just waiting for the right moment to swallow me whole.

He moved in, distance vanished in seconds. My knees buckled nearly to the floor, but I willed myself to remain upright.

“Do you know what the worst part is?” he said, his voice low enough that it sent a shiver down my spine. “I despised you from the moment I learned. You disgust me, Sandra. You always have. The way you looked at me, like you thought I could ever love someone like you.”

It stung my eyes, but I wouldn’t let them fall. “You don’t really mean that,” I whispered. “I know you, Lucas. This isn’t—”

His hand lunged toward me so quickly I didn’t see it coming.

A slap, sharp and blinding.

The force knocked me to the ground, my cheek on fire, my ears ringing. I gasped, frozen, looking up at him as he towered above me, his jaw clenched, chest rising and falling.

Mia let out a low whistle. “Damn. Guess she finally shut up.”

“Get up.” Lucas’s voice was more cutting than the slap, his tone sparing this debate.

I crawled to my knees, my eyes welling with tears, my chest feeling as though it had been set on fire by betrayal.

“Please, Lucas, don’t—”

“Enough.” His voice sliced like a whip of steel. “You don’t get to beg. You don’t get to talk. You don’t get to even breathe near me, you understand?”

I choked back a sob, trembling all over.

“I gave you one rule,” he said, venom in every word. “One. Don’t tell anyone. Don’t let anyone know. And yet, here you go making this mess, ruining what was perfectly good, putting your nose where it doesn’t concern you.”

My mouth opened but no words came out. My throat was too tight.

Lucas sighed, shaking his head as if I was some annoyance. He faced the door and threw it open with a bang that knocked it against the wall.

“Get. Up.” His voice sliced through me like a knife.

Mia yawned behind him, wrapped still in sheets. “Lucas, let’s end this right now. Do what you gotta do.’ ”

He nodded, stepping aside. “Outside. Now.”

I didn’t move. I couldn’t.

His eyes flashed. “I won’t ask again.”

I pulled myself up, legs quaking. My vision swam as he seized my wrist and pulled me forward, hauling me down the corridor. My bare feet slid against the cold stone floor; my heart was pounding in my ears.

The crowd was already massing in the courtyard, the chorus rising into a dull roar as Lucas pushed me to my knees in front of them.

Before I could even beg anymore, his voice pierced the air.

“I, Lucas Culkin, cast you, Sandra Franklin, from my mate.”

Pain exploded in my chest, a sharp, heinous agony that had me gasping for breath. My wolf screamed in my head, howling in sheer agony as the bond snapped into a million fragments.

I hardly glimpsed Lucas’s boot before it slammed into my ribs. The world goes dark as my body hit the cold ground, the pain taking me whole.