My Ex Cheated, So I Chose His Alpha Uncle

Chapter 7 Wyatt Was Devastated

Sophia's POV

Over the next two days, I made sure to drift near the bear at unpredictable moments — a murmured line here, a hand pressed to my stomach there. A few times I covered my mouth and rushed out of the room. When I came back, there was faint red at the corner of my lips.

"You're frighteningly good at this," Aurora said.

Every day I received updates on Ivy's latest activities. No wonder Wyatt had been essentially absent — he'd spent those two days with her. A escape room. Skydiving. A club night.

Then Ivy apparently developed a conscience, because she called me.

I saw the number and understood immediately what was coming. I made sure I was sitting in front of the bear, flowers in hand. I put the call on speaker, kept trimming stems, and picked up like it was nothing.

Her voice came in sharp and confident. "You're really something, sitting there pretending you don't know. You think if you don't acknowledge it, everything's fine? You've never even slept with him, have you? Do you know what he did with me last night —"

I let her finish.

Then I looked up at the flowers, let my eyes fill, and spoke in the quietest voice I had. "Do you actually love him?"

Silence. She hadn't expected that.

Her confidence slipped. "Of course. We've known each other a year. I flew all the way down here for him. You saw the photos and the videos — you two aren't right for each other. He and I are the same kind of people."

"I know," I said, calmly. "I won't be able to stay with him much longer anyway. If you really love him, will you take care of him for me? After I'm gone?"

"What do you mean, after you're gone?"

"Stomach cancer. Stage four." My voice was steady, almost peaceful. "I won't make it through this month."

A long pause.

"I'm sorry. I — I didn't know."

"It's alright. He doesn't know yet either. Can you keep this between us, just for now?"

We talked a little longer. A few gentle words was all it took — she gave me her contact, was calling me a friend by the end of it. She believed every syllable.

A few minutes later she posted:

[I'm a terrible person.]

I set down my phone and snipped the last stem. I turned to the flowers with a wistful expression.

"What a shame. Something this beautiful — and I'll never get to see another spring."

Wyatt came home early that evening.

Ivy's guilt had apparently done its work. She'd stepped back, cleared the field, decided to let him spend time with me.

I touched the corner of my eye as he walked in. "You're home."

"Sophia — have you been crying again?"

"I was just thinking about my mom," I said.

He knew she'd died when I was young. He pulled me in without another question. "Don't cry. You've got me."

He hadn't even changed his shirt. Someone else's perfume was still on him, close enough that I could smell it.

"Push him away," Aurora said.

I did, gently, then looked up at him with careful softness. "Wyatt, you know how you've always talked about taking me somewhere? What if we went to the coast tomorrow? Just the two of us."

He frowned slightly. "Tomorrow — I actually have to go back North."

"Is it urgent? I took time off specially." I let my voice go small. "Just this once. Please."

He patted my head. "Something came up at home. Two days at most, I promise. When I'm back, we'll go anywhere you want. The coast, wherever."

"Okay..."

Wyatt's POV

I was in the bathroom washing up when I saw it.

The trash bin.

A tissue, pushed to one side. And underneath it — more. A dark, unmistakable stain.

My hand went still. My fingers started to shake.

What was that?

I lifted the top tissue.

More blood. Too much for what she'd told me.

No. It couldn't be.

My heart was slamming against my ribs. Then I remembered — she'd said her period had come early. I made myself breathe. That had to be it. That was all it was.

I told myself that. I almost believed it.

But I couldn't sleep that night.

Every time I closed my eyes I saw her. Sophia, crying quietly in the dark, not saying a word, not asking for anything. I called her name in the dream and it echoed back at me empty.

I woke up drenched in sweat.

The room was dark. Sophia was breathing steadily beside me, deep asleep. I reached toward her face, then pulled my hand back without touching her.

Maybe I was imagining things.

Before I left in the morning she was still asleep, lying on her side. Something about the stillness of her made it hard to walk out the door.

I stood at the edge of the bed. "Sophia," I said quietly. "I'll be back soon."

She didn't stir.

I turned and left.

At the airport, waiting to board, I got a call from a number I didn't recognize.

My eye had been twitching since I woke up. Some instinct in me went cold before the person even spoke.

"Hello — is this Sophia's emergency contact?"

"Yes." My voice came out unsteady. "That's me."

"I'm calling about her condition. Ms. Sophia has been diagnosed with late-stage cancer. The doctors are strongly recommending she continue treat —"

The rest of it went white.

My phone nearly hit the floor.

"WHAT?" I heard myself shout. "What did you just say? What happened to her?"

This wasn't real. It couldn't be.

By the time the call ended, I couldn't feel my face. I grabbed Damian's wrist, my lips barely working. "Damian. I have to go. Right now."

Damian's voice was steady, measured. "Don't forget — today you're meeting the Shadowfang Alpha's daughter. This is an alliance negotiation. It isn't something you can just walk out of."

"I know. But this is more important. Handle that side for me, please — explain however you need to —"

My fingers were shaking as I pulled up Sophia's number.

It rang twice. Then: the line is currently unavailable.

Damn it.

I went straight to her office.

"Where's Sophia? Where is she?" I grabbed the first person I saw coming through the door.

The employee looked stricken. "President Sophia — she resigned. She's already left."

The floor dropped out from under me.

The apartment. She had to be at the apartment.

I drove back so fast I barely registered the route. I hit the door with my shoulder still moving.

"Sophia! SOPHIA!"

The living room was empty.

I ran to the bedroom.

On the nightstand: the engagement ring I'd given her. The property deed. Stacked neatly, like things that had been thought about and set aside.

My hands were trembling when I lifted the bottom of the stack.

A medical report.

I read the diagnosis line. Then I read it again.

Malignant tumor. Late stage.

Estimated survival: three to six months.

My knees gave out.

I hit the floor.

"No..." The word came out broken. "No, no — how did this — what did I do — Sophia, I'm sorry —"

While she was sick. While she was hiding it and getting weaker and trying not to ask me for anything — I was with someone else. I was with Ivy.

"Sophia — where are you?"

"Sophia, pick up, please — PICK UP —"

I called over and over. Every time: unavailable.

"Sophia. I was wrong. Please come back. Please."

I was crying and I couldn't stop.

Then I remembered. The bear. The camera.

I pulled up the footage.

She hadn't gone into work for days.

She'd been quietly, methodically clearing her things out of the apartment. A few items at a time, nothing dramatic.

In between, she'd doubled over clutching her stomach, face bone-white, and then straightened herself again like nothing had happened.

She'd chased painkillers with a half-glass of water alone in the kitchen.

She'd curled up on the couch and cried into her sleeve, small and silent, the way people cry when they're used to doing it where no one can hear.

Every frame was another cut.

And then I heard Ivy's phone call.

My expression changed completely.

So she had known. She had known about my betrayal the whole time.

And she hadn't said a single word. Not one confrontation. Not one accusation. She had just — quietly started to disappear.

The last frame: Sophia, pulling a suitcase toward the door.

"NO!" The sound tore out of me. "SOPHIA!"

I wiped my face and called Donny immediately.

Within minutes he called back. "Wyatt. I found a flight in her name. Coastal route. Departs in one hour."

"I can't make that. Book me the next one. Anything."

A pause. "Wyatt — today you were supposed to meet the Shadowfang Alpha's daughter. The alliance. You can't push Sophia to —"

"SHUT UP." I was shaking. "Are you seriously telling me to leave her again? Book the next available flight. If there's nothing commercial, get me a private charter."

Sophia had three to six months.

I was going to be there for every single one of them.

I was going to fix what I'd broken.

I was going to make her understand — none of it had been nothing. I did love her. I did.

"Okay — okay, I'll get it sorted." Donny's voice was careful now. "Try to breathe."

I sat on the floor of the bedroom, the medical report in my hands, and I cried until I had nothing left.