Vanessa.

"Aidan! What’s going on here?" The words flew out of my mouth before I could stop them, sharp, stunned, and far louder than I intended.

I had barely crossed the threshold when the scene hit me like a punch to the stomach.

Aidan stood far too close to Maria, his body angled over hers and her cheeks flushed crimson, their breath—still uneven. And his eyes...moon Goddess....those eyes held nothing else but hunger, need, undeniable desire. It was written across his face so clearly that it sent a sharp sting to my chest.

For a moment, the whole world narrowed into a single point, just the three of us frozen in that suffocating room. My heart lurched, pounding so hard I could taste the metallic edge of betrayal on my tongue.

Were they...?

Were they actually...No.

No, no, no.

I shook my head violently, as if I could physically fling away the thought clawing into my skull.

There had to be another explanation.

There had to be.

"Maria," I whispered under my breath, nearly choking on the name. She was a rogue. A servant. Nobody. She couldn’t be....she wouldn’t dare.

It could only mean...She initiated it....She had to.

Aidan would never, he couldn’t. Not with someone beneath him. Not with someone beneath us.

"What’s going on, Aidan?" I demanded again, louder, harder, my voice cracking at the end.

This time, I needed an answer. I needed him to deny it. To laugh, to explain, to call it a misunderstanding. To pick me, even if we weren’t lovers or mates or anything of the sort.

But he didn’t move, didn’t blink, nor did he speak.

He just stood there, chest rising and falling, gaze flickering between me and her, like he was torn between two entirely different worlds.

And that silence...that infuriating, deafening silence...Was the answer I never wanted.

Rage struck faster than thought.

"You bitch!" I screamed, the word shredding out of me before reason could intervene.

I lunged toward her, closing the small distance between us in a burst of blind fury. My palm connected with her cheek so sharply that the sound cracked through the room like snapping wood.

The sting vibrated up my arm, satisfying and horrifying all at once.

She gasped, her head jerking to the side, hair flying across her face. A red mark bloomed across her cheek immediately, but I didn’t feel guilt, not even a flicker, just betrayal twisting deeper into my gut.

"How dare you seduce your Alpha!" I spat, voice shaking with more than just anger.

This wasn’t only fury, it was humiliation, panic, fear I refused to acknowledge.

She just stared at me, wide-eyed, stunned, lips trembling but saying nothing. Not even defending herself.

And that silence only stoked the fire roaring through my veins.

"You have no shame," I continued, my voice dripping with venom I didn’t know I had in me. "Crawling your way up his bed like a desperate parasite."

I turned to Aidan then, searching, pleading silently, for something on his face that could make this make sense. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

An apology.

A denial.

A hint that he was angry too.

But he looked...struck.

Like someone who had been caught doing something he shouldn’t. Someone who couldn’t deny what his body had already confessed.

So I faced her again, the words ripping out of me like claws:

"Is that the only thing you rogues are good at?"

Her face shifted then,not in guilt, not even in fear, but something else. Something wounded, something fierce, more like I had stepped on her prude.

But I didn’t care.

Couldn’t care.

If I allowed myself even a second to feel anything besides fury, I would break.

Without another word, without looking at either of them again, without letting myself see Aidan’s expression one more damnable time, I spun around and stormed out.

My footsteps were loud, echoing through the hall, almost deafening against the racing thud of my heart.

"Vanessa, wait!" Aidan’s voice chased after me, strained and urgent.

But I didn’t turn back. Not when my eyes burned, not when my throat tightened, not when my wolf howled confusion and betrayal inside me.

I couldn’t look at him.

So I kept walking,one foot after the other, until the door slammed behind me, sealing the scene away.

And I pretended my chest wasn’t splitting open from the inside.

"Vanessa!" His voice ricocheted through the hallway, desperate and strained, just seconds before his hand closed firmly around my arm.

I barely had a chance to turn before he spun me toward him with more force than necessary. My breath hitched as I met his eyes, still dark with something wild and heated, but now mixed with panic.

"It’s not what you think," Aidan rushed out, the words tumbling from his lips as though they were chasing my retreating shadow.

His chest rose and fell in hard, uneven pulls, he had definitely sprinted after me, and the realization did something traitorous inside my chest. Heat bloomed there, soft and unwelcome, like a spark catching in a pile of dry leaves.

His hand found my arm, fingers curling just tight enough to anchor me. Not painful,not even close, but firm, steady, a silent vow that he wasn’t letting go until he forced the truth into the open.

The contact sent a confusing tremor up my spine, something between relief and fury, comfort and the urge to shove him away.

He dragged in another breath, slow, deliberate, heavy, like he needed to swallow every emotion, reorder every word, wrestle his thoughts back into something that made sense before speaking again.

"I don’t love her," he said, each word thick and heavy with urgency. "I actually love..."

He paused.

A heartbeat stretched, thick, trembling.

I waited.

My pulse staggered, hope caught somewhere between my ribs and my throat, aching, stubborn.

But nothing came next.

He opened his mouth again, only to close it. His throat bobbed. His eyes flickered away.

Silence, not a denial, not a confession.

Just silence that bruised more than any blow could.

I swallowed hard, the tiny spark of foolish hope inside me guttering like a candle exposed to wind.

"Look," he continued quickly, as though his unfinished sentence didn’t hang between us like a blade, "I just need you to believe me."

His hand shot upward, fingers pointing toward the night sky visible through the open hallway windows.

"It’s the full moon," he said, frustration slipping into his voice. "You know what that means. It’s the Alpha’s heat period." His gaze darted back to me intensely, almost pleading. "She definitely knows that. So she came to my room on purpose, looking all... nice and seductive."

The bitterness in his voice when he said "seductive" was almost convincing.

Almost.

I exhaled slowly, the air leaving my lungs like defeat rather than relief. My eyes dropped to the floor for a heartbeat, then flicked back up to his.

I wanted to believe him, Moon Goddess knew I did. I wanted to cling to every word he fed me, wrap myself in them like armor.

But the truth, the one lodged deep in my chest like a thorn, refused to be ignored.

She could have walked in naked.

She could have kissed him first.

She could have moaned his name like she already belonged to him.

None of that mattered.

He could have resisted.

He could have thrown her out.

He could have walked away.

But he hadn’t.

Because he was drawn to her.

And worse, he didn’t even know.

A pain I wasn’t prepared for seared through me, raw and humiliating.

"Aidan..." I whispered, forcing my voice to stay steady though it trembled like a leaf in the wind.

My heart slammed against my ribs so loudly I wondered if he could hear it.

And then the dam inside me cracked.

"I am in love with you."

The words slipped out, bare, unarmored, unforgivingly vulnerable. A truth that had been clawing at me for months. A truth I swore I would take to my grave. A truth I never intended to say out loud, not like this.

I dropped my gaze to the polished stone floor beneath us, unable and unwilling to meet his eyes.

I didn’t want to see confusion. Or surprise.

Or—Moon forbid—pity.

My hands shook, so I clasped them tightly in front of me.

Aidan remained frozen, silent again.His grip on my arm loosened ever so slightly. His breath slowed. His wolf stirred behind his eyes, something flickering through them I couldn’t read.

But he still didn’t move closer. He didn’t pull me into his arms. He didn’t say my name like he promised. He didn’t whisper back the words I so desperately wanted to hear.

I squeezed my eyes shut for a heartbeat, steadying myself.

Because what came next, Whether he stayed silent or spoke, whether he broke me or saved me... Would change everything.

And all I could do now was wait in that suspended breath between what I hoped for... and what would crush me.

Then he called out, breaking through the silence, "Vanessa, I... I.." he hesitated for a heartbeat like he wasn’t so sure of his words. "I love you too."