Chapter 40
Iwoke up as the sun’s rays brushed against my skin. I turned around, lying on my stomach and trying to sleep again, when I suddenly realized where I was.
My body jolted up as I sat and looked at my surroundings. Why am I in bed?
I remembered pushing a sofa chair by the window and crunching up there, waiting for Hunter to come back from the forest, but I didn’t notice when I fell asleep.
Did Riley come and place me on the bed?
My eyes darted to the space beside me and I suddenly missed him. My heart felt so heavy seeing the empty, untouched side of his bed.
I wanted to mindlink him and ask where he slept or if he even slept, but I stopped myself. There were still many doubts and questions in my head, and I had to face them first before I went head-on and faced Riley and his demons.
After I washed my face and changed into my day clothes, I went downstairs and went directly to the kitchen, hoping Riley wasn’t around. As much as I missed him, I didn’t want to see him yet.
I saw Jenny sitting by the counter. Just the person I wanted to see.
“Hi!” I greeted her as I walked towards the other side, and opened the fridge, pulling out the milk and other things I could use to make some sandwiches.
“Luna…” She stood up, went to the dining table, and came back carrying a tray of food, placing it on the counter in front of me. “I was about to bring this upstairs. They’re still warm.”
“Thank you.” I smiled at her before placing everything I pulled out of the fridge back into its place. “Is Riley around?”
“No. He went with Beta Dominic to the other side of the territory. They just left ten or fifteen minutes ago. I don’t think they’ll be back soon. It will probably take up their whole day as that project has been delayed for many months and the Alpha just began attending to it lately.”
I nodded my head, biting my lips before speaking up again. “Jenny… I’m sorry about my outburst yesterday. It was wrong of me…”
Jenny shook her head as tears started to pool in her eyes. “You didn’t do anything wrong. If anything, it was a good wake-up call for all of us.”
“Riley told me the truth about rolling off an Alpha command on the three of you, so you were hindered from telling me the truth.”
“He also took it off yesterday, so if you want to ask me anything, I will be honest with you. Some parts will be painful, but I will try to explain.”
“I would love that. It’s hard to ask Riley because everything cuts deeper when it comes from him.”
“The Alpha, he’s not a bad person… He’s just lost.”
“Do you like Riley as an Alpha? I know you’re not from here.”
“I came from Alpha Jacob’s Pack. And he’s a good one, so I know what I’m saying if I say Alpha Riley is a good one too.”
“So Alpha Jacob knew what Riley did to Andrea?”
“He did. But he never condoned it. He actually helped Alpha Caspian, even though he and Riley were closer. Well, I really don’t know how close, but that was what Alpha Jacob’s Gamma told me.
Alpha Jacob and Alpha Caspian just recently got reconnected, but I guessed Alpha Jacob was smart enough to know what Alpha Riley was doing was wrong, so he wanted to help Andrea out of it. ”
“Was it really that bad? Did you know if he hurt Andrea?”
“Physically no.”
“Did he attempt to touch her?”
“That part I have no idea, but Andrea could have told me if the Alpha did. And..”
“And?” I asked, my brow furrowing as I laid the fork down. I still didn’t have any appetite.
“I’m not sure if saying this would help or just hurt you more.”
“Say it…”
“Andrea begged the Alpha to cancel the Luna ceremony, and the Alpha said…” She stopped, and my heart stopped beating as I waited for her to continue. “He would cancel the ceremony if she slept with him.”
My hand clamped over my mouth as a gasp left my throat. I felt my lips quivering as tears threatened to fall.
He was so cruel.
“Wait… Listen, please… Andrea agreed because she was desperate, but… The Alpha didn’t touch her.
Andrea told me the Alpha didn’t even look at her when she showed up in his room.
He pushed her away instead. I know it was the truth because that night, the Alpha asked me to pick up Andrea, and I found her outside the Alpha’s door. ”
I closed my eyes, trying to stop my tears. I didn’t want to hear anything more.
“And then, the next day, the Alpha told Dominic he didn’t know that Andrea would actually show up because he knew how much Andrea valued herself.
But he had no intention of forcing himself on her.
And then he ordered the Beta to cancel the ceremony.
Dominic said the Alpha told him that he had already accepted that he would be sleeping alone in his bed for the rest of his life.
I knew at that moment, he already decided to let Andrea go. ”
“He must have loved her so much that he was willing to let her go…”
Jenny smiled at me. Her hand reached for mine at the top of the counter and squeezed it gently.
“I don’t think he really loved her. He was just afraid of being alone.
But I want to believe a big factor of him letting her go was because his attention was already somewhere else.
If I was right, he knew you already existed.
That was why he kept driving back and forth to Alpha Darvin’s territory. He was looking for you.”
“If he didn’t smell me, he would probably still force Andrea to be his Luna.”
“We would never know. Maybe yes. Maybe not. I can’t read Alpha Riley, no one can. But he has his own struggles. Did you know why he was pushing himself to Andrea?”
“He loves her.”
“Sebastian told me the Alpha just wanted someone to stay with him. Despite being good at almost everything, he’s a very insecure man. He thought he was not good enough for someone to actually like him.”
“Funny, because Beta Dominic said the same thing.”
“Because it is the truth. He used the blood contract between their fathers so he could take hold of Andrea. He thought no one would like him. At least Andrea would stay because she had no other option.”
“Why would he even think he was not good enough for someone?”
“His mother’s abandonment left him with that impression. Growing up, Sebastian said, the Alpha would always stare at mothers, but he never talked about his own. He kept it all inside him. Maybe he thought he was not good enough to make her stay.”
“For Goddess’ sake, he was only a baby when she left. How would he ever think it was his fault?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it was what his father made him believe?
I never met Alpha Melvin so I had no idea how he was as a father.
But Sebastian said he never took another Luna after she left, and he told Riley the Luna position was just for his mother alone.
I was guessing his father’s loyalty to his mother made his hatred for her grow deeper.
Because how could she leave when his father was so loyal to her? ”
“But it’s only one side of the story. Maybe there’s something more.”
“That’s what I keep saying to Sebastian. Because how could you, as a mother, just abandon your child?”
I didn’t know what to say anymore. A part of me was hurting for my mate for what he must have felt about his mother, but a part of me was still scared of him.
Now that he found out I was his mate, will his obsession with Andrea shift to me? Will he hold me against my will if I decided I didn’t want to be here anymore?