The Alpha's Unwanted True Mate's Secret

Aurora's POV: "The number you have dialed cannot be reached. Please leave a message after the beep." The same cold, automated voice.

The stark repetition was a confirmation, not a surprise. For the tenth time, I lowered my phone and stared at the screen. It was nine o'clock. Our sixth wedding anniversary.

Six years since the Mating Ceremony bound me to Conrad Harris, Alpha of the Blackwood Pack.

Six years since I became his Luna in title only—the wolfless Omega bride he tolerated for the sake of Pack politics and his family's obsession with pure bloodlines.

The crystal glasses gleamed under the chandelier, throwing fractured rainbows across the white linen.

The sixcourse meal, prepared by a private chef, had long gone cold on the vast oak table. The foie gras had congealed into a grey smear; the truffle risotto had skinned over.

My fingers gently traced the rim of my wine glass, the silence of the room further accentuating the questions in my head.

Across from me, an empty chair seemed to mock me—that was my husband Conrad's seat. Beside it, a high chair sat neatly pushed against the table.

Our sixyearold daughter, Delma, should have been there swinging her little legs, yelling to be the first to roll over.

Beside my plate, a slim, elegantly wrapped box from Patek Philippe held the watch I'd spent months sourcing for him. A symbol. A hope.

Martha Foster, our housekeeper, approached softly, her face a canvas of pity. "Mrs. Harris, shall I have the staff clear the table?

The Alpha is late." I forced a smile, the muscles in my face feeling stiff. "No, thank you, Martha. Let's wait a little longer.

He's likely just held up with Pack business." She sighed, a soft, sad sound that told me she didn't believe it any more than I did. She retreated without another word.

The mate bond—a tether I had once cherished—lay slack and silent in my chest. No frantic pulse of distress from him, no warmth. Just a hollow, dead weight. He wasn't in danger.

He just didn't care. I steadily unlocked my phone and opened the vehicle tracker app.

Conrad had insisted on installing this system on both our cars—he said it was for my protection. This way, the Alpha could always keep track of his wolfless Luna's location.

And now I was using this system to track his location in reverse. A small red dot pulsed on the screen. His car. It wasn't at the Pack House. It wasn't at his downtown office.

It was parked at The Gilded Lily, an upscale restaurant in the city's most exclusive district. A place we had never been to.

The pieces clicked into place with a terrible, cold certainty. I didn't sit there wondering.

I stood up, the chair scraping loudly against the marble floor in the quiet dining room. "I'm stepping out for a bit," I told Martha, my voice distant to my own ears.

I grabbed my car keys from the bowl by the door, leaving the Patek Philippe box on the table beside the untouched anniversary dinner.

The night air hit me like a slap as I descended the front steps. I didn't bother with a coat.

The engine of my Bentley roared to life, and I sped into the night, my knuckles white on the steering wheel, the tracker open on the phone mount beside me, the red dot holding steady at The Gilded Lily.

Twenty minutes later, I parked across the street, hidden in the shadows of an old oak tree. I killed the engine and the lights.

The restaurant's floortoceiling windows were like a brightly lit stage, offering an unobstructed view of the tragedy inside. And there he was. My husband. Conrad.

He wasn't wearing the new suit I'd laid out for him. Instead, a casual black shirt stretched across his broad shoulders. His head was tilted, a soft, gentle expression on his face.

An expression I hadn't seen directed at me in years. It was all for the woman sitting opposite him. Jasmine Becker. His "assistant." The Pack's worstkept secret.

She wore a beautiful white dress, her laughter echoing silently behind the glass. On the table between them sat a small, elegant birthday cake. My breath caught.

Today wasn't her birthday. Today was our anniversary. My gaze shifted, and a new detail froze the blood in my veins.

Sitting beside Jasmine, her small face alight with joy, was my daughter. Our daughter. Delma. My sixyearold girl was chattering excitedly to Jasmine.

Then, with Conrad's large hand guiding her small one, she picked up a knife and cut the first slice of cake. For Jasmine. Conrad reached into his pocket and pulled out a velvet box.

He opened it. A necklace. My vision narrowed. I knew that necklace. The Tear of the Moon. A sapphire heirloom passed down through my family, the Marshalls, for generations.

It had been in my mother's vault. How did he get it? He leaned across the table and fastened it around Jasmine's neck.

She tilted her head, a shy smile on her face, and then leaned in to kiss his cheek. Delma clapped her little hands, beaming as if this was the most natural thing in the world.

A perfect family portrait. A wave of disgust so profound it threatened to choke me washed over me. I gripped the steering wheel, my knuckles white, forcing the bile back down.

Reason severed the last tether of love with the precision of a scalpel. Cold clarity bloomed in the hollow where my heart used to be.

The initial shock, a sharp, physical blow, began to recede. In its place, a chilling clarity bloomed. A dead, quiet cold. I didn't storm in. I didn't scream.

I got back in my car, pulled out my phone, and aimed the camera at the window. I pressed record. The video captured it all. Conrad raising his glass in a toast.

Jasmine's radiant smile. Delma snuggling against her side. I saved the file, my face expressionless.

Then, I sent a single text message to Conrad. “I'm waiting for you at home.” I started the car and pulled away from the curb, driving calmly, as if I hadn't just watched my world burn to the ground.

The rearview mirror reflected my face, pale and strikingly beautiful. My violet eyes, once full of love for him, were now as empty and cold as a winter sky.

Aurora's POV: I didn't turn on the lights when I got back to the manor. The house was a cavern of shadows, silent and empty. I walked into the living room and sat on the sofa.

The giftwrapped box with the Patek Philippe watch—which I’d snatched from the dining table in a daze before heading out—slid from my lap and landed silently on the plush rug.

I glanced at it, a sixfigure asset, now just a piece of evidence. I just sat there. Waiting. The grandfather clock chimed midnight. Headlights swept across the front windows.

He was home. The front door opened, and Conrad stepped inside, bringing the scent of expensive wine and Jasmine's cloying perfume with him.

He flicked on the lights, and his eyes narrowed when he saw me. "Why are you sitting in the dark? You look like a ghost." His voice was rough with impatience. I didn't look at him.

My voice was terrifyingly calm. "Happy anniversary, Conrad." He froze for a second.

A flicker of something—annoyance? guilt?—crossed his face before his usual arrogance settled back in. "There was an emergency at the Pack. It's just an anniversary, Aurora.

Do you have to be so dramatic?" A laugh, brittle and sharp, escaped my lips. "Yes. Just an anniversary.

Not nearly as important as Jasmine's birthday." His face hardened. "Did you follow me?" he snarled.

Before I could answer, a small voice called from the top of the stairs. "Daddy, you're finally home!" Delma came running down, clutching a new, elaborately dressed doll.

Conrad had sent her home with a driver an hour ago, presumably to steal more private time with Jasmine.

She stopped when she sensed the tension, her eyes darting between us. "Look!" she said, holding the doll up for Conrad. "Aunt Jasmine said this one's way prettier than the one you got me!" Her innocent words were a calculated strike, a testament to Jasmine's insidious influence.

She turned to me, her lower lip pushing out in a pout. "Mommy, why did you call Daddy? You ruined Aunt Jasmine's birthday party!" A triumphant smirk touched Conrad's lips.

He looked at me as if to say, See? Even our child chooses her. Just then, my assistant, Paige Sullivan, hurried in through the side entrance, a folder in her hand.

She stopped dead, her gaze taking in the scene: Conrad's smugness, Delma's accusatory stance, and my frozen posture.

Her face tightened. "Ma'am," Paige said, stepping forward and handing me the folder. "The background check you ordered last month.

I finally secured the medical records." Her eyes flickered to the father and daughter, and she leaned in close, her voice a fierce whisper only I could hear. "It confirms your suspicions, ma'am.

Jasmine lost the ability to have children after an accident years ago." My head snapped up. I stared at her, my mind reeling.

Paige's voice was relentless. "That's why the Harris family needs you. To them, you're nothing more than a tool. A womb to produce a pureblood heir for the Blackwood Pack." Tool.

The word didn't shatter anything. It simply confirmed the cold calculus I had begun to suspect.

The marriage wasn't a failure; it was a transaction. "What are you two whispering about?" Conrad's voice cut through my shock, laced with irritation. "I'm tired, Aurora.

Stop this nonsense." "Yeah, Mommy, you're so mean!" Delma chimed in. "Aunt Jasmine is sick, but she still played with me. All you do is stay home!" The contempt from my husband.

The accusation from my daughter. This alliance solidified my next move. I stood up. For the first time since he'd walked in, I looked directly at him.

The love that had lived in my eyes for so long was gone. In its place was the cold, detached assessment of a stranger. Without a word, I walked past him and up the stairs.

I heard him take a sharp breath. For a fleeting moment, I felt a strange tremor through our bonda flicker of unease from his inner wolf. It was too little, too late.

I entered our bedroom and locked the door behind me. I walked to the antique writing desk, pulled out a sheet of heavy cream paper, and uncapped a fountain pen.

The nib hovered over the fibers. In the silence, a memory surfaced—our wedding night. Conrad’s hand, warm and rough, cupping my face. ‘I’ll protect you, Aurora.

Always.’ The mate bond had hummed bright and gold between us then. Now, it was a severed wire, sparking uselessly in the void.

I couldn’t believe how stupid I had been to cling to that promise for so long. Now my heart was utterly dead. What was left of me was nothing but a creditor come to collect.

At the top of the page, I wrote two words. Divorce Agreement. Outside, the full moon rose. It illuminated the path I would now have to walk alone.

Aurora's POV: The next morning, I found Conrad in the study. I was dressed in a sharp charcoal pantsuit, my hair pulled back in a severe knot.

He was slumped in his leather chair, nursing a hangover, his eyes bloodshot. "What now, Aurora?" he grumbled, rubbing his temples. "What new drama are you inventing today?" I didn't answer.

I simply slid a single document across the polished surface of his desk. "Sign it," I said. He picked it up.

His eyes scanned the title. "Divorce Agreement." First, a look of disbelief. Then, he threw his head back and laughed, a harsh, mocking sound. "A divorce?

Aurora, be serious." He crumpled the paper into a tight ball and tossed it into the wastebasket. "You can't even pay next month's credit card bills without me.

Stop playing games." My expression didn't change.

I reached into my briefcase and pulled out an identical copy, placing it in the exact same spot. "I'm not playing," I said, my voice flat. "I want a divorce.

I want full custody of Delma. And I want fifty percent of your personal assets." The laughter died in his throat. His face went dark.

He stood up, towering over me, his Alpha presence flooding the room like a toxic wave. "Are you insane?

On what grounds?" I met his furious gaze without flinching. "On the grounds of Dr. Julian Price." The name hit him like a physical blow. His face went white. Dr.

Price was the world's leading oncologist, the only surgeon skilled enough to perform the delicate operation Jasmine needed. "What did you do?" he hissed, his voice a low, dangerous growl.

A small, cold smile touched my lips. "Nothing much. Dr. Price was a scholarship student my mother sponsored through medical school. He owes the Marshall family a favor.

I called him yesterday. He has canceled Jasmine's surgery." I didn't just speak. I pulled out my phone, tapped the screen, and slid it across the desk toward him.

The email confirmation from Price's office glared on the screen: Surgery for Patient J. Becker — CANCELLED. Rescheduled for priority Patient S.

Harris. "Instead, he will be prioritizing another patient," I said, watching his eyes lock onto the screen. "Your father, Sebastian Harris." He looked like I had just stabbed him.

His father was also gravely ill, waiting for the same surgeon, though his condition was considered less immediately critical than Jasmine's. Now, I held two lives in my hands.

His lover and his father. The choice was mine. His eyes turned a feral, bloodred.

In a flash, he crossed the space between us, his hand clamping around my throat, slamming me back against the wall. "You wouldn't dare," he snarled, his face inches from mine. "Jasmine can't wait." Air struggled to enter my lungs.

My vision started to spot, but my eyes remained locked on his, cold and defiant. Time dilated.

I saw the war in his eyes—the Alpha wolf howling for blood, the man terrified of losing his mate. His fingers tightened, crushing my windpipe. Then, a tremor.

His thumb brushed the skin he was bruising. The red in his irises flickered, fighting the human rage.

He saw the hatred in my eyes—no fear, only absolute, fatal resolve—and the wolf whimpered. He understood then: this was not a game.

This was checkmate. "Sign the papers," I rasped, the words scraping my raw throat. "And Dr. Price will be back on her surgical schedule immediately.

Don't... and you can start planning her funeral. And hope your father holds on." My words were poison, and I watched them work their way through him. His hand trembled violently.

He was caught between his Alpha pride and his desperate need to save his precious Jasmine. He saw the hatred in my eyes and finally understood. This was not a game.

Suddenly, he let go. I collapsed to the floor, gasping for air, my hand flying to my bruised neck. The pain was sharp, grounding. I sucked in oxygen, rattling and loud.

Conrad stood over me, his chest heaving. "You think this is how you win? You're a fool, Aurora." He didn't pick up the agreement.

He turned, and with a roar of pure rage, he slammed his fist into the solid oak door.

The wood splintered with a deafening crack. "I will not divorce you," he bit out, each word dripping with venom. "I will make you regret you were ever born." His eyes held a terrifying, possessive madness. "You are my Luna.

You will die as the Luna of the Blackwood Pack." He ripped the damaged door open and stormed out, leaving me alone in the silent room.

I stayed on the floor, shoulders shaking, letting the tears come. I looked utterly broken.

But as I lifted my phone with trembling hands, switched to the front camera, and captured the purple fingerprints blooming on my throat, my mind was icecold.

The first piece of evidence was already in my lawyer's hands—the video of the three of them having dinner together, a perfect family portrait without me.

Now I had the second: domestic violence, timestamped and documented. I let the tears fall harder for the camera, playing the part of the shattered wife. Evidence logged. Case built.

A grim, humorless smile twisted my lips. The war had just begun.