Elodie’s POV~
That day, I forced myself not to think about Dante and Sienna. Pretending not to care had beco a survival skill, though my chest still felt like it carried a weight I couldn’t set down. I stayed buried in work until almost nine, staring at spreadsheets long after the words blurred.
When my phone buzzed, I almost didn’t answer. It was Cara, my best friend. Her voice was slurred, words tumbling over one another. She was drunk. She needed .
I shoved the files into a neat pile, grabbed my keys, and drove. The city lights blurred past the windshield, mocking with how alive everything seed while I felt half-dead inside.
Twenty minutes later, I pulled into the restaurant’s lot. Just as I was heading toward the entrance, I saw her.
A little girl, small fra, dark hair catching the glow of the lights. My steps faltered. My lungs forgot how to work.
“Liora?” My voice cracked in my throat, though the word never left my lips.
My daughter. My little girl.
She was supposed to be in the European Pack, finishing her term at the academy. Dante had said the project there would keep him for months. I thought I had ti, ti before I had to face him again, ti before I had to face her.
But she was here. Skipping through the parking lot with her braid bouncing, humming a tune only children know. And she hadn’t called . Not once.
My hands tightened around my bag until the leather bit into my palm. I followed quietly, my heart a frantic ss inside my chest.
At the corner of the lobby, voices drifted toward . And then her. Sa Sienna. Surrounded by Dante’s friends, glowing like she owned the whole damned world.
Liora’s face lit up the second she saw her. “Auntie Sienna!”
I froze. My daughter ran, not to , but into her arms.
Sienna laughed softly, graceful even in sothing as small as a hug. “Liora, you’re back too?”
“Because you ca back,” Liora said brightly, “Daddy finished work early so we wouldn’t miss your birthday! We even made you a necklace together... see? Isn’t it pretty?”
The Entire world tilted.
I slipped into the nearest chair, tucking myself behind a potted plant like a coward. My chest cracked open as I listened to my little girl gush about how much she missed her. How Dante had worked late into the night, not for , not for us, but to handcraft sothing for her.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. Instead, I sat there, nails digging crescent moons into my skin, listening to the sound of my daughter’s laughter as she kissed Sienna’s cheek.
“It’s been a week since I saw you, Auntie Sienna. I missed you so much,” Liora whispered.
And Sienna, without hesitation, returned it: “I missed you too, little wolf.”
My throat burned. My eyes stung. But the worst hadn’t even co yet.
I heard him before I saw him.
Dante. His footsteps. I could pick them out anywhere. Years of waiting up for him, listening to those sa steady strides echo in the halls long after midnight, had burned them into .
Unhurried. Composed. Like the whole world bent around him. Nothing ever rattled Dante. Nothing ever cracked his ice.
Except her.
I didn’t need to lift my head to know the way his gaze would soften when he saw Sienna. I didn’t need to look to know his lips would curve into the faint smile he never once gave .
And as my daughter clung to the woman who had everything I didn’t, I realized the truth I had been running from, that Dante had already built his family. And I wasn’t part of it.
I should have left the mont I saw them. I should have turned around, walked out, and spared myself the agony. But my body betrayed , rooting in place like a coward hiding behind shadows. A coward who could no longer speak or move.
“Daddy!” Liora’s small voice rang out, bright and sweet, like bells I hadn’t heard in weeks. My little girl.
And then him. Dante. My husband. No no, ex husband. He walked in with that sa steady stride, flanked by his n. His friends greeted him like he was the center of the universe, and he acknowledged them with that cool, indifferent nod I knew too well. My heart clenched, stupidly still tied to every flick of his eyes, every movent of his body.
He looked at Sienna next. “Happy birthday.” Just that. Short, effortless. But the way his gaze lingered on her, the faint curve in his lips... it felt like soone reached inside my chest and crushed my heart with their bare hands.
“Thanks,” Sienna answered, her smile soft, familiar... too... too familiar.
“Daddy, didn’t you prepare another birthday gift for Auntie Sienna? Quick, give it to her!” Liora’s innocent excitent sliced deeper than any blade. My daughter’s laughter belonged to soone else now. Not . Not her mother. But Sienna.
Silence fell. I held my breath.
Then one of Dante’s friends laughed, crouching to pinch Liora’s cheek. “That’s a private gift your daddy prepared. He’ll give it to her later, just the two of them.”
The others chuckled. Filthy, knowing laughter.
Dante’s voice followed, calm and unbothered. “I’ve already given it to her.”
The ground tilted beneath . My nails dug into my palms.
“When?” Liora pouted. “Daddy, you saw Auntie Sienna without again? That’s not fair!”
Their laughter echoed off the walls.
And ? I just sat there, hidden, breaking. Because I rembered Sienna walking into his office this morning. I thought it was business. Goddess, I wanted to believe it was business. But no, he had already given her the gift. Behind my back.
Sienna, ever so graceful, touched the necklace at her throat and said with a shy smile, “Let’s not stay here. Let’s go upstairs.”
And like that, they walked away together. My husband. My daughter. My replacent. Their footsteps faded, and I was left with the silence, my heart pierced with a thousand tiny blades.
I don’t know how long I sat there, staring at nothing. Long enough that the ache in my chest turned numb, long enough that I had to remind myself to breathe.
Finally, I forced myself to move. I had co here for Cara. She needed . So I pressed the pain down where no one could see it and dragged my body toward the elevators.
The private rooms were on the sa floor. Fate has a cruel sense of humor. As I guided Cara’s drunken body into the elevator, the door slid open, and for a mont, I felt eyes on . One of Dante’s friends, Levi. His steps faltered.
“What’s wrong?” soone asked him.
“I thought I saw soone I knew,” he muttered.
They all knew about once. Knew how pathetically I’d loved Dante. How I was the quiet one in the background, the wife who never fit his world. Beautiful, maybe, but forgettable. Disposable.
Levi’s eyes flicked over again, uncertain. Then he shrugged. “Never mind.”
And just like that, I was erased. As though I was a ghost. Soone they couldn’t even recognize anymore.
The doors slid shut between us. My heart cracked.
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