Chapter Thirty: A Shattered Heart

Charlie’s heart raced in her chest as she squared her shoulders, forcing herself to meet Leah’s sneering gaze. Every fiber of her being screamed at her to run, to escape the confrontation that was unfolding in the kitchen. But she wasn’t the same weak Omega anymore. She had come too far. Survived too much. Now, she was mated to the Alphas—Luna, if only in name for the moment. And she wasn’t going to let Leah, of all people, tear her down.

"You better leave before Liam or Luther shows up," Charlie said, trying to sound braver than she felt. Her voice didn’t waver, but her chest tightened with the effort. The last thing she wanted was to show any weakness in front of Leah.

Leah’s lips curled into a sneer, her eyes gleaming with malice as she sauntered closer. “So now that you’ve fucked the twins, you think you’re something special?” she scoffed, her hand resting on her hip in a show of superiority. “News flash, slave girl—most of the women in this pack have been with your precious Alphas. You’re nothing special. Nothing more than a passing fling before they cast you aside for the next female.”

The venom in Leah’s words cut deeper than Charlie expected, but she refused to let it show. She clenched her fists at her sides, willing herself to stay strong. But when Leah took a step closer, Charlie’s body betrayed her, instinctively stepping backward until her back pressed against the hard edge of the kitchen counter. Her heart lurched in her chest, and a flash of shame ran through her at the retreat.

Leah took another step closer, her gaze predatory, like a wolf toying with a cornered rabbit. Her chest tightened, panic flickering at the edges of her mind as she realized she had nowhere else to go.

Leah’s laughter filled the kitchen, loud and harsh, as if she had been waiting for that moment. She threw her head back, cackling with cruel delight. "You’re still the same pathetic little Omega you always were," Leah mocked, her voice sharp and cutting. “No matter what you think you are now.”

Charlie’s stomach churned with the weight of the insult, but she held her ground, refusing to let the fear take over. I’m not that girl anymore, she told herself. I’m stronger now. I’m mated to them.

But Leah wasn’t done. There was a glint in her eyes, something darker, something almost gleeful as she took another step forward. Her voice lowered to a conspiratorial whisper, the words dripping with malice. “That’s probably why your precious Alpha was with me the other night,” she hissed, each word a sharpened dagger aimed straight at Charlie’s heart. “While you were off fucking his brother, I was busy with Luther.”

Charlie’s heart froze in her chest. The breath caught in her throat as Leah’s words sank in, cold and cruel. She stood, paralyzed, unable to move, unable to think. The kitchen around her seemed to blur, the world narrowing to the horrible realization that hit her like a punch to the gut.

“I watched as he stripped naked for me,” Leah continued, her voice taunting, “before I grabbed his rock-hard cock in my hand and—"

A low growl tore from Charlie’s throat, cutting Leah off mid-sentence. Her entire body trembled with a mix of fury and devastation, her chest heaving as tears began to well in her eyes. She didn’t want to believe Leah’s words—she couldn’t—but there was no denying the truth that seeped through every syllable.

One of the cruel realities of being a wolf was the ability to detect lies, and no matter how desperately Charlie wished Leah was lying, her instincts told her otherwise.

Leah was telling the truth.

And the truth hit her like a freight train, crashing through the fragile sense of security she had built with Luther and Liam. Her heart shattered, pieces of it scattering through her chest as doubt crept in, gnawing at the edges of her mind. Had Luther really left her that night to be with Leah? Was that why he had smelled so freshly showered the next morning when they woke up together? How could he claim to care for her so deeply, only to betray her in such a cruel way?

Charlie’s hands trembled at her sides, her nails digging into her palms as tears spilled down her cheeks. She hated that Leah had the power to make her feel like this, to make her doubt everything she had fought for. But the pain was too raw, too immediate to ignore.

Leah watched her with cold satisfaction, her lips curling into a smirk as she saw the effect her words had on Charlie. “You see, Charlie,” she sneered, her voice soft but lethal, “they’ll tire of you, just like every girl before you. You’re nothing more than a toy for their entertainment.”

The words were like acid, burning through Charlie’s skin, searing into her soul. Her chest tightened as she tried to breathe through the pain, but it felt like she was suffocating, like there wasn’t enough air in the room to fill her lungs. The betrayal, the humiliation, the heartache—it was all too much. She wanted to scream, to rage at Leah, at Luther, at the world for being so cruel.

But she couldn’t find her voice. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t do anything but stand there, pinned beneath the weight of Leah’s lies—no, not lies—her truth.

Leah took another step forward, her eyes gleaming with victory. “You’re still the same pathetic little Omega you’ve always been,” she repeated, her voice dripping with disdain. “No amount of bonding with the Alphas is going to change that.”

Charlie’s hands clenched into fists, her nails biting into her palms until they nearly drew blood. She wanted to fight back, wanted to scream at Leah and tell her to leave, but her voice was stuck in her throat, blocked by the painful lump that formed there. The tears fell faster now, sliding down her cheeks, each one a reminder of the broken trust she had placed in Luther.

Leah’s words echoed in her mind, replaying over and over again. I watched as he stripped naked for me. The image that formed in her head made Charlie sick to her stomach. The thought of Luther, the man who had held her so tenderly, so carefully, being with Leah… it was too much. It was like a nightmare she couldn’t wake up from, and the more she thought about it, the more her heart shattered into irreparable pieces.

Her breath came in ragged gasps, and she barely registered Leah’s continued taunts. The pain was too great, the betrayal too deep. Her mind spun with doubt, confusion, and heartbreak, unable to process the full weight of what Leah had said.

She had trusted him. She had opened herself to him in ways she hadn’t thought possible. And now…now everything was crumbling.

A part of her screamed that it couldn’t be true, that Luther wouldn’t betray her like this, not after everything they had shared. But the part of her that had lived through years of torment, that had been conditioned to believe she was nothing more than an object, whispered that Leah might be right about her being nothing but a toy for their amusement.

Charlie couldn’t take it any longer. She shoved at Leah to get her out of her way and went running up the stairs. She went past the twins’ rooms that she has been staying in for the last week and kept going until she reached her tiny little closet.

Once she was alone in the room that she called home for all of her life, she allowed the heavy flow of tears to release from her eyes.

What if Leah was right? What if, after all the progress she had made, she was still just that weak, broken Omega?