After I left, He began to love me.

I was dragged out of the barn roughly, my wrists bound, tied to the rusted hook at the back of an old sled.

The engine roared to life. In the darkness, the sled began to move.

The rough stone ground tore at my clothes and skin; dust and blood mixed together, leaving streaks of red across the path my body traced.

I screamed his name again and again, my voice swallowed by the night wind.

“Alpha Cole! Look at me! Do you even remember who I am?”

But he—he was already holding Diana in his arms, tending to her wounds, wiping the blood from her skin.

Every ounce of tenderness he once gave me now belonged to her.

Eliza was dragged behind, her cries unanswered, unseen.

Pain and humiliation intertwined like a thousand needles piercing my nerves. My mind shattered, collapsing into endless darkness.

When I opened my eyes again, the harsh light inside the healer’s tent stabbed into my vision.

Alpha Cole stood by my bedside, his expression cold, restrained.

The first words from his lips were not concern, but a weary sigh.

“Eliza, I didn’t want to drag you like that. But could you please stop causing trouble for NianNian?”

My fingers trembled beneath the furs.

That chase—the one that nearly killed me—he had ordered it himself?

All because… he feared I might go after that woman?

I stared at him—the man who once swore to love me above all others—and now, he was a stranger.

My voice trembled so violently I could barely speak. “What is your relationship with her, exactly?”

Alpha Cole pinched the bridge of his nose, as though struggling for composure. Finally, he spoke the words that shattered what remained of my heart.

“I wasn’t going to tell you. But since you already know… I fell for her at first sight. I like her. I really like her. I like her very much.”

That word—“like”—he said it three times.

Each time like a silver blade, cutting into the flesh of my chest.

Even when he once swore his vows beneath the moonlight, he had never sounded so fervent.

I could hardly breathe; tears blurred my vision. “And what about me? What do the twenty years between us mean to you?”

He fell silent for a moment, then spoke in a calm voice colder than the northern winds.

“Eliza, you’re too strong. Too distant. You’re like the Moon Goddess herself—beautiful, unreachable. I thought I loved you, but it was only a desire to conquer. When I met NianNian, I finally understood what true affection feels like.”

He paused, as if reciting a decree before the council.

“This is my fault. If you promise not to hurt her, you may remain my mate in name. You will still have your rank, your honor, everything you deserve.”

Then he turned and left the healer’s tent without a backward glance.

In that moment, I felt as though my entire life had been sentenced to death—with nothing more than a casual decree.

I once thought it might all be a dream.

But dreams never hurt this much.

Soon after, Alpha Cole’s affection for NianNian became the hottest gossip in the pack council.

Moonstone jewelry, a crimson war chariot, a cliffside villa—he lavished her with treasures beyond even what he once bestowed upon me.

To make her feel “worthy of him,” he brought her openly into the pack territory, handing her the keys to both the treasury and the land.

From that day on, our home was rewritten.

Warmth turned into frugality and suspicion; laughter gave way to silence and cold restraint.

Until tragedy struck—my beloved younger brother paid the ultimate price for this foolish triangle.

In that moment, I finally understood—

the collapse of love does not begin with arguments.

It begins the moment an Alpha allows his heart to belong to someone else.