Ellie POV

'We can't do this! He needs us!' My wolf whined in my head. Her whimpers on separating from our mate blocked my ears from the noise of nature around us, 'He didn't mean what he said! He loves us!' She tried to tell me.

'Then he wouldn't have told us to leave', I spoke back to her.

After almost three months of accepting us, he changed his mind. All it took was three words for him to no longer love me, to make my entire world shatter around me.

My wolf, Raelynn, continued to sob in my mind as I pushed to go faster. We had to make it to the border while we still had a head start.

'We need to go faster', I yelled to her.

She whimpered more at my request and my urgency to be as far from our mate as possible, but she did as I asked.

The darkness of the forest lit up as we neared the pack border. All I had to do was cross the line and never look back.

I was about to cross over when I heard her try to reason with me once more, 'What if he changed his mind? What if he really does want it?'

I shook my snout in response to her, 'He was disgusted by the mere thought of this child. He believes I lied to him. He thinks that this child isn't his.'

'Just go back and talk to him', she pleaded.

'If I go back, he will kill our child on sight. I will not let him hurt it, I reasoned with her.

'But—'

'There is no but, Raelynn,' I interrupted her, 'He swore to kill us and our child if we ever stepped foot back on his land. If we hadn't of left, he would have executed us on the spot.'

'We are his mate. He wouldn't do that to us,' she tried again.

'He rejected us. He used us, Raelynn. There is no going back.'

I shut off the mind link between us as I crossed the border. Fire burned my mark as I sprinted into the forest.

I pushed through the pain, refusing to turn back as a distant howl cracked my already fractured heart into shattered pieces.

***

It had been 7 years since I was forced to flee from my home, my life, my mate.

I try not to look back at the life I had lost so many years ago. But as I look into the eyes of my child, all I see are her father's. Her bright blue pools reflected the part of his soul I had fallen in love with. Every time I looked at my child, I replayed all the memories I had shared with her father, from the love to the betrayal.

Zea danced around the field, laughing at her own silliness. Happiness seemed to surround her, a feeling she gave to all who knew her. Over the years, being away from my mate broke my heart into a million pieces, but just being around her would put a smile on my face.

She was only six years old, yet she was my life line to living a life I could be happy in without him. She was the greatest gift I had ever been given.

I watched as she played in the field behind the pack house. Her laughter filled the air around me as she giggled about some secrets she was sharing with her Aunt.