Christina's POV
Slap!
My head snapped to the side, vision blurring, skin burning as if someone had pressed a brand into me. For a heartbeat, I couldn't even process it.
My fated mate just hit me.
Three minutes ago, I'd been stupidly daydreaming about curtains, rugs, chandeliers, wondering how I would make the ridiculously expensive pack house look less like a museum screaming I have more money than personality.
Two minutes ago, I'd knocked over a framed photograph in his bedroom. Just an accident. A picture of my sister smiling like the golden saint she always was.
Now, blood rushed in my ears as the sting on my face spread, sharp and humiliating. The boy I once believed was my forever had just turned me into the villain of his story.
Akira roared inside me, claws scraping at the walls of my chest.
Rage, betrayal, heartbreak swirled together until I could barely breathe.
Niall's lips pressed into a tight line."You broke the only photo I had with Beatrice. Your jealousy makes me sick."
"Are you fucking insane?" I gritted my teeth.
"No, you're the insane one!" he roared."I already agreed to marry you,what more do you want? Beatrice had to leave because of you!Because you exposed our mate bond and forced me to accept you!"
The hatred in his eyes cut deeper than the slap.
"She was your sister! And now you're jealous? You won't rest until every trace of her is erased, will you?" He said in anger as he shoved me backward, into the coffee table.
Sharp pain sliced through my palm as I landed on the shattered glass frame.
Blood smeared across Beatrice's perfect smile.
How poetic.
My cheek throbbed. My hand was bleeding.But nothing hurt more than the realization that my so-called mate had never loved me.
"It wasn't me," I said, one final attempt at reason."I never forced this mate bond on you. I never asked her to leave."
Technically speaking, I understood why someone might blame me.
On my eighteenth birthday, I shifted and realized Niall was my fated mate.Stupidly, I wrote it all down in my diary.I planned to tell him when he returned from his business trip. If he couldn't accept me, I was prepared for rejection.
But Beatrice found my diary and made it public.
Privacy was apparently a foreign concept to her. She told everyone in The Crescent pack about my diary.
I was dragged out and shamed as the pathetic spare who dared reach above her station for her perfect sister's Alpha.
Then Beatrice graciously left for abroad,leaving behind a letter saying she'd "discovered my secret" and decided to "let go," to "let him be mine."
My sister was about as generous as a reality TV contestant with someone else's money.
And I? I was the villain who drove away The Crescent Pack's perfect princess.
To my family,I'd been bumped to the starting lineup after years on the bench,so I should've been grateful.My parents didn't truly care which daughter married Niall, only that the pack alliance was sealed.Even if Niall had literally ripped my heart out, my parents would've handed him napkins to clean up.
It was as if my parents had always hated me. No matter how much I outperformed Beatrice in training, they always made excuses for her and found fault with me. I was bitter, ungrateful, someone who couldn't appreciate her dear sister.
My fingers clenched around the engagement ring.This pathetic symbol of our joke mateship.
Hot tears blurred my vision. I blinked them back fast.
I bolted for the door.Had to get out before the tears came.
Niall grabbed my wrist to stop me. "Clean it up."
"What?"I stared him in disbelief, needing to confirm I'd heard him right.
"You broke the photo frame. Clean up the pieces." Ice-cold command.
Too bad I never was good at taking orders.
"No." I lifted my chin. Zero compromise.
His jaw clenched. "You sure you want to do this, Christina?"
"Yes. I said no." I stared him down without flinching.
If love meant grinding my self-respect into cigarette ash, then fuck love.
The air between us snapped, tension rising like a storm. He leaned in, fury blazing. "Last chance. Disobey me, and I'll end this bond right here—"
"We are over," I cut in.
Shock froze his face.
For a moment,the air went still.
He hadn't expected me to actually say it.
I yanked my arm free, breath hitching as hope for escape flared—only for him to seize me again, his grip bruising, his eyes burning with something close to hatred.
"This is on you, Christina!" Niall snarled, his tone that of a sworn enemy rather than the mate fate had chained me to.