Chapter 2 The Voice

Malia

I woke up feeling groggy and disoriented, my head pounding with a dull ache. As my eyes fluttered open, I was surprised to find Jackson, my mate, and the pack doctor standing by my bedside.

"Alpha, she's awake!" The pack doctor's mouth moves but I'm unable to decipher the words coming out of it yet.

"W-what's happening? Where am I?" I try to sit up but there's a sharp ache spreading through me.

"Luna, be careful. You're still in recovery." The doctor says before fixing a table behind me.

"Recovery?" I mutter weakly. Confusion washed over me, but I'm more confused as to why Jackson has decided to keep a distance. As I stretched my hand out to reach out for Jackson, suddenly my head was filled with the memories of his infidelity yesterday, they flooded back, weighing heavily on my heart.

I remember everything. The wolfsbane, my suicide attempt...

How am I here?

"It's because of me..." a voice whispered weakly. Almost as if it was in recovery too.

I looked at the doctor and Jackson but neither of them had uttered a word.

"Yeah. After you left the hospital two days ago, you left behind your bag. I came to drop it off after closing hours and found you with the almost empty bottle of wolfsbane in your hand," The doctor explains. My gaze drifts to Jackson who has been quiet since I woke up, he checks his time impatiently as if he'd rather be anywhere but here.

Maybe with that whore who he cheated on me with. That even hurts more than the fact that I was passed out for two days.

My chest tightens.

"Enough of this chit-chat. Is she well enough to comprehend things or not?" Jackson asks roughly finally tired of waiting.

"Uh, yes. I just need to run more tests. With the amount of aconite intake I detected, no werewolf should be able to survive it. Especially one with your... condition, Luna." He's talking about my curse, my fist clenches. "Even a shifter werewolf can not survive that sort of aconite poisoning. So, how did you?"

"We're alive because of me." The voice from earlier whispers again. I am now one hundred percent sure it wasn't either of the people in this room. My eyes were on them.

"Who said that?" I ask before I can stop myself. Jackson and the doctor look at me like I'm crazy.

"Unbelievable," Jackson's sneer of disgust cut through me like a knife. "First you fail at being a true werewolf or Luna, now you fail at a suicide attempt too? You're a natural failure." Jackson laughs. "At least we know you're good at something other than cleaning up after me. Failing." The way he wasted no time in belittling me made me realize that I never knew the real Jackson. "It's probably your fault that the entire women in your generation are cursed too." My chest clenches with pain at the way he wastes no time in blaming me for the curse that seemed to run in my family.

"Jackson, please stop," I begged weakly trying to wipe away tears.

All I've done is cry since I caught him. I've cried so much in the last couple of days than I have in my entire life.

Jackson produces a folded paper from his pocket, "Sign this." He sneers, throwing the paper on my body. "I'll take pity on you and keep you as a mate, but I do not want to be bound to you in marriage." In front of the pack doctor, he offered me divorce papers, as if our bond meant nothing to him anymore.

Still reeling from the betrayal, "Is this why you saved me? Just so you can divorce me?"

Jackson scoffs, "I didn't save you. I had no idea you were dying until he called for me." I wonder who he was doing I think to myself sarcastically. "He saved you. Your pulse was low, but you still had one according to him. Left to me you would have rot in this room for days." Jackson sneered. Every word he uttered was full of disdain and pride and I had to ask myself how blind I must have been for two years not to notice the hate he harboured for me.

Heartbroken and tired of the maltreatment and disrespect, I took the divorce papers and signed them. At that moment, I couldn't bear the thought of being tied to someone who saw me as nothing more than an object.

An idea flickered in my head, and I relished the small victory it would give me. "I, Malia Bailey, Luna of the Moonblood pack reject you Alpha Jackson Kenner." I rejected him before he could reject me, a flicker of defiance igniting within me. Our hands instinctively go to the space where our hearts are located. I sigh in relief as I feel the mate bond being broken.

It hurts, but it's the first step in finding freedom from what I once perceived as love.

There's a small gasp in the room, probably from the long-forgotten doctor. Jackson's anger flares, "How dare you reject me! I offered you everything. You ungrateful bitch!" his words dripping with venom. "You'll regret this. No one will ever accept you the way I have, whore!" As his threats echoed in my ears, a mixture of sadness and determination welled up inside me.

I knew deep down that I deserved better than his toxic love and constant reminders of my perceived failures. It was time to break free from the chains that bound me to him and find my path, even if it meant facing the unknown.

"Anything is better than you, Jackson Kenner." I get up from the bed and walk to the table. I grab anything I can think of before walking out of the house.

"It hurts..." the voice speaks again and I jerk a little at the unexpected sound, but I don't stop moving until I'm in my car.

I have to get out of here. Not just this house, this pack. Not long now, the entire pack will hear of the rejection. Knowing the real Jackson, I'm not surprised he'll try to spin the story to favor him. The only other person that knows the truth is the pack doctor and he's bound by duty to his Alpha.

"Malia..." The voice speaks again and I almost scream. I have to park the car abruptly, pausing my journey to my best friend, Melissa's house.

Am I losing my mind?

"Who are you? Who's speaking?" I must be truly crazy for speaking to an unknown voice that only I seem to be hearing.

I sigh defeatedly when I don't hear anything anymore. Starting the car again, I concentrate my breathing and try to clear my head as much as a newly divorced Luna can before resuming my drive to Melissa's house.

Just as I take the turn that leads to Melissa's street, the voice speaks again, whispering the most shocking thing I've heard in years.