Free Web NovelChapter 21: Chapter 21 Deep Regret
_Rowena’s POV_
The banquet hall looked expensive.
I could say that without bitterness because I knew exactly how expensive it was, I had seen the loan agreement, signed it, and transferred the money myself. The flower arrangements along the center tables, the lighting between the beams overhead, the catering spread that filled the room with the smell of something rich and sweetly prepared. All of it was funded, in part, by twenty thousand dollars sitting in Kaelen’s an account earning fifteen percent for me.
I found my assigned seat near the middle of the hall, not at the head table and it was not at the back. Somewhere carefully chosen to be neither prominent nor obviously sidelined. Maelis’s doing, probably. Keep the Luna visible enough to avoid questions, inconspicuous enough to avoid upstaging the bride.
I sat down, accepted a glass of water from a passing server, and watched the room fill.
The guests were a cross-section of regional pack society, Alphas and their mates, alliance families, elder members who remembered when the Varkos name had meant something more substantial than it currently did. They came in and found their seats and did what guests at these events always did: looked around to see who else was there and started talking.
I heard my name within the first ten minutes.
Not directed at me but from across the table, two women from a neighboring pack were speaking in the lowered voices people use when they want to be overheard just enough.
“That’s her. The Luna.”
“She looks like that and he went elsewhere?”
“Three years she managed this pack. My cousin’s mate knows someone on their elder council, she kept them solvent.”
“And he brought that woman back from the territory dispute.”
“Some men don’t know what they have.” frёewebnoѵel.ƈo๓
I took a sip of water and looked at the flower centerpiece.
“They’re not wrong, though. Kaelen is one foolish man to ever exist.” Kyra grimaced as she voiced her irritation.
I laughed inwards, trying not to let my composure slip.
“Does it bother you?” She asked again.
I considered that honestly. The pity in the room was real, I could feel it moving around me like weather.
Two weeks ago it would have been unbearable. Now it felt like something happening at a slight distance, relevant but not painful. The difference between watching rain through a window and standing in it.
“Nope,” I said. “Not really.” And I meant it.
The room shifted when Alpha Pierre arrived.
I felt it before I saw him, the pressure change that came when a strong wolf also entered a space.
Pierre Ashford was the Alpha of the Bloodmoon Pack, three territories north, and he was nice and humble.
Widely respected was an understatement. He was the Alpha other Alphas called when something needed resolving cleanly.
He came in with two of his own people, scanned the room with cafreully and found me within thirty seconds.
He crossed the room directly.
“Luna Rowena,” he said to my surprise with a small smile, and bent slightly, not a full bow, more an acknowledgment between equals. “You look well.”
“Pierre.” I stood briefly. “Thank you for coming.”
He pulled out the chair beside me and sat down without asking, which told me this wasn’t a social visit. He had something to say.
“I’ll be direct,” he said, settling in with ease. “I’ve known Kaelen since he was an untested Alpha trying to hold a struggling pack together with borrowed confidence. I respected his potential.” He looked at me steadily. “I do not respect what he’s done here. Starting something with a woman, making promises, leaving for three years, and then coming back with someone else and acting like it’s a reasonable outcome.” He picked up a water glass from the table. “That’s not Alpha behavior. That’s cowardice dressed up as authority.”
Across the hall, I was fairly sure Kaelen had noticed Pierre sitting beside me. I didn’t look to confirm.
“I appreciate you saying so,” I said honestly.
“I’m not saying it to make you feel better,” Pierre said. “I’m saying it because it’s true and someone should say it in a room full of people who are thinking it and staying quiet.” He glanced around the hall briefly.
“Half the packs here have been watching Moonreign for three years and wondering who was actually running it. They always knew, Ro.”
Before I could respond, the doors at the far end of the hall opened.
Virella arrived, walking down the aisle.
She understood presentation. The room turned toward her the way everyone always turned toward a bride, and she moved through the attention with the ease, already expecting the looks.
Kaelen was waiting at the ceremonial arch the pack elder had set up at the front of the hall.
He looked good. I could observe that without it costing me anything anymore, the same way you could look at a painting you’d once loved and appreciate the craft without wanting to take it home.
He was watching Virella approach, and then, for just a moment, his eyes moved to me instead.
It was brief. Three seconds at most. I said nothing, knowing Pierre also saw it.
Kaelen looked back at Virella.
The elder began speaking, the formal language of a pack wedding ceremony, the acknowledgment of bond and commitment and shared future. The room settled into silence as they witnessed the wedding.
I looked at my water glass.
“Don’t let it get to you, okay?” Kyra said calmly.
“I don’t care. It’s okay.”
“You sound like I’m not a part of you. I feel whatever you feel, and the pain in your heart is enough.” She pointed out carefully and I sighed.
It hurts, but I was used to it already. I just regretted ever accepting this arrangement. Regretted marrying Kaelen instead of saying a blatant no on the day mother introduced us to each other.
But it was all in the past, and I had to move on now.
He wasn’t and would never be mine.
I deserve better.
