Page 121 of The Enforcer's Rejected Mate

“I’m his mate! I would never betray you!”

“Then what was the Frostclaw Heir doing here?” Cassidy asks.

I drop Thorne’s arm. “I-I-don’t know. I swear.”

“You think that you can get out of this? He knew exactly how to find you. How to get past all of our defenses. You gave him that information. I’ve seen you out in the woods. I know you’re meeting him there.”

Until today, I’ve never been in the woods on my own. “That’s not true.”

“I saw her,” a woman says. “Today. I saw you coming up from the woods.”

“No, it’s not what you think. I swear. I can explain.”

Cassidy gives me a smug look. “You think I’m going to let you lie to my pack?Take my mate? Because he is mine. My mate!,” she screams, voice echoing and bouncing off the walls until it sounds like there’s an army of her. “He’s always been mine, not even your little fated mate shit was ever going to take him away from me. He’s marrying me. It’s a play that was put in place long before you dragged your ass into our lives.” She holds up her hand. “I’ve already got the ring on my finger too.” She gives her hand a little wiggle and I almost vomit.

How is this my curse from the universe? Two fated mates and twice they’ve been promised to other women?

I look at Thorne. “I didn’t do any of what she’s saying. You believe me, don’t you? You know it’s not true. You have to.” I take a step towards him and Thorne backs up a step. I stop like he slapped me. He’s trying to close off his emotions, I know he is but as much as he’s trying I still feel one.

Regret.

“Thorne. Please. You believe me, right? Please, please say yes.”

“Don’t you dare talk to him!” Cassidy shrieks from the dais. “You lost that right when you conspired to destroy us.”

I look away from Thorne. “No! You’re lying! You’re lying about everything.” I refuse to believe anything she’s saying aboutThorne being her mate. About the ring. It can’t be true. Gods. Please tell me it isn’t true.

Thorne’s regret ramps up. Disgust mingles with it so heavy that I choke on it and have to double over, hands on my knees.

“Why would I lie? I’m the Beta’s daughter. I would never betray my pack. And anyways, if I was lying, would I know where your mate is hiding?” She looks out at the crowd and throws her arm out to them as she speaks like this is some perverse version of a game show. “Who wants to see the Frostclaw Heir? I’ll show you where he is!” She points a finger at me. “But you already knew he was here, didn’t you?”

“What? No. I don’t know anything.” I spin and look around the pack, at the people that I thought of as my friends, but they’re not friendly now. It doesn’t matter that I spent all week treating them and helping them with cures. None of that matters now. They believe Cassidy.

I see Clover and Piper. Nova and Lux are hovering behind them. “Clover, Piper? You believe me, right?”

Clover looks uncomfortable. “Cordy…why would she know where he is?”

That’s all it takes for the thin hold I have keeping myself together to snap. After all these years, after a lifetime of knocking at a door and hoping someone, anyone, would answer, I can’t do it anymore. My hope dies. I’ll never find my home.

“Cordelia, wait,” Piper steps towards me but I dodge her. I don’t even stop to look at Thorne or anyone else. I can’t bear to see what I would find there. I’ve been rejected by my mate and my pack again. There’s no use staying here for another second. I grab my skirts and run.

Chapter

Fifty-Two

CORDELIA

When I run out of the meeting hall I don’t have a direction in mind. Part of me screams to run home, but where is that? I don’t have a home. The cottage has my things and I know I’ll have to go there eventually but right now, I can’t. I’ll lose it. I’ll shatter into a million pieces so small the pieces would be sand.

No, I can’t go home.

If I go home, I know Thorne will eventually show up. He’s decent enough to try to talk to me about Cassidy. The ring on her finger sparkles and shines in my memory. So bright that it could be the midday sun. Tears roll down my cheeks. I don’t bother to stop to wipe them, I just keep running. I pass a few stragglers on my way down. A few of them call out to me about where I’m going and if everything is okay, but I don’t answer them. They won’t care what’s wrong with me once they are under Cassidy’s poisonous spell.

I burst out of the Keep and sprint through the courtyard.

“Hey! Cordelia, where are you going?” I turn to see Thorne’s second-in-command, Lucian. He’s a few feet away. What the hells? It’s then I realize he’s running alongside me.

I turn away and don’t answer him.