Despair closed over me like water. I blinked back tears and picked up my chopsticks. "I'll eat."
Once this meal was finished, everything would be over.
In the dead of night, the pain tore through my abdomen. Blood seeped from between my legs, spreading across the sheets in a slow, dark stain. The mating mark at my throat throbbed dully, as though it too was losing something it could not name.
Hadeon called out toward the door, and Soren Ashwick walked in at once, as though he had been waiting just outside.
The agony had blurred my vision, but I still heard Soren's careful, measured words: "My lord, the lady's previous pup loss already damaged her body. If we don't intervene now, she may never carry again."
Silence. Then Hadeon spoke. "It doesn't matter. Do as I told you. When I take a second mate someday and she bears pups, I'll give one to Perenna to raise in her old age."
"Understood, my lord."
So it was true. He thought I was filthy. He had never wanted a pup with me.
The last ember of hope inside me turned to ash. My wolf made no sound. She had gone so still I could not feel her at all, and that absence was worse than pain.