A Luna for Alpha Kieran-Chapter 51: The Morning After

A flash of light intruded Autumn’s sleep, as she slightly stirred. Someone must have opened the blinds and let the sun dance.

She slowly blinked into consciousness, the remnants of fever dreams and Kieran’s touch clinging to her like silk strands she couldn’t shake off.

Her body still ached, her limbs heavy... warmth curled around her like safety.

Until...

SPLASH.

A bucket of freezing cold water crashed against her skin and face...sending something like a high voltage electric shock.

She gasped, convulsing in instinct, flailing upright with a strangled cry.

"Wha...What the..."

YANK.

The blanket was ripped off her body with brutal force, leaving her entirely exposed. As naked as a baby... like she was.

Autumn’s hands flew to cover herself, her heart hammering against her ribs as her vision cleared.

Gasps. Sneers. Laughter.

She froze.

The room was full.

Full of faces...sneering, whispering, judging, cursing. Dozens of eyes bore into her. Her limbs moved in desperate, clumsy motions to curl onto herself.

The blanket was gone.

Clutched in the hands of one man.

Roanoke...Her father.

Autumn’s blood turned to ice.The sight of his face after so long, sent such a shudder of fear down her spine that was unexplainable.

However his face was twisted in glee. Not anger. Nor shame.

Triumph.

His lips curled into a disgusted sneer.

"Well, well... look what we have here." His voice dripped with venom. "My bastard daughter, spread out like a common whore in her sister’s wedding bed."

Autumn’s breath hitched. She scrambled to her knees, desperately reaching for the blanket, but Roanoke snatched it away, tossing it onto the floor with a flourish.

"No, no, sweetheart," he mocked, spreading his arms wide. "Let them see what you really are."

The crowd erupted.

"Disgusting!"

A woman gasped audibly. Another man spat on the floor.

"No shame at all!" an elderly man growled. "On her own sister’s wedding bed?! Filthy..."

"By the Moon, damn filthy!" someone echoed.

Autumn reached down to snatch the blanket...

SLAP!!!

The crack of it echoed across the walls.

Her head snapped violently to the side, hair whipping across her face as a hot taste bloomed in her mouth.

Blood!!!

She fell back, dizzy. Her ear and head rang.

Roanoke’s voice became louder. "I knew I should have left you in the gutters where you belonged. I knew you would shame this family!"

Well, technically he did.

Autumn’s vision blurred, her heart pounding so loud it drowned out everything.

She wrapped her arms around her chest, shaking, crouching...trying to gather herself, trying to understand what was happening.

Autumn’s skin burned under their stares. She twisted, searching wildly for Kieran, but he was nowhere.

Gone.

Just like always.

Where the hell was Kieran?

"You dared to seduce the Alpha?!" a woman shrieked, hurling a vase at her.

Autumn ducked. The vase shattered behind her.

"I didn’t!" she croaked, her voice hoarse, trembling. "I didn’t seduce anyone! I didn’t..."

"Then why are you naked, Autumn?!" Roanoke spat the word like venom. "What were you doing in that bed? Were you showing the Alpha what he was missing now that he’s got Lyla? Huh?"

"Slut!"

"Whore!"

"Rogue trash!"

"She cursed Lyla’s union!"

"She bewitched him!"

Another vase flew past her head...hurled at her like she was nothing more than a stray dog.

She ducked, arms wrapped around herself, but there was no escape.

More things came flying. A comb hit her shoulder. A towel bounced off her arm. Someone hurled a candlestick that nearly hit her temple.

Autumn tried to rise, to crawl, to run... but they surrounded her from all directions.

"She was not even mated to the Alpha! He didn’t even claim her!" someone shouted." May be she hexed the entire mate bond thing! "

"He looked worried because she was sick.This bitch probably faked the fever to lure him in!"

"No wonder her own father hates her!"

Autumn’s hands trembled as she crawled towards the corner, reaching for anything...anything to cover herself.

No clothes. No Kieran. No escape.

Roanoke smirked, stepping towards her like a beast circling its prey.

"You thought you could have everything, didn’t you?" he snarled. "You thought you would thrive in this pack???Be wanted!!!You are nothing, Autumn. You were born nothing, and you will die nothing."

"Where is he?" she whispered, head spinning. "Where is...Kieran?"

Roanoke bent low, his eyes gleaming. "Gone.Probably thoroughly regretting last night."

Autumn blinked. "No..."

"Left before the morning lights," Roanoke hissed. "Which tells me everything I need to know. ."

The words gutted her.

"No," she murmured. "He wouldn’t..."

But he had. He wasn’t there. He hadn’t stopped this. He had left her behind...all alone...

Roanoke stepped on the blanket on the floor, grinding it into the marble with his boot. "This? This is what you are. Dirty. Discarded. Unworthy."

"Get her out of here!" someone screamed.

"Throw her into the cells!"

"No! The woods!"

"Let the rogues have her, that’s what she wants!"

Autumn saw red.

Something in her snapped.

With a guttural cry, she lunged forward...grabbing the only piece of cloth that she could see, yanking it to her chest.

"Enough!" she screamed, the sound ripping through her throat like barbed wire.

"You jinxed your sister’s wedding!Yet you dare to bark?" Roanoke bellowed.

"You hate me!" she screamed back. "I get that. I get that now, completely.You never saw me as your daughter! I have no idea why. But all my life I lived hoping to prove myself...hoping someday you would acknowledge me.Hoping one day you would actually acknowledge that you have two daughters and not one...but you never did. "

Gasps.

But Autumn didn’t care.

"I see you now," she said, standing shakily, wrapped in that dirty shirt...like it was her only armor. "You don’t care about honor or family. You care about control. You would sacrifice anyone for your pride. Even your own blood."

Roanoke raised his hand again...but this time, Autumn caught it.

"I said enough."

Their hands collided mid air.

"Enough," she hissed again, through clenched teeth, her body shaking from head to toe...not with fear this time, but from the sheer force of holding herself together.

But it didn’t last.

Her fingers loosened. Her legs buckled. And all the fire...all the defiance...cracked.

She crumbled to the floor...a muffled sob escaping as she clutched the shirt tighter to her chest. Her knees hit the cold marble, and with a broken whimper, she folded in on herself.

Then came the tears.

Silent at first. Then louder.

Raw.

Unfiltered.

Shaking her shoulders as her chest heaved, and she gasped between sobs like she was drowning.

Her hair fell in front of her face, soaked in the cold water...and shame. Her mouth opened in pain, but no words came out. Only sound.

The crowd, so eager to jeer and condemn just moments ago, fell into an uneasy silence.

One by one, their sneers faltered. Some exchanged glances, discomfort flickering across their faces.

A few muttered under their breaths before turning away. Others followed, their earlier outrage now dampened by the sight of her broken form.

Soon, the room emptied.

Only Roanoke remained.

He watched her with cold, calculating eyes, his lips curled in disgust. When the last of the onlookers had disappeared, he stepped forward.

Roanoke stood tall, towering over her trembling form like a shadow that never left... an unshakable mark.

When the door shut and silence fell like death across the room, he nudged her shoulder with the toe of his shoe

Tap.Tap.

The hard nudge of his boot against her shoulder made her flinch.

"Want to know," he said in a low, amused growl, "why Kieran didn’t marry you?"

Autumn didn’t answer. She didn’t even move.

But she looked up.

Tears streaked down her cheeks, eyes rimmed red, lips parted in wordless devastation. Her face was flushed with humiliation and grief...like a never ending saga.

A flicker of disbelief.

Roanoke crouched slightly, so his face was level with hers.

He smiled. Cruel. Twisted.

"You think I hated you because you were weak?" he spat. "Or because you weren’t pretty enough? Or because you had no skills? No. It was because you were never mine."

Autumn blinked. Her body swayed.

"What...?"

"You heard me," he said coldly, straightening. "You were never my blood...your blood is filthy."

He let that sink in before delivering the next blow.

"Your mother...was defiled. Defiled by a criminal. She never spoke his name again, but she begged me to keep you. So I did. For her."

He laughed then. Bitterly.

"Look how that turned out."

Autumn shook her head slowly, a desperate denial building in her eyes. "No..."

But the ground beneath her had already begun to crumble.

Her hands dropped from the shirt, hanging limp by her sides. Her lips trembled, but her voice had vanished, lost in the shock.

She stumbled back on her knees.

Then up.

One foot. Then the other.

Staggering. Breath ragged. Her vision swimming.

She walked.

Aimless.

Disoriented.

Down the hallway. Through the doors. Past guards who didn’t try to stop her. Past the same people who had thrown things at her moments ago...now silent, now distant.

She walked.

And walked.

The world blurred. Faces melted. Walls dissolved into trees.

And before she knew it...she was running.

This content is taken from (f)reewe(b)novel.𝗰𝗼𝐦