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Broken Vows of the Pack
NovelMaster
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Chloe, my best friend, tried to set me up with Ethan, an enforcer who grew up in the same pack as her. I turned her down flat. I was recognized as the most promising young warrior in our entire pack; ...
章節（4）
第1章
Chloe, my best friend, tried to set me up with Ethan, an enforcer who grew up in the same pack as her. I turned her down flat.
I was recognized as the most promising young warrior in our entire pack; I didn't need anyone playing matchmaker for me.
But Chloe kept nagging and begging until I finally agreed to meet him just once.
To my surprise, the moment I laid eyes on him, sparks flew.
Before long, we completed our mating bond.
Yet when I was six months pregnant, my best friend suddenly dropped a bombshell on me:
"I lent him to you for all these years. Isn't it time you gave him back?"
Hearing those words completely stunned me.
Today was supposed to be my checkup with the Pack Healer, as I was already six months along.
My best friend had rushed back from out of town to be with me, and I had even planned on asking her to be my baby’s godmother.
Instead, the second she sat down, she threw that right in my face.
Past memories flashed before my eyes, one after another, as if mocking my stupidity.
In truth, the signs had always been there; I had simply chosen to turn a blind eye.
Whenever we attended the pack's Full Moon Festival together, Ethan's gaze would drift toward Chloe without him even realizing it. When Chloe danced, her skirt fluttering in the air, Ethan would stand in the corner with a drink, eyes glued to her.
I would walk up and ask him, "What are you looking at?"
He would snap out of it. "Oh, nothing. Just pack business."
Chloe would inevitably stroll over, link her arm through mine, and tease, "He's been like this since we were kids. He completely spaces out during Full Moon Festivals, just ignore him."
"Back when we were little, during one festival, he sneaked out to chase a rabbit and got hopelessly lost in the deep woods. I spent all night tracking him, and when I finally found him, he was bawling his eyes out under an oak tree."
"And that other time, when we went on a border patrol together. He insisted on acting tough and taking the lead, only to step right into a hunter's snare. He dangled upside down from a branch for half the day until I climbed up to cut him down."
"Don't forget the pack hunt contest! Trying to beat me, he took a shortcut and ran headfirst into a rogue grizzly. It chased him all over the mountain until I lured it away and saved his hide."
Back then, I actually thought this was completely normal. After all, they had grown up in the same pack. It made sense they shared stories I wasn't part of, and their closeness seemed innocent enough.
It turned out to be anything but.
Chloe left right after dropping that line.
I tried calling Ethan like crazy. Seven or eight calls, and he never picked up.
My mind drifted back to a time Chloe and I were walking near the pack borders. We had accidentally stepped into a neighboring pack's marked territory and were quickly surrounded by their border patrol. I identified myself and explained it was an honest mistake, but they refused to let it go.
I called Ethan over and over, but he never answered.
Eventually, an annoyed Chloe snapped, "Let me try!"
The call went through on the very first ring. "What's wrong, Chloe? Are you okay?"
Chloe complained, "Emily and I accidentally crossed the border, and their patrol is cornering us! Why haven't you been picking up your phone?!"
Ethan answered without missing a beat, "I answered the second you called, didn't I? I'm bringing a team over right now."
Back then, I assumed he just happened to look at his screen when she rang. Now I knew the truth—he simply never missed *her* calls.
I wasn't someone who gave up easily.
By the tenth try, Ethan finally answered.
The background was dead quiet, but his voice carried a faint trace of irritation that was hard to miss.
Had he always sounded like this whenever he answered my calls?
"Why haven't you been picking up?"
"I've been in the Beta's office going over reports. Didn't I just text you?"
I tested him intentionally. "Chloe came with me to my appointment."
He sounded completely oblivious to what had just happened, answering naturally, "Good, take care of yourself at the clinic. By the way, isn't she training in close combat lately? Tell her to take it easy so she doesn't flare up that old shoulder injury."
"She never told me she was hurt."
"And you call yourselves best friends? You don't pay any attention to her. She took a hard slam during the last pack sparring tournament and her shoulder never fully healed. You didn't notice?"
Oh, so you know every little detail about her. Did you know that I got hurt during that tournament, too?
I had cracked a rib and spent an entire month visiting the healer alone to get herbal poultices applied.
Chloe came to see me every single day, yet you never asked about me once.
第2章
Ethan came to pick me up from the clinic.
I handed him the ultrasound and medical charts. He didn't even reach out to take them, merely casting a careless glance before gesturing for me to put them away.
"Where's Chloe? Didn't she come with you?"
"She said she wasn't feeling well and went home."
Ethan's hands froze on the steering wheel, and he pulled a sharp U-turn on the spot.
"Let's go check on her. I had someone bring over a special healing salve from a neighboring pack, so I can drop it off. I told Chloe already, you were just having a routine checkup, she didn't need to tire herself out."
I stared at his profile. The genuine worry written all over his face was impossible to fake—a stark contrast to the cold indifference he showed my medical charts just moments ago.
Cracks in a facade spread like wildfire once exposed.
Just like now, I saw every single detail through completely different eyes.
I refused to believe he felt nothing for me, yet I could no longer tolerate a shred of deception.
"Why did you think to get healing salve? Did you go out of your way to ask someone for it?"
Ethan frowned, sounding displeased. "You really don't care about Chloe at all, do you? You know her shoulder's injured."
"Ah, silly me. I thought you prepared it because I'm pregnant."
Ethan froze, quickly backtracking. "Well, of course it was for you, too. It was just convenient to grab both."
Chloe, naturally, didn't come out to take the salve. She didn't even pick up her phone.
Ethan brought me to her front door and knocked for half an hour, but no one answered.
I stood in the driveway watching him call Chloe, then Chloe's father, and then Chloe's mother.
In the end, it was obvious she simply refused to see us.
Ethan finally let out a heavy sigh and turned to me. "Did she get mad at you? Did you two get into a fight recently?"
I remembered a time when I didn't answer his calls, too.
It was around our first anniversary as mates. He had completely forgotten about it because he was back at our old territory celebrating Chloe's pack promotion.
By the time he remembered the next day, he called me twice. I didn't pick up.
Chloe, on the other hand, blew up my phone. When I finally answered, I overheard Ethan in the background muttering impatiently, *What could possibly happen to her? She's probably just sleeping in the barracks.*
Looking back, the difference between love and indifference had always been painfully obvious.
I had simply been blinded by the excuse of their lifelong pack bond.
I was the one who permitted another relationship to stand above our sacred bond.
It was all on me.
I was an adult, and I had to take responsibility for my own choices.
I, Emily, took full accountability for my blindness.
Still, there was one thing I couldn't wrap my head around.
If they were in love, why didn't they just mate? Why drag an innocent third party into their mess?
What did I do to deserve this?
Looking back on the past few years, perhaps my biggest mistake was letting the joy show on my face the very first time I met Ethan.
From that moment on, Ethan pursued me with complete confidence and ease.
Yes, he was always so composed, because he knew he already had me wrapped around his finger.
My feelings for him were obvious, and Chloe was constantly pushing us together.
To court me, he would take me on walks along the most breathtaking lake in the pack territory under the full moon.
He would silently bring me warm soup after grueling training sessions.
He would be the very first person at the healer's clinic whenever I took a blow.
I genuinely thought that was love.
About six months later, I accepted his claim.
Looking back now, maybe love was there, but who it was truly meant for remained an open question.
Most of our dates, after all, included three people.
第3章
Giving up warrior promotions that required long deployments, choosing to carry a pup right as my standing peaked—I had considered none of it a sacrifice.
Because I thought I was stepping boldly into the happy life I envisioned.
Now, I decided to sever the mating bond.
It was fine; whatever I took on, I could let go of just as easily.
The only hesitation I had was the pup.
With my financial standing, raising a child on my own was not a problem.
Yet, did I want this baby to be born without a father?
I hadn't even found my own place in this web of lies; why should an innocent child shoulder the fallout?
Only by severing everything could Ethan and this disgusting farce truly be cut out of my life.
Was that why Chloe chose this exact moment to confess?
Because she didn't want me to birth this pup?
She thought the moment the baby was born, the tie between Ethan and me would become unbreakable.
And then, she and Ethan could never be together without a shadow hanging over them.
In her eyes, I was merely an insignificant nobody in their grand romance, while this unborn little soul was her greatest threat.
How utterly pathetic and absurd.
Perhaps the emotional turbulence had been too overwhelming; while on duty at the training grounds that afternoon, a sharp, tearing pain struck my abdomen. Cold sweat drenched my skin, alarming my squadmate, who quickly helped me outside for fresh air.
He warned me, "I called Ethan to pick you up. Go see the Pack Healer right away. You're approaching your third trimester, you can't be reckless."
Ethan was always meticulous. Whenever I brought him to pack gatherings, he made sure to get everyone's contact info, claiming it was so he could reach me whenever I was stationed around pack grounds.
By the time Ethan arrived, I had already finished my checkup and walked out of the clinic.
"Come down, Emily, I'll drive you to the healer."
Before I could answer, my squadmate's voice came through the receiver:
"Ethan, why are you just getting here? I called you nearly two hours ago! Emily already clocked out and headed home."
"I was tied up handling urgent pack business. Thanks for looking out for her, Mike, I'm heading home right now."
They exchanged a few more brief words before Ethan asked me, "Are you at home?"
"What were you busy with just now?"
Caught off guard by my question, he paused before answering, "I was with Chloe."
"What happened to her?"
I rarely pried like this, leaving Ethan without even a prepared excuse to brush me off.
Instead, he deflected. "Did you and Chloe get into an argument recently?"
The deflection seemed to give him an outlet for his frustration.
"I knew something was off between you two lately. You're usually glued at the hip, so why haven't you mentioned each other at all?"
"Did you do something to upset Chloe?"
"She's childish like that, you just need to appease her."
"How about I pick up a small gift for you to give her? An apology so she has a way out of this."
I thought I was done being angry over the two of them. I had already convinced myself they weren't worth the heartache.
Yet the thought of them treating me like an utter fool for all these years made the humiliation and fury inside me bubble violently, like a shaken soda can waiting to burst.
"How about I gift you to her instead?"
I hung up right after saying it.
I changed my mind.
I had originally planned to quietly walk away.
But running wasn't my style. Fighting was.
I refused to leave them their dignity while keeping all the agony for myself.
第4章
When I walked into the house, Ethan was sitting on the couch waiting for me.
His face was dark as he demanded loudly why I would say something like that.
In all the years we had been together, he had never once raised his voice at me. Now, he truly looked provoked.
"When did it start? From the very beginning, or later down the line?"
Ethan sprang from the couch, shouted that I was being completely unreasonable, and stormed into the bedroom.
He was so flustered that he forgot his phone had slipped into the crack between the sofa cushions.
I wasn't about to pass up such a golden opportunity.
I retrieved his phone, went into the study, and locked the door behind me.
I had trusted Ethan completely, so I had never once snooped through his phone.
Yet when I typed in Chloe's birthday to unlock the screen, it lit right up.
I went through all his messaging apps. His chats with Chloe were scrubbed completely clean—not a single trace left behind.
Too clean. It screamed suspicion.
I opened the hidden apps folder and discovered an encrypted messaging app.
I tried the passcode several times to no avail. I tried Chloe's birthday—wrong. I tried mine—wrong again.
I punched in the date they first met—it unlocked.
Inside lay years of chat logs between him and Chloe.
I scrolled through them line by line: from the early flirting, to their calculated schemes, to their recent bitter fights.
It turned out that from day one, I was nothing more than a pawn in their little game.
I took screenshots of every single message, reset the phone to how it was, and stuffed it back into the sofa cushion.
Opening the bedroom door, I saw Ethan lying in bed, pretending to be asleep.
That was his signature move. Whenever guilt ate at him, he faked sleep, assuming he could dodge the issue entirely.
To be honest, my initial attraction to him had been superficial, but what truly made me fall in love was a specific incident.
Back when we were stationed in different territories, rogue wolves were spotted near our perimeter, and several Betas were ambushed over successive nights.
One evening, an attack occurred in the woods right next to my quarters. I heard the savage snarls and dying screams, leaving me terrified to close my eyes all night.
The moment Ethan heard, he sprinted through the night to reach me. He accompanied me everywhere I went and even pitched a makeshift tent in the clearing nearby to keep watch through the dark hours.
He stayed until our pack warriors captured the rogue, only heading back after the threat was eliminated.
From then on, our bond deepened rapidly. Whenever friction arose between us, the memory of those two weeks of devoted protection always softened my heart.
Ethan knew I had walked into the room.
He poked his head out from under the covers, eyes bloodshot. If I hadn't just read his phone, I would have genuinely believed he was weeping over my harsh words.
"Emily, why would you say something like that?"
Was he playing dumb, or testing the waters?
I brushed it off casually. "Probably just hormones. My emotions have been all over the place lately."
He put on a wronged, hurt tone. "Even so, you shouldn't talk about Chloe and me like that. We've known each other for years. If I had feelings for her, why would I have stayed with you this whole time?"
Right. That was the exact question I wanted answered.
Though I had a feeling I'd find out soon enough.