Chapter 116

Lucian’s POV

Standing inside of Aria’s trashed bedroom, I couldn’t understand what I was seeing. Ben was in the doorway behind me, also looking around.

The pictures had been torn from the walls and thrown across the room. The mattress had been overturned. The desk drawers had been yanked out, their contents spilled over the floor.

My immediate thought was for the diary, such a precious insight into Aria’s mind. Was it lost forever too?

“How did this happen?” I asked. “Sheila was taken into custody at the hospital. She should have never returned here.”

“The housekeeper noticed the lock on the door had been tampered with, and she decided to investigate,” Ben said. “There’s no telling when Sheila actually entered here and did this.”

I tried to think back to the last time I had entered this room. It had been a bit before the incident at the hospital. Had Sheila waited for me to be distracted with something, then doubled back to destroy the room?

I supposed it didn’t matter when she had done this. That she had done it at all was the problem, like she had left one final insult against me and against Aria.

Gods, I wished I had seen through her lies sooner. I had been so ready to accept the guilt and the blame, that I had let her manipulate me into doing everything she wanted, including distancing myself from my wife.

I couldn’t entirely blame Sheila for my divorce, I knew that. Aria would have forgiven me anything if I had only been more open with her, more honest. Instead, I’d hidden myself away and treated Aria no better than a servant or an acquaintance.

Sheila hadn’t helped matters, but the main failing of my relationship with Aria fell on my own shoulders.

Without Sheila in the house, peace had seemed to be restored. Many of the old staff returned to work, including the head housekeeper. I had profusely apologized to each of them only this morning.

“She offered to clean this up, but I asked her not to touch anything,” Ben said. “I thought you might want to see it for yourself, and decide if anything here is worth keeping before they start hauling everything out…”

Most of Aria’s things were damaged. Even the jewelry she’d left behind was smashed on the floor, as if a heeled shoe had stomped down on it again and again. But I ignore that.

I had bought Aria jewelry, anything I had perceived she might have wanted, but I knew, for her to have left it, meant she didn’t have any special affinity for it. She had never wanted things from me, only actions, and those had been what I had denied her the most.

More than the broken string of pearls and the shattered vases and picture frames, the only thing I truly wanted to save was the diary.

Carefully, I stepped forward into the cluttered mess. I lifted the drawer that had once contained the diary off the floor. It had been overturned and was empty now. Its contents were scattered over the floor. I set the drawer aside, then followed the trail of pencils and pens. It lead toward the bed, where the mattress had been shoved against the wall, the blankets strewn about.

Lifting a blanket, a rush of relief flew through me. There, on the ground under the blanket, was the diary, entirely intact.

Shelia mustn’t have seen it or known what it was, or surely she would have taken it, ripped out the pages or burned it.

For me to find it here and in good condition felt like a miracle.

“What is that?” Ben asked from the doorway.

I had forgotten he was there. This entire endeavor felt far too personal to share, even with my Beta and friend. Right now, especially with Aria gone from the pack lands, I felt like I was walking through a tomb of old memories.

“Leave me, Ben. For now. Please. I will explain things to you later.”

Ben seemed surprised by my words, but still nodded with obedience. “Of course, Sir. I will keep the housekeepers away. We will wait for you to exit the room, when you are ready.”

Slowly, Ben stepped out into the hallway, closing the door behind him.

Alone now, I lifted the diary. I’d already read through much of it, leaving only the last few pages out of fear of what I would find.

Perhaps Aria had grown to hate me, and the pages in the diary would reveal how much. As she was gone now, the words she’d left behind were the only way I would uncover the truth of her feelings.

If I was to be rejected, I would hear it from her own words.

With a steadying breath, I opened the front cover and skimmed forward to the last few entries, the ones I had always avoided, the most recent.

Dear Diary,

As Lucian continues to prioritize Sheila over our marriage, I can’t even pretend to be shocked anymore. It still hurts, of course, but with that pain comes a certain realization.

How long am I going to let myself be hurt like this?

I’ve come to believe that Harold and Julia’s advice at our wedding was inaccurate. They’d encouraged me to give up my past life and dedicate myself entirely to Lucian and our marriage as the Lunas of the past had done. This was the tradition, they assured me.

I don’t know what those Lunas in the past did that I cannot. Maybe I’m just not as good a homemaker as I need to be. Perhaps if I could find some way to be even more attentive to Lucian, he would finally see me…

No. I believed that once but I don’t anymore.

Every day it feels like Lucian has chosen Sheila and stepping away from me.

I think it might be time for me to start making other plans…

Cathy says there are openings at the hospital. She’s been pushing that for years, ever since I gave up on my medical career.

I know there’s still a lot of good I can do for the world. Maybe it’s time for me to focus on that again.

I don’t want to leave Lucian, but I don’t know how else to get him to see…

Maybe if he knew the person I truly am…

Maybe if I returned to my medical career…

I don’t know. But I do know I don’t want to feel this empty anymore.

I have given up so much to be Lucian’s perfect bride, but the harder I try, the more I seem to lose him.

What’s the right choice, Diary? Where do I go from here?

Aria

I read through the passage and then reread again. I remembered that Aria had taken some medical classes, but I hadn’t realized she’d been so serious about it, as to want it as her carrier.

Not just anyone could be a Healer. It took a special affinity, one that I had assumed Aria lacked.

Had I been wrong all this time?

The shred of doubt that I had pushed away time and time again started to rise within me once more.

The physical similarities. The shared dream of helping others. The background in medicine.

Dr. A’s mysterious appearance around the time Aria left me.

“They don’t smell the same,” my wolf said, but even in his voice, I can hear the doubt. “Plus she is pregnant. We would know if that was our pup.”

I wanted to think that too, but I couldn’t be so sure. Everything else was lining up too perfectly.

It could be a coincidence, but…

I didn’t know what to believe, but maybe it was time again to look into Dr. A and her mysterious background.