Chapter 512

Enzo

I couldn’t explain it. I wasn’t much of a jealous type, especially when it came to Matt or any of the other guys in the group.

But when I saw them hugging beneath that candlelit tree outside the mansion, and when I saw the way they stepped closer to each other and their fingers brushed, I felt…

Furious.

Growling under my breath, I snapped the curtains shut before I could see more and crossed over to the bed. I plopped down and began tugging my sneakers off, and the soreness in my body from training all day did nothing to outweigh the anger in my heart.

“She could be cheating on you,” my wolf growled in the back of my mind. “You should go down there right now. Confront her”

Another soft growl rumbled in my throat. “No, I won’t,” I said quietly. “I can’t go down there. Besides, it’s probably nothing.”

But my wolf was relentless. “You know what you saw yesterday morning,” he snarled. “You know how you felt when you saw them hugging in the kitchen, and the words you heard leading up to that. As though…”

I swallowed as my wolf reminded me of what I had seen and heard. Even just thinking about it now made me feel as if I was back there again…

“Ah, shit. My nose started bleeding again.” Matt stood up from the field where we were doing our drills, holding his nose. I looked up only briefly from my workout to see him jogging over to Nina, who was sitting on the sidelines. They disappeared into the mansion a few moments later, no doubt to patch him up.

“Actually, since Matt’s gone, let’s take a ten minute break,” Aldric said, glancing at his watch. “Come back here once you’ve had a rest and something to drink.”

Taking a deep breath, I stood up from the damp grass and dusted myself off. I turned to say something to Aldric, but he was already walking away. “Aldric—” I called out.

“Ten minutes, Enzo,” he said. “Let’s not waste them talking.”

Aldric was right; we could talk another time. And I needed to use my break to refuel myself, because I certainly wasn’t going to be chosen as one of his three assassins if I wasn’t at peak performance.

So, sighing, I made my way toward the mansion for some fresh water from the sink.

That was when I saw it.

Just as I was rounding the corner to the kitchen, I saw two figures standing perilously close. I heard what sounded like a giggle from Nina, followed by a low chuckle from Matt.

And then…

“If you want me to talk to Enzo, if you need someone to step in…”

I froze in my tracks as Nina mumbled something incoherent in response to Matt’s words. Then, I heard her mutter in response: “I know what you’re thinking…”

Furrowing my brow, I slipped a little further behind the corner, listening just out of sight. And then I saw something else that made my blood run cold.

They hugged. Tightly. Matt’s arms wrapped themselves around Nina’s waist, and I saw her sink into him, tucking her face into his chest.

I couldn’t even begin to explain the hurt that I felt in that moment. It wasn’t just the hug, no, but the words they had spoken. ‘If you need someone to step in’ he had said. ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ she had replied.

Step in? In regards to what?

Now, as I sat on the edge of the bed gripping the sheets so tightly that my knuckles were turning white, I think I knew what it was in regards to. It seemed, judging from what I had seen and heard, that they were having an affair.

And how long would it be before they were coming to me, claiming to plan on running away together? How long would it be until Nina decided to slip the ring off of her finger and hide behind her big, strong lover as she waited for her brute of a husband to fly into a rage?

As I sat there, picturing this scenario in my mind, I looked down at my palm. The cuts from when I had shattered that glass were healed by now, but it felt as if they were still there sometimes.

I had scared her that night. Hell, I had scared her when she found me beating the shit out of Matt. And I had scared her again when she had found me on the verge of doing the same to Ronan.

And maybe, just maybe, she didn’t want to be scared again.

“I know that I’ve been a bit… different from my usual self lately,” I muttered under my breath, “but to seek solace in Matt? Why wouldn’t she just talk to me?”

“It’s fishy, to say the least,” my wolf said. “Rather than going to Lori or Jessica, or even Luke for support, she’s going to… him. Your Beta.”

“And he’s reciprocating,” I growled as images of the two of them embracing beneath the tree flickered through my mind again. “Do they plan to overthrow me as Alpha?”

My wolf sneered. “It’s not unheard of. Betas are the most likely to try and usurp their Alphas. And after all, you and Matt are so similar in strength… Maybe he thinks he could do better than you, and he’s beginning by taking your wife.”

Hearing those words made my blood boil. If it was true, then not only was my marriage at stake, but so was my pack.

As I stood and began to change out of my clothes, however, I tried to rationalize everything. Matt was a good friend, one of our closest. He was my Beta, my confidant, a protector when we needed him to be. Maybe Nina was just confiding in him in the same way that she would confide in anyone else in our group.

“Maybe I’m just overthinking things,” I relayed to my wolf. “That has to be it. Nina is pregnant with my child. She would never…”

But my wolf merely shifted uncomfortably in the back of my mind, pressing his ears back flat against his head.

Maybe I didn’t know my wife—or my best friend—as well as I thought I did.

I climbed into bed that night, still trying to rationalize what I had seen and heard. I tried to tell myself, over and over again, that I was just imagining things. I tried…

I tried to push it away.

And yet, when Nina came sauntering into the room, all hot and husky from her embrace with Matt under the tree, I felt my wolf surge again inside of me.

“See how he turns her on?” my wolf growled in the back of my mind as she straddled me and began to kiss and lick across my neck and jaw. “See how she comes to you to finish the job?”

I stifled another growl of my own. Nina’s body against mine was hot and tantalizing, and it made me hard, but I felt… stiff. I couldn’t touch her. Couldn’t kiss her.

And every time I closed my eyes, all I saw were blood splatters and the horrifying visage of Mila’s face anyway.

“I’m sorry, Nina,” I found myself saying, even though my voice sounded far away and garbled even to my own ears. “I’m just so tired, and with Mila still out there… you know…”

Her face paled, and she stood. “I get it. It’s fine.”

Without another word, she slipped into the bathroom and turned on the shower. I didn’t call out for her, didn’t go after her; I just shut the light off so I could lay there with my own swirling thoughts in the darkness for a little while. Maybe, somehow, that would calm me.

A few minutes later, I heard the shower turn off. I listened intently as I heard my wife go through her nighttime routine, a ritual that I normally reveled in watching through my half-lidded eyes. When she opened the door a few minutes after that, I was still wide awake.

But as she softly called my name out in the darkness, I pretended to be asleep.