The Triplet Alphas' Secret Mate

Chapter 5: His Secret

Liam’s POV

​I stood on the balcony, my knuckles tightening as I gripped the stone railing. Below me, Scarlett was a small, trembling figure kneeling under the merciless afternoon sun. My wolf was pacing in my head, a low, constant snarl vibrating in my chest. "She is ours," he howled. "She is burning. Set her free!"

I ignored him, but the pain was clawing at my throat.

​Yes, Scarlett was my mate. I had known the day she turned eighteen, two years ago—barely hours after I had dropped my hand to signal her parents’ execution. It was the cruelest joke the Moon Goddess ever played.

I had spent years dreaming of the day I would finally be able to claim her. Before the betrayal, I had planned to pull Leon and Leo aside on her eighteenth birthday and finally confess that I wanted her. I was going to ask for their blessing to court her, to make her my Luna.

​But then the tragedy happened. Her parents plotted my mother’s death and betrayed our pack. The love I once felt had turned into a poisoned well of shame.

​How could I admit that the girl I had sworn to break was the only person I was fated to love? If my brothers knew, they would look at me with the same disgust we reserved for rogues. I refused to be a laughingstock. I refused to be the Alpha who mated with a traitor—a traitor that filled my thoughts every blessed day.

​My plan was simple: wait until she turned twenty and realized the bond, then reject her so harshly she would never dare speak of it. It was cruel, but it was the only way.

​I watched her palms hit the scorched gravel as she nearly collapsed. A sharp, stinging pain shot through my heart; that was the mate bond’s physical response to her distress. I had run into the yard the moment my wolf felt her being flogged, my blood boiling with the need to rip the guard’s head off. But I had to stay back. I had to play the part of the cold Alpha. If I showed mercy, the pack would whisper. They would say the "Traitor’s Daughter" had bewitched me.

​"What has the bitch done this time?"

out of my thoughts. He stepped up beside me, folding his arms across his chest as he

honestly don’t know

to enjoy her suffering. Sometimes, the way he tortures her makes me wonder if he even remembers that there was a time

raise suspicion, I wiped the concern from my face and replaced it with a nonchalant

was caught stealing the kitchen purse," I replied smoothly. It was a lie. I knew Scarlett wasn’t a

side. "I caught her sneaking books from the

was sobbing silently. Every hitch of her shoulders felt like a serrated blade across my own

​Fuck this mate bond.

it!" Leo grunted suddenly. He looked

single soul split into three. We shared everything—women, secrets, battles. Except this. I was the one keeping a secret now, and the

looks like she would collapse soon," Leon commented, sounding somewhat worried, or maybe it

"She

me years ago that we would stand by and let tears fall down Scarlett’s cheeks without lifting a finger, I would have called them mad. From the moment

I could be nicer to her... but doing

body went limp. She hit the gravel, her face flat on the ground, and didn’t

is wrong..." Leon said, sounding panicked, or perhaps I

silent. The

wolf roared. "GO

moved before I