EMMA
Xander had noticed that his words hurt me, mot that it mattered. The damage was already done.
He had hurt me deep inside, where scars lingered forever. In front of Leon, the guards, and goddess knew how many maids eavesdropping from the shadows, he'd called me a slut.
That word wasn't new to me. I'd grown up hearing it whispered about my mother more times than I could count. To them, she'd been the Beta's forbidden mistress, the shameful stain no one spoke of openly but never stopped gossiping about.
And now, to them, I was no different.
The Beta's bastard. The whore's daughter. Doomed, apparently, to repeat her mistakes.
No one had ever given me a chance to prove otherwise.
My breath hitched, jagged and shallow, and I stumbled to a halt in the corridor. Pressing a trembling hand against the wall for support, I forced myself to breathe in, out, slow and steady, anything to keep the tears at bay.
But they came anyway, burning hot tracks down my cheeks.
