Betrayed by All

Betrayed by All
POV Sage Winters

Celeste stumbled backward, her hand flying to her reddening cheek. She stared at Vivienne with wide, disbelieving eyes, as if she couldn't comprehend what had just happened.

Vivienne stood there, her hand still raised, her whole body shaking. Tears poured down her face, but there was fury in her eyes now too. Real, genuine fury that burned away the last traces of her blind loyalty.

"I almost murdered my own grandfather because of you!" The words came out as a wail of anguish. "Everything you told me was a lie."

Celeste reached out again, desperation making her movements jerky and uncoordinated. "Vivienne, please—"

"Don't touch me!" Vivienne recoiled as if Celeste's hand was a snake about to strike. "Don't ever touch me again! You're a liar! You're a murderer! You're nothing but a monster!"

The door burst open with enough force to make everyone jump.

Damien strode into the room, his presence immediately commanding attention despite the chaos already unfolding. His eyes swept across the scene, taking in Vivienne's tears, Celeste's reddened cheek, and the accusatory faces surrounding them both.

When his gaze settled on Celeste, I saw something flicker in his expression. Not sympathy exactly, but a kind of calculated assessment, as if he was rapidly determining how this situation would affect his own position.

Celeste's entire demeanor shifted the moment she saw him. Hope flashed across her features, bright and desperate. She pushed herself away from the wall, stumbling toward him with her hands outstretched like a drowning person reaching for a lifeline.

"Damien," she breathed, her voice cracking with relief and desperation. "Thank god you're here. They're all lying about me. They're trying to frame me for things I didn't do. You have to help me. You know me. You know I would never—"

She got close enough to touch him, her fingers stretching toward his shirt.

For a split second, I thought he might actually take her hand.

Then his leg came up fast and brutal. His foot connected with her abdomen with enough force to lift her off the ground. The kick sent her flying backward into the wall with a sickening crack. She crumpled to the floor like a broken doll, her body curling in on itself as a scream of pain tore from her throat.

Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth, bright red against her suddenly pale face. She clutched at her stomach, gasping for air that wouldn't come. The room erupted in shocked gasps, but Damien's expression remained cold and unmoved.

"Don't touch me with your filthy hands," he said, his voice flat and emotionless.

Celeste tried to speak, but could only manage a weak cough that brought up more blood. She stared up at him with wide, disbelieving eyes.

"Mom told me everything," Damien continued, his voice shaking now with barely contained fury. "She came to me one hour ago. She told me that you were planning something against Grandpa."

His hands clenched into fists at his sides. "I warned you, Celeste. I warned you to drop this insane plan. I told you explicitly that I would never forgive you if you hurt my grandfather."

"What?" The word emerged as barely a whisper from Celeste's bloodied lips. "Maeve told you?"

"She said you'd already made one attempt to poison Grandpa that failed," Damien went on, his voice rising with each word. "That you were planning something else. Something worse."

Celeste's face went from pale to ashen gray. "No... that's not true. She told me to do it. She planned everything. She said Marcus had to die, that it was the only way to help you get the Alpha and CEO position. This was all her idea."

"Don't you dare!" Damien's roar made everyone in the room flinch. His eyes flashed gold as his wolf surged close to the surface. "Don't you dare try to drag my mother into your sick schemes!"

He took a step toward her, and Celeste instinctively tried to scramble backward despite the pain. "My mother would never suggest something so vile. She's always respected Grandpa. She loves him. You're just a pathetic coward trying to shift blame for your own evil."

"She did!" Celeste's voice rose to a desperate shriek despite the pain it caused her. "She said if I did this, she'd make sure we ended up together. She said we could control the Pack once you became Alpha. Every step was planned by her!"

Damien's control shattered completely. His hand came up so fast I barely saw it move. The slap caught Celeste across her already injured face with brutal force, snapping her head violently to the side. More blood sprayed from her mouth, spattering across the pristine hospital floor.

"You tried to murder my grandfather!" His voice broke on the last word, raw with anguish and betrayal. "The man who raised me. The man who showed me what it means to lead with honor. And you did it all while lying to my face, pretending to support me."

Celeste's hand went to her face, covering the new bruise that was already darkening. Fresh tears mixed with the blood on her cheeks. "I did it for you," she sobbed brokenly. "Everything I did was for you. For us. For our future together."

She looked up at him with those tear-filled eyes, still trying even now to manipulate him. "I wanted Marcus gone so you could rise faster to Alpha and CEO. I was clearing the path for you, removing every obstacle in your way."

"I never asked you to do any of this!" Damien's voice cracked with genuine pain now. "I never wanted this. You think I wanted you to become a murderer? You think I wanted my grandfather dead?"

His shoulders shook as he struggled to control himself. "I warned you. When you first hinted at this insane plan, I told you to stop. I told you that if you hurt anyone in my family, we were done. And you looked me in the eye and promised you wouldn't."

Something flickered across Damien's face then—shame, I realized with surprise. He knew she was telling at least a partial truth about his ambitions. He'd known what she was doing, maybe not the specific details but certainly the general goal. And he'd chosen to look away until it was almost too late.

But he couldn't admit that, not here in front of everyone. That would make him complicit in attempted murder.

He turned away from Celeste's broken form on the floor, facing Thorne instead. His shoulders squared, but I could see the tension in his jaw, the way his hands trembled slightly at his sides. "Thorne, I need to apologize to you."