Part A: Chapter 9

***Jemila’s POV***

I woke up with a huge smile on my face, it had been so long since I had spent time with Aidan and last night had been incredible. I looked around the room for him but his side of the bed was empty.

*He must have woken up early for training or work. *That had to be it.

I got out of bed and took a shower before walking back into the room and to the closet where Esther had gotten me new clothes. Everything she had gotten me was something that I had seen from magazines when I had arrived at the Carmichael estate and now I owned them. It was still strange to feel so at home when only a few weeks ago I had no one and never thought I was going to find someone who I would hold me in their arms and call me theirs. Heck, the thought hadn’t even crossed my mind. Living alone was something I had started getting used to until I found a wounded Aidan who showed me there was much more to life, much more to being a werewolf and much more to being me.

I picked out a pair of black leggings with a matching crop-top and put on my trainer, getting ready for my training session with Ivan. I was starting to get used to the training sessions and no longer found them as gruelling as I used to when we first began. Smiling to myself when I saw how I looked in the large mirror, I walked out of the bedroom and into the small kitchen where I quickly made myself something to eat. Days when Aidan wasn’t around and Esther didn’t come calling me to have breakfast with the main family, I preferred to make my own in the kitchen and eat by myself before training and today was one of those days were I didn’t want to sit through a long and excruciating meal with Shelly and Gerald. Those two didn’t like me and I didn’t like them as much.

After I made breakfast, I huffed it down and then decided to grab a headband from the room where I had left it the previous day. But when I got there and picked it up, my eyes flew to the bed and the memories of just how I had let Aidan go flashed in my head, making heat creep by my cheeks but then something caught my eye. I walked over to the bed and picked up the white envelope, I slowly turned it around but the only thing written on it was my name. A smile crept to my lips when I noticed it was Aidan’s lovely handwriting.

Without wasting any more time, I tore into the envelope and pulled out the letter.

*My sweet Jem,*

*There is no better way for me to say this but I have to go and fight to keep our home safe. I tried finding the right words to use yesterday but when I saw you, all I could think about was how unfair it was of me to ask you to remain behind after claiming this was our home. Looking at you made me lose sight and all trains of thought.*

*You may hate me for not telling you when I had the chance but I simply couldn’t look you in the eye and tell you I was leaving when I had promised to never leave your side. You must be disappointed and angry with me but there was nothing I could do.*

*Please find it in your beautiful heart to forgive me. I will see you soon and I shall always be thinking of you every day or every waking hour, minute and second.*

*Love Aidan.*

The letter flattered to the floor as my body shook with sobs. He left me, that was the only thought that was going through my head. He had left me alone. I walked over to a corner and crawled into a ball as sobs racked through me, the sadness of being alone engulfing me.

*He had left me without a word, only a stupid letter.* What was I supposed to do with the stupid thing? Burn it? Pack up and bags and leave this place before he comes back?
He had made me leave the only place I had begun to call home with fake promises of us having a future together but he couldn’t even look me in the eyes to tell me he was going to be gone. For how long? Days? Weeks? Months? Years? I didn’t know. All I knew was he chose to leave a letter after one of the best times we had shared. I should have known better than to put my trust in a complete stranger.

Tears kept flowing down my cheeks as the realisation that I was alone hit me hard. What was I going to do with Shelly and Gerald? I was certain they were going to make my life a living nightmare since the only person that could protect me had left without so much as the courage to tell me in person.

I don’t know how long I spent crying, but the tears stopped coming and all I felt was numbness. I had to leave this place. I was so tired of all the lies and fake promises. Without putting much thought into it, I stood up and began shoving the things I had come with in my worn out duffle bag. I had no intentions of carrying anything that had been gotten for me whilst I was here. I had to leave the same way I came, that way, people wouldn’t think I was only after Aidan’s money, power and status. I had much more dignity than that.

After I was done packing, I set out to create a plan of how I was going to leave unnoticed. *Nightfall*, the tiny voice in my head said.

I stopped feeling sorry for myself, so what if it had been my fault for allowing his lies to fool me into thinking I had finally found a place that I could belong and begin to call home? I had known from the onset that betrayal and disappointment weren’t far away from my future but I still blindly chose to believe that maybe it wasn’t going to turn out the same.

A humourless laugh escaped my lips as a memory flashed in my head.

*I was sitting at a table with a woman and a man, I couldn’t see their faces but I knew it was me. The woman was saying something and we all laughed.*

Pain shot through the corners of my head as the memory disappeared and I clutched my head to stop myself from falling. Why was I suddenly having memories of things I didn’t even know and who was that girl? Why did she look like me?

I rummaged around Aidan’s bathroom drawers and found some Advil which I swallowed down with a glass of water before walking back to the living room and sitting on the same couch I had been sitting on yesterday. A part of me twinged with guilt of how much I was going to miss this place but I knew I didn’t belong here. I had to go and find answers for myself.

A knock on the door pulled me from my thoughts and I got up to answer. Ivan’s smiling face greeted me.

“Looks like Luna forgot we had training,” he said smiling as he entered and closed the door behind him. “What gives? You have never missed a single day of training even when you complained of having a headache.”

I sighed, “I figured you left with the others,” I replied with a shrug and walked back to the couch.

Ivan followed after me and sat next to me. “Someone has to make sure things are running here when he comes back,” he replied, “but that still doesn’t change. Are you feeling okay? You look a little pale.”

I waved my hand dismissively, “I’m okay.”

Ivan seemed like he didn’t believe me but he didn’t say anything, instead, he changed the topic altogether. “Have you read about the prophecy?” he asked.

“What prophecy?”

“It’s believed to be a myth but I think there is some truth to it. It talks about how all lycans will fall and only one blessed by the Goddess will be able to save us all. But it’s a load of crap,” he said as he leaned back on the couch and then turned to look at me, “you don’t think it could be true?”

I shrugged, I didn’t know anything and I didn’t plan on staying long enough to find out what he was talking about. “I don’t know. It could possibly just be a children’s tale.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Come with me, there is something I want to show you.”