Chapter 584: Being Enticed To The Other Side_Part 1

Had Laila’s uncle still been among the elders, Mr. Herman wouldn’t have dared speak to her that way, but he was well aware that she had lost that standing in Silver Pack.

"I didn’t start any fight. Go ahead and ask the sales assistant. She saw everything, including how Lorna clawed my arm," Laila said, unable to show him the marks because they had already healed.

Mr. Herman turned to the she-wolf in question, who had been scanning the things Laila bought. Upon being addressed, the girl who had been snapped at by Laila a moment ago didn’t hesitate to pay the arrogant she-wolf back for her behavior, and she said smugly, "Miss Serrano started it, Mr. Herman. They were only talking to her when she shoved them off. I saw everything and she threatened to sleep with Miss Annie’s boyfriend." The girl added what she didn’t hear.

Upon hearing that, Mr. Herman turned back to Laila, who stared at him in disbelief. She shouldn’t have been surprised that the sales assistant had lied so easily, but the betrayal still stung, especially when she remembered how guilty she’d felt for snapping at the girl earlier.

Her fingers curled into fists at her sides as anger slowly replaced her regret. This was exactly why she rarely bothered being kind to people in the first place. She took one last look at the sales assistant, committing her face to memory, before turning her attention back to the manager, ignoring the murmurs around her as people threw insults at her and called her a shameless bitch.

"Can I return to my shopping?" Laila asked, not wanting to face the crowd, Anna, or Lorna. If she could just go back to picking out the babies’ clothes, she would pretend today had never happened and that she wasn’t seething with rage over being lied to.

"I’m afraid you’ll have to leave. From now on, you are no longer welcome in our mall, as you’ve shown aggression toward our peaceful shoppers," Mr. Herman told her before calling security to escort her out.

During the chaos, a lot of the customers who had gathered around to see what was happening in the baby section, and many of them snickered at Laila being sent out.

It had taken her an hour to shop for all those things, and she would have to go to another place and shop all over again. Laila’s eyes went to the things on the counter, but her not moving immediately only made the manager believe she was refusing to leave, and he gave his security guards permission to throw her out.

Laila was seized by the arms before she knew it, and in no time she was shoved out of the mall onto the snowy street, where her ankle twisted and she fell down hard, scraping her knees against the pavement as laughter rang out from the building and reached her ears. She turned around to look at the glass door, where Lorna and Annie stood smug about their success.

Laila felt rage welling up inside her, and she balled her hand into a fist against the snow as the two she-wolves, and everyone laughing along with them, turned away and left her in the evening cold, insulted and denied the right to shop for the Alpha’s children, when she hadn’t even done anything wrong.

She was composing herself and getting up with what little dignity she had left, determined to finish her errand at another shop and to think about this humiliation only afterwards, when a hand came into her view, offered to her, and she looked up at the owner of the hand.

He was standing with the sunset behind his tall figure, which cast him in silhouette, but she recognized the hoodie and the aura. She peered at his face until she saw him clearly, and her heart went still.

"Nickolas..." She muttered softly, rising on her own without taking his offered hand, and he didn’t bother hiding his identity from her this time around. How was he alive?

"Long time no see, Laila." He mused, a smile in his voice, as the rest of his face stayed hidden behind the hoodie, but his eyes moved over her drenched clothes from being thrown onto the snowy street before he added,

"Though I’ll admit I didn’t expect you to become a society outcast someday. How does it feel to be shunned and insulted?" He tilted his head to the side, still smirking, and recalling all the days she bullied the weak.

The words stung more than the fall had, because he was right, and hearing it from him made her feel it all over again. Laila’s jaw tightened. She refused to let him see it.

"It’s as terrible as the fact that you are still alive, Nickolas." She gritted out, recalling vividly the image of Zoe’s torn body and how he had killed her.

"Surprised? Who told your flimsy Alpha he could kill a man with ambition as great as mine? He made a mistake the day I became his enemy, and I can’t die until I complete what I’ve started." He said nonchalantly, standing there as though he had every right to, with no fear at all of being caught.

Laila didn’t know what to do at first, shocked at the sight of him. She would have screamed bloody murder if anyone would listen, but there was no one on the streets, as everyone was indoors, and even if someone heard her, they wouldn’t come to her aid to catch this bastard and make him pay for his crimes.

"You should have stayed dead." She said, wishing she could reach for the phone in her purse, which lay on the ground where she had fallen, so she could dial a number while she kept him here. Her eyes flicked toward it, and she measured the distance in steps she didn’t dare take.

"I am very much alive, as you can see, and I am back to take what is mine." He told her.

"Which is?" Laila asked, looking up at him and feeling the intense aura around him, which resembled Sebastian’s and made it hard to breathe.

"My woman, my pack, my family." Nick said with an air of possessive rights as he turned his eyes to the healing house in the distance before turning back to her.

Laila followed his gaze to the distant building, and her stomach dropped. Viola was in that healing house, exhausted and defenseless, with three newborns, one of them barely clinging to life. The thought of this man anywhere near them made her blood run cold.