To ruin an Omega - Chapter 372: One Hour

Chapter 372: One Hour

ALDRIC

The head elder’s voice cut through the murmuring crowd.

“Alpha Aldric Donlon. You have heard the charges brought against you. How do you answer them?”

I stood with my hands loose at my sides. The healing Madeline had performed still sat warm in my chest. My nails had returned to their normal color. The tremor was gone. I felt steady again. Strong enough to do what needed to be done.

“Not guilty,” I said. My voice carried clearly through the hall. “To every single charge.”

Elder Callum nodded once.

“Then you will be given the opportunity to defend yourself against the testimony brought forward.” He gestured toward the gallery. “We will begin with the witnesses who have come forward.”

I watched him shuffle through the papers in front of him. He was moving slower than necessary. Drawing it out. Making a show of the process. I knew what he was doing. He was buying time. Trying to figure out which way the wind was blowing before he committed too hard in any direction.

Smart man.

But not smart enough.

“The court calls Madeline Blossom to the stand.”

The name landed in the room like a stone dropped into still water. Ripples moved outward. Heads turned. People shifted in their seats.

I looked toward the gallery.

Madeline stood. She smoothed the front of her dress with hands that did not shake. Then she walked toward the center of the hall where a single chair had been placed for witnesses.

She sat down and folded her hands in her lap.

Elder Callum looked at her.

“Miss Blossom. You have come forward with testimony against the accused. Please state your relationship to Alpha Aldric Donlon.”

“I have none,” she said. Her voice was calm. “I know him only through his nephew, Alpha Cian Donlon, whom I was once engaged to marry.”

Callum nodded.

“And what testimony do you bring before this circle?”

Madeline reached into the small bag she had brought with her and pulled out her phone. She held it up so the elders could see it clearly.

“I have proof,” she said. “Voice messages sent to me by Alpha Aldric Donlon. Messages that show a pattern of threats and coercion.”

The room went quiet.

Elder Callum leaned forward slightly.

“The court will hear them.”

Madeline tapped the screen. Then she held the phone out toward the circle.

My voice filled the hall.

“Pick it up right now. Or I swear to you. I will ruin you. I will ruin everything attached to you. You know I mean that.”

The recording ended.

I kept my face still. I did not move. I did not react. I simply stood there and let the room absorb what they had just heard.

Madeline tapped the screen again.

Another recording played.

“You think this is a game? Make moves without my express permission. You know exactly what happens. So pick up the fucking phone. Pick it up now. Or I will make you regret every single breath you take from this moment forward.”

The second recording ended.

The murmuring in the room grew louder. I could feel the shift happening. The weight of opinion moving in a direction I did not like.

Madeline played a third.

“Madeline. I am calling your father next. And when I do, I am going to tell him exactly how his daughter has decided to become a liability. You know what that means. You know what I will do to him. So whatever little fantasy you are living in right now, whatever you think this is, end it. Call me back. You have minutes. Not hours. Minutes.”

The hall erupted into noise.

People were no longer trying to keep their voices down. The whispers had become open discussion. I heard fragments of it from every direction.

“He threatened her father.”

“That does not sound like someone innocent.”

“Why would he send those if he had nothing to hide?”

Elder Callum raised his hand and the noise subsided slowly.

He looked at Madeline.

“Miss Blossom. Can you explain the context of these messages?”

“These were threats,” she said simply. “And there were worse ones that I could not record. I was afraid for my safety.”

She paused and looked directly at the elders.

“For anyone who might be confused, these messages were sent because Alpha Aldric wanted to use me to put a wedge between Alpha Cian and his bride, Luna Fia. He wanted me to exploit the history Cian and I shared. He wanted me to convince Cian somehow to let go of the Alpha seat.”

She stopped again. Then she added quietly.

“And not because he was particularly interested in playing fairy godfather. But simply because he wanted the Alpha seat for himself.”

I felt something cold settle in my chest.

She had framed it well. Too well.

The room was watching her now with full attention. She had their sympathy. She had their belief. She looked like a victim standing in front of them. Small and brave and telling the truth despite the cost.

I almost admired it.

I let the silence sit for a moment longer than was comfortable. Then I laughed.

It was not loud. It was not mocking. It was just enough to shift the energy in the room back toward me.

Every head turned.

I looked at Madeline.

“Forgive me,” I said. My voice was calm and reasonable. “But if I am this big bad you are painting me as, what could I possibly have to lord over your head? Or even your father’s head? What power could I hold over you that would make you obey threats like that?”

I paused and let the question hang in the air.

“Tell the court.”

Madeline went very still.

I watched her face. Watched the shift that happened behind her eyes. She knew exactly what I was doing. She knew the trap I had just laid in front of her.

If she told the truth about her father, about the fleshcraft, about the experiments he had conducted for years, then she would destroy him. She would bring her own family down in the process of bringing me down.

And she could not do that.

I could see it written all over her face.

The elders were watching her now. Waiting for an answer.

Elder Callum leaned forward.

“Miss Blossom?”

Madeline’s jaw tightened.

Then she spoke.

“Because you said yourself that if I loved Cian, then I would have to do it.”

Her voice was steady now. Stronger than it had been a moment ago.

“You said it was either I use the love we once shared to get him off the Alpha seat and he would get to live, or you would get tired of playing the nice guy and just instigate a coup and seize power. And that would mean killing them all.”

The room went silent again.

I felt the shift happening. The sympathetic looks turning back toward her. The doubt creeping back into the faces of people who had been wavering.

She was good.

Better than I had given her credit for.

But she still did not have the hammer to hit the nail on the head. She could paint me as a villain all she wanted. She could play recordings and tell stories about threats and coercion. But without concrete proof of what I had over her, it was just her word against mine.

And I was an Alpha. She was just a witch. A different spevie. I would be given grace againa nd again before they would fully completely buy her tall tales.

Then her eyes darkened.

Something changed in her expression. A decision being made in real time.

“I remember him telling me that Cian was like his father,” she said. Her voice had gone quieter now. More deliberate. “Too weak to rule Skollrend. But he was the better choice.”

She looked directly at me.

“He wanted the Alpha seat for his direct lineage as well. That was why Ronan worked for him.”

My stomach tightened.

“Beta Ronan Ashworth is not just a traitor,” she continued. “He worked with Aldric Donlon because he stood to benefit a lot from the treachery. He is Aldric’s biological son after all.”

The hall exploded.

The noise was immediate and overwhelming. People were shouting now. Not whispering. Not murmuring. Shouting.

I stood there and felt the ground shift beneath me.

She had done it. Hammered the nail and hard.

She had taken the one piece of information that would turn this from a trial about crimes into a trial about character. About bloodline. About legitimacy.

It was an emotional appeal. A brilliant one.

And it made me look even more unreliable in the public’s eye especially when it was one that could be proven.

I turned slowly and looked at Cian.

He was sitting in the gallery with his hands folded in his lap. His expression was calm. Composed.

And he was smirking.

Just slightly. Just enough that I could see it from where I stood.

It could not have been her idea.

This sounded like him.

This was the kind of move Cian would make. Strategic and calculated. Using information at exactly the right moment to maximum effect.

It could only be the boy I partly raised.

Cian.

He had known. He must have already known about Ronan’s parentage and he had waited until this exact moment to use it. He had given Madeline the ammunition she needed to destroy me in front of this room.

Our eyes met across the hall.

He did not look away.

Neither did I.

Elder Callum was calling for order but the noise was too loud now. People were not listening. They were too busy processing what they had just heard.

The fact that Ronan could be my son was a big deal.

The Beta who had stood beside Cian for years was actually my blood.

And I had used him to betray the pack.

The optics of it were devastating.

It was sad to see too because it meant that a coup was the only way to go now.

Finally the noise began to die down. Elder Callum raised his hand again and this time people obeyed.

He looked at the circle. The other elders were leaning toward each other. Speaking in low urgent tones. I could see Pryce shaking his head. Saoirse looked uncomfortable.

Callum turned back to face the hall.

“The court will be shortly adjourned,” he said. His voice was firm. “We require time to verify the authenticity of the voice messages presented. And we will conduct a DNA test to confirm the claim made regarding Beta Ronan Ashworth’s parentage.”

He stood.

The other elders followed suit.

“This hearing will resume in one hour.”

The gavel came down.

People began moving immediately. The noise rose again. Conversations breaking out in every direction.

I stood there in the center of it all and watched Cian rise from his seat.

He looked at me one more time.

Then he turned and walked out of the hall with Fia beside him.

I felt my hands curl into fists at my sides.

One hour.

They had one hour to run their tests and confirm what Madeline had just dropped in the middle of this trial.

And when they came back, the room would know for certain that Ronan was my son.

That I had fathered a child in secret.

That I had used that child to undermine my own nephew.

I looked toward the doors where the sentinels were already moving to escort me back to the holding area.

One hour.

That was all the time I had left to figure out if it was time to just do completely away with this farce of a trial and just intigate the coup.