Chapter 293: Mother!!
Rebecca’s POV
”Yes, dear. It’s me.” The woman’s eyes softened as she stared at me. “You remember me.”
My entire body went still. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even breathe properly.
The last time I had seen my mother, I had been around seven years old. One day, she had simply disappeared from the pack without saying goodbye to anyone. My father had told me she had left. As I grew older, I heard different stories from different people. Some said she had abandoned me. Others said she had died. Eventually, I stopped asking.
But I had never forgotten her face. I remembered sitting on her lap while she brushed my hair. I remembered sleeping beside her whenever I had nightmares. I remembered her voice and the way she used to hold me.
And now, after all these years, she was standing right in front of me. Alive.
”Mother?” I whispered again, my voice cracking.
”Yes, Rebecca.”
My eyes filled with tears. “How…” I swallowed hard. “How are you here?”
She glanced briefly at Stephanie before looking back at me. “Please, sit down, Rebecca. We need to talk.”
Talk? She disappeared from my life when I was seven years old, appeared through some strange portal more than a decade later, and she wanted me to sit down and talk?
But I was too stunned to argue. My legs felt weak as I slowly moved toward the bed and sat on the edge. Stephanie remained beside me, still watching the woman suspiciously.
My mother walked closer but stopped several feet away. “There is so much about yourself that you don don’t know,” she said quietly. “And there are things about me that you deserve to know too.”
I just stared at her, my mind still struggling to accept that she was actually standing in front of me.
She took a deep breath. “I suppose I should start with the most important thing.” She paused. “Alpha Kelvin is not your father.”
My eyes widened. For several seconds, I genuinely wondered if I had heard her correctly.
”What?”
”Kelvin is not your biological father.”
I immediately stood. “What are you talking about?”
”Please, Rebecca.”
”No.” I shook my head. “You can’t appear after all these years and tell me something like that.”
”I know.”
”Then what do you mean he isn’t my father?”
She looked directly into my eyes. “Kelvin was my friend. A very good friend. When I needed somewhere safe to go, he helped me. And when I had you, he agreed to tell everyone that you were his daughter.”
My heart began pounding. Everything I had believed about myself suddenly felt as though it were shifting beneath my feet.
”Then who is my father?”
My mother hesitated. “Lord Drake.”
I frowned. The name sounded familiar, but it took me a few seconds to understand why. Then my breath caught.
”Lord Drake?” I repeated. “The Lord of the Hybrids?”
”Yes.”
I stared at her. “No.”
”It’s true.”
I slowly sat back down because my legs suddenly felt incapable of holding me.
Lord Drake. The Lord of the Hybrids was my father?
Stephanie looked just as shocked as I felt, but neither of us interrupted as my mother continued.
”Long before you were born, Drake and I were together. Secretly. Our families were not on good terms, so neither side would have accepted our relationship. I am the daughter of Alpha Linus of the Stone Pack. My family had their own expectations for me, just as Drake’s family had expectations for him. We knew they would never approve of us, but we loved each other, so we continued seeing each other in secret.”
Her expression became sad. “Then I became pregnant with you.”
My hand instinctively moved to my stomach.
”When Drake’s family discovered the pregnancy, they were furious. They didn’t want you to be born. They demanded that I get rid of you.”
My stomach twisted. “And your family?”
”They weren’t any better. They saw my pregnancy as a disgrace. They wanted nothing to do with the child I was carrying.” Her eyes filled with pain. “So I ran.”
The room became completely silent.
”I had nowhere else to go, so I went to Kelvin. He had been my friend for years. I told him everything, and he agreed to protect me. When you were born, Kelvin allowed everyone to believe that you were his daughter.”
I stared at the floor as pieces of my childhood suddenly began returning to me. The whispers. The way people called me Alpha Kelvin’s illegitimate daughter. The way I had always been treated like something shameful.
All those years…
He hadn’t even been my father.
”Did Kelvin know who my real father was?”
”Yes.”
My head snapped up. “He knew?”
”He knew everything.”
I couldn’t believe it.
My mother took another breath. “But your parentage isn’t the only thing I kept away, Rebecca.”
I looked at her. “What else could there possibly be?”
Her eyes moved toward the silver choker lying on the floor. “A prophecy was made about you before you were born.”
I froze. Stephanie moved slightly closer to me.
”What prophecy?”
”When I was pregnant with you, I was told that the child inside me would possess abilities unlike anything our families had seen before. You were not going to be an ordinary werewolf.”
I stared at her in confusion. “Because Lord Drake is a hybrid?”
”Partly.”
She glanced again at the choker. “When you were born, I could already feel something unusual inside you. Power that a newborn should never have possessed. I became terrified that someone would sense it and come looking for you.”
She looked back at me. “So I sealed it.”
My brows pulled together. “Sealed what?”
”Your abilities.”
I stared at her. “You locked away my powers?”
”Yes. You were a baby, Rebecca. You couldn’t control them, and if either of our families discovered what you were capable of becoming, they would have taken you from me. I intended to remove the seal myself when you were old enough to understand and control what was inside you.”
Pain crossed her face. “But I never got the chance.”
My chest tightened. “What happened?”
”When you were seven, my family finally found me. They came for me without warning. They used magic to pull me out of Kelvin’s territory.”
Tears filled her eyes. “They took me home and demanded to know where you were.”
My throat tightened. “What did you tell them?”
”That you were dead.”
My eyes widened.
”It was the only way I could protect you. They knew about the prophecy. If they discovered you were alive, they would have come for you.” She wiped a tear from her cheek. “But telling them you were dead wasn’t enough. They were afraid I would return to you.”
Her voice became quieter. “So they erased you from my mind.”
I stared at her. “What?”
”They took every memory I had of you. My pregnancy, your birth, your first steps, your voice, your face. Everything.”
I shook my head slowly. “No…”
”For years, Rebecca, I didn’t know you existed.” Her eyes filled with tears again. “I didn’t abandon you. I didn’t choose to leave you. I simply didn’t remember that I had a daughter to return to.”
The anger that had begun building inside me suddenly disappeared.
”Then how do you remember me now?”
Her gaze dropped to the floor, settling on the choker.
”That.”
I followed her eyes. “The choker?”
”The moment you removed it, I felt you.”
My heart skipped.
She stepped closer. “The seal I placed inside you when you were born was connected to me. Whatever that choker was doing to you suppressed far more than your wolf. It suppressed your aura and the power I sealed inside you.”
I stared at the silver metal lying uselessly on the floor.
”When you removed it, your power awakened enough to reach me. The connection between us returned, and the spell that had kept my memories buried shattered.” My mother’s voice trembled. “I remembered everything.”
A tear rolled down her cheek. “I remembered holding you for the first time. I remembered your first word. I remembered the way you used to climb into my bed whenever there was a storm. I remembered being taken away from you.”
My vision blurred.
”And I remembered that somewhere in this world, I had a daughter.” She took another step toward me. “The moment your aura appeared, I followed it.”
My hand moved to my chest.
This was too much. My mother was alive. Alpha Kelvin wasn’t my father. Lord Drake was. My mother had never abandoned me. And apparently, there was something inside me that had been sealed since the day I was born.
I looked down at the choker before slowly lifting my eyes back to her.
”So you teleported here?” I asked quietly.
”Yes.” My mother nodded. “Our family comes from a long line of powerful teleporters. It is one of the abilities passed down through our bloodline. We can travel almost anywhere we want to be, as long as we know where we are going or can sense the person we are trying to reach.”
I glanced toward the spot where the portal had appeared only minutes ago.
That explained how she had suddenly appeared in the middle of the room.
My mother’s expression softened again.
”Rebecca, there is something else you should know.”
I looked back at her.
”All the threats are gone now,” she said. “My parents, your grandparents, are dead. They died two years ago.”
My eyes widened slightly.
She took a slow breath before continuing.
”I am the Alpha of the Stone Pack now.”
I stared at her, still trying to process everything she had already told me.
My mother.
The woman I had believed was dead or had abandoned me.
She was alive.
She was an Alpha.
And she had somehow found me after all these years.
She stepped closer, her eyes filled with tears.
”Rebecca,” she said softly, “you don’t have to hide anymore.”
My chest tightened.
”You can come home with me.”