He Mocked My Scar, So I Left Him to His Regret Chapter 03

He Mocked My Scar, So I Left Him to His Regret Chapter 03

The next day, I showed up on time for my dishwashing job at the

restaurant.

From ten in the morning until eight at night, I scrubbed dishes

without a break.

The summer heat had turned the kitchen into a furnace. Sweat

ran into my eyes, stinging so badly I could barely see.

After the entrance exam, I’d worked myself to the bone, taking every job I could find to save up for a graduation trip with Holden.

When I’d first applied to be a server, the manager had stared at my face for a long time.

“Your build is fine, but that silver scar is too noticeable. We get

guests from other packs. They might think we hire rogue wolves.”

“You’d be better off in the back, washing dishes.”

I swallowed the humiliation.

My hands, pale and wrinkled from the water, ached, but I didn’t

dare stop.

But now, I’d already decided to cancel the trip with Holden.

Didn’t that mean I could finally rest?

On my way to tell the manager I was quitting, one of the food

runners clutched his stomach and begged me to take a soup out

for him.

Before I could refuse, he bolted for the bathroom.

When I pushed open the door to the private dining room at the

back of the restaurant, everyone inside froze.

Holden reacted first. He grabbed my arm and tried to drag me

back toward the door.

“Lucia, what are you doing here?”

In the struggle, scalding soup sloshed over the back of my hand,

my skin flushing an angry red.

I bit back a cry of pain and set the tureen steadily on the service

stand.

When I said nothing, Holden grew even more agitated.

“Did you hear Bianca did poorly on the entrance exam and come here to laugh at her?”

I looked up at him, my hand throbbing, my eyes starting to sting.

“Is that really what you think of me?”

He froze, then reached out as if to wipe my tears.

I turned my head, avoiding his touch.

“Then why are you here?” he demanded.

“All right, just don’t cry. Bianca only scored nine-sixty. She’s upset enough as it is.”

“Her parents brought her out to cheer her up. Just go. If she sees you, she’ll only feel worse.”

He pulled a cheaply wrapped white box from his pocket and held

it out to me.

“This is your graduation gift.”

My heart, battered as it was, still managed a flicker of hope.

I carefully opened it.

Inside was a cheap fountain pen, worth no more than fifteen

dollars.

The next second, Bianca bounced over to Holden’s side.

There wasn’t a trace of disappointment on her face. She was clutching concert tickets for a famous singer at the Seacliff Music Festival, and she looped her arm through Holden’s affectionately.

“Holden, thank you! These tickets are impossible to get. I’ve tried every time they went on sale and never got one.”

I stared at the cheap pen in my hand, and the last flicker of hope

died.

I turned to leave, but Holden followed me out.

“Lucia, don’t get the wrong idea. I just happened to get those for

her.”

*Happened to?*

Bianca had just said how hard they were to get.

He didn’t even care if his lies made sense anymore.

“By the way,” he said, “have we decided where we’re going for

our graduation trip? If we have, I’ll book the flights tonight.”

I stared at him in disbelief.

The trip itinerary I’d stayed up nights perfecting-he’d never even looked at it.

A wave of exhaustion crashed over my anger.

I lowered my head, ready to finally end this.

“Holden, about our trip, we should-”

Before I could say *cancel it*, Bianca stepped close, her voice a

low whisper only I could hear. “Lucia, do you like my necklace?”

“If Dad hadn’t mentioned you were good at hiding money, I never would’ve known that piggy bank in your closet held so much.”

My head snapped up. I stared at the pearl necklace around her

neck.

Every pearl was perfectly round and lustrous. The gold clasp bore the Heather Jewelry mark.

“The center pearl alone cost eighteen hundred, and with the chain… that makes twenty-three hundred exactly-ah!”

I slapped her, hard, across her smug face.

Bianca stumbled back and fell to the floor, her eyes wide with

shock.

“You hit me? How dare you hit me!”

I turned to Holden, shaking with rage. Wolfish fury made my

fingertips ache, but I forced myself not to shift.

Holden knew what that money was for.

I’d saved for years. It was for the reconstruction of my silver scar after I came of age.

“You took her into my house?”

“You’re the only one who knows my passcode. What right did you have to bring her into my home?”

Holden just frowned. “I didn’t.”

The private dining room door opened again.

Priscilla’s shriek pierced the air.

“Bianca! What happened to you?”

The next instant, a vicious slap cracked across my face.

Lockwood stood before me. The restaurant staff, recognizing

But hearing him say it still felt like a knife twisting in my gut.

In the end, the farce only concluded after the restaurant owner apologized profusely to the Lockwood family.

Once they had left, the owner turned on me, cursing me out for half an hour.

My wages for the past two weeks were supposed to be paid in cash. With a single sentence, he withheld all of it, declaring it would go toward compensating Bianca. He refused to give me any record of payment.

When I threatened to file a complaint with the territory’s labor office, he just sneered. He reminded me that Lockwood controlled Mooncrest’s resource allocation-and could easily ensure the guards processed Bianca’s assault complaint before they ever looked at mine.

In Mooncrest, that wasn’t an empty threat.

Then he shoved me out of the restaurant.

My phone buzzed. It was a flight reminder.

Beneath it was a notification from the Tidewatch Pack, confirming my eligibility for transfer. That unfamiliar pack, at the very least, was willing to evaluate me by its own rules, not by what Lockwood thought.

I wiped my tears dry, used the last forty dollars in my account to hail a car, and went straight to the airport.

There was no one left in Mooncrest worth staying for.

I was going to find a life of my own.