C1

"Five years of waiting, and the candles are already burning down to nothing."

I stare at the dining table, the steam dying off the roasted lamb I spent four hours preparing. It is Micheal’s favorite meal, cooked with the herbs from the pack house garden just the way he likes it. My hands twitch against the fabric of my apron, fingers brushing the plastic stick tucked deep inside the pocket. Two hard blue lines. A positive pregnancy test. A real heir for the Bloodmoon Pack, growing inside me after five long years of empty promises and silent rejection.

The clock on the wall ticks past nine. He is three hours late.

My chest tightens, my wolf clawing at my ribs with a restless, churning anxiety. I pull the test out, staring at the double lines again to make sure my eyes are not playing tricks on me. Five years as his placeholder mate, five years of the pack whispering behind my back that I am barren, that I am not strong enough to sit beside an Alpha. This stick was supposed to change everything tonight.

My phone buzzes on the wood table, light flashing against the dark polish.

I pick it up, expecting a short text from Micheal saying pack business kept him at the border. Instead, it is an video from a blocked number. My thumb hovers over the screen. My heart hammers against my ribs, heavy and sickening. I tap play.

The video is raw, shaky, and crystal clear.

It is our master bedroom on the top floor of the pack house. The dark silk sheets I washed yesterday are tangled around two bodies. Micheal’s broad, tattooed back rises and falls in hard, brutal thrusts. Beneath him, clutching his shoulders with manicured red nails, is Cecelia. She is screaming his name, her back arching off the mattress as he buries himself inside her.

My breath stops in my throat. My vision blackens around the edges.

"No," I whisper to the quiet dining room. "No, this is fake. It has to be fake."

My wolf whines inside my head, sickened by the scent of betrayal vibrating through the video speaker. I do not stay at the table. I do not cry. My legs move on instinct, carrying me out of the dining hall, up the grand stone staircase, down the dimly lit corridor toward our private quarters. Every step feels like walking through deep, freezing water. The plastic test stays clutched tight in my right palm, biting into my skin.

The bedroom door is slightly open, a strip of bright light spilling out onto the floorboards.

I hear the noises before I even reach the threshold. Wet, heavy thudding. Heavy breathing. Female giggles and the sharp metallic click of a phone camera.

I push the door fully open.

The nightmare on my screen is real. Micheal is on top of Cecelia, his powerful shoulders flexing with every violent push inside her body. She groans, her eyes rolled back in pleasure, her hands gripping his hair. Standing by the side of the bed, phone raised high, is Cynthia, recording every single angle with a vicious grin.

In the far corner of the room, holding a glass of dark wine, stands Elizabeth. She takes a sip, her eyes landing on me the second I step into the room.

"Finally the real Luna is here," Elizabeth says, her voice dripping with loud, mocking laughter.

Micheal does not stop. He does not pull out. He does not even try to cover Cecelia up. He keeps thrusting, his dark eyes snapping toward the doorway where I stand paralyzed, my blood running cold as ice. The heat in the room smells like sweat, sex, and foreign slickness.

"You're interrupting," Micheal says flatly. His voice has no shame, no guilt, no warmth. Just cold, absolute power.

My stomach turns over, nausea hitting me like a physical blow. The scent of another female on my mated Alpha makes my wolf want to rip her own skin off. But I do not collapse. I do not fall to my knees or beg him to explain. My spine goes rigid. The pain in my chest sharpens into pure, burning anger.

I reach into my pocket, pulling out the white stick, and step forward into the light of the bedroom. I hold it straight up between us.

"I’m carrying your heir, Alpha," I say, my voice steady, cutting straight through the sickening sounds of the bed.

The entire room freezes.

Cynthia drops her phone an inch, her recording hand going still. Elizabeth lowers her wine glass, her smile instantly dying on her lips. Cecelia’s breath hitches under Micheal’s weight, her hands dropping from his neck.

For one split second, Micheal stops moving. His pupils dilate, his jaw locking tight as he stares at the stick in my hand. His eyes flicker with something sharp, something raw and jagged that looks like pure hesitation. Fear. Real, unvarnished fear flashes across his face as the Alpha bond reacts to the truth in my words.

Then his face hardens into stone.

He pulls out of Cecelia with a brutal, careless movement, ignoring her small gasp. He steps off the bed naked, towering over me, his body covered in sweat and her scent. He lunges forward and snatches the test right out of my fingers.

He squeezes his fingers together. The plastic snaps with a sharp, loud crunch, shattering into small sharp fragments inside his palm. White bits fall to the rug between my feet.

"Then the pup dies with you, placeholder," Micheal says, his voice cold enough to freeze the blood in my veins.

Cecelia sits up against the pillows, pulling the silk sheet over her bare chest, her lips curving up into a slow, triumphant smile.

"Come join us, sister," Cecelia says softly, her eyes flashing with pure malice. "Or leave. Your choice."

I do not look at her. I stare straight into Micheal’s dark eyes, locking onto the fading remnant of terror I saw beneath his mask, burning every single detail of this room into my memory.