After Repaying the Seven Lives I Owed My Alpha, I Left Him

“Ariana, what are you doing standing here all by yourself?”

Dylan’s voice came from behind me, casual and unconcerned.

I turned as he strode in carrying a white pastry box.

Eva followed behind him in a pale blue sweater, Dylan’s black coat draped over her shoulders. Around her neck hung an intricately crafted silver wolf pendant.

Dylan had bought it at an auction in the North last month.

At the time, he’d told me the wolf’s eyes reminded him of mine when I shifted, and that it would make the perfect Mate Anniversary gift.

Now it was around Eva’s neck.

“I brought you your favorite pastries.”

Dylan set the box on the table and flipped open the lid.

“Eat them while they’re fresh.”

I walked over and glanced inside.

There were only three kinds of pastries: honey cake, moonberry cream puffs, and almond cookies dusted with silvermoon pollen.

I didn’t like any of them.

Worse, silvermoon pollen made me break out in red welts. Dylan had known that since our first year as mates.

“I don’t eat any of these.” I looked away.

Dylan’s hand paused over the box.

“Don’t you love that bakery on the east side?”

“I love their lavender cake.”

He visibly faltered.

Eva immediately stepped forward, looking timid.

“Ariana, don’t blame Dylan. I mentioned I was craving the moonberry puffs, so he picked some up while he was out.”

The bakery was forty minutes in the opposite direction.

He had gone out of his way to buy what she liked, then come home and told me he’d brought my favorites.

I gave a faint smile and glanced at the box. “If they’re what you wanted, you should have them.”

“Oh, I couldn’t.” Eva waved her hands, her eyes already turning red. “Dylan bought them for you. If I ate them, you’d only feel worse.”

She turned to Dylan as if asking him to rescue her.

“Dylan, please explain. This is all my fault for mentioning them.”

Dylan frowned, clear disapproval settling over his face.

“Ariana, Eva made one harmless comment. Do you really have to make her feel this bad?”

“I’m not.”

“You won’t even take one bite. How is that not you sulking?”

He pushed the plate of almond cookies toward me.

“Just try one with Eva. She can’t finish all of these herself.”

A fine layer of silvery powder coated the cookies. My throat had already started itching from the smell alone.

“I’m allergic to silvermoon pollen. It gives me a rash.”

Dylan froze.

For several seconds, his brow drew tighter and tighter, as though he were struggling to remember something he should never have forgotten.

Then he looked away, his voice stiff.

“It’s been so long since you’ve had a reaction. I forgot.”

He’d forgotten.

For the past three years, I’d carefully avoided anything containing silvermoon pollen because I never wanted my allergy to ruin an occasion for him.

Because I never ate it, he’d apparently decided there was nothing to remember.

“It’s fine.” I pushed the cookies back. “Eva can have them.”

Eva hovered awkwardly, unsure whether to take the plate, her expression turning anxious as she looked to Dylan.

Dylan sighed and put the pastries back in the box.

“Enough. If you don’t want them, don’t eat them. This is too small a thing for both of you to make such a fuss over.”

He adjusted his cuff, and that was when I noticed his left ring finger was bare.

“Where’s your ring?”

Dylan glanced down, and something evasive flickered across his face.

The moonstone ring I’d carved for him with my own hands was gone.

“Eva got scared by a rogue a few days ago. She hasn’t been sleeping well. Moonstone calms the wolf, so I let her wear it for a couple of days.”

Eva lowered her head and twisted her fingers together.

Only then did I notice the moonstone ring on her right ring finger.

“I didn’t ask him for it, Ariana. Dylan saw that I couldn’t stop shaking and took it off himself. He said… it was only a ring.”

Only a ring.

I gave a small nod. “It looks nice.”

“Don’t read too much into it,” Dylan said quickly. “Eva needs it more right now. If it bothers you, I’ll take it back.”

He reached for Eva’s hand, moving slowly enough that it was obvious he expected me to stop him.

“Don’t.” I turned toward the stairs. “It suits her.”

Behind me, Dylan let out a breath of relief.

“I knew you’d understand. You’re my Luna. You’ve always been more reasonable than everyone else.”

I went back to my room and closed the door behind me.

That made four.

Three more chances, and the seven lives I owed Dylan would be repaid.

Outside, Eva’s maid Chloe was chatting with my maid, Nora.

“Nora, the Alpha is so good to my lady. Even when he buys pastries, he remembers exactly what she likes.”

“He was already going that way!” Nora snapped.

“And somehow what was ‘on the way’ was exactly what she wanted. Sounds like fate to me.”

I opened the window. Dylan and Eva were still downstairs, laughing together.

“Nora.”

She answered at once. “Luna?”

“Give Chloe the crystal glasses that arrived yesterday.”

“Luna! Alpha had those brought all the way from the North especially for you!”

“I don’t want something after someone else has had their hands all over it.”