MasukMona POVAlessandro did not speak when he found me in the courtyard.He took one look at my face, at the way I still wiped the back of my hand across my mouth, and the gold in his eyes went flat and dangerous. He didn’t touch me in front of the students still watching through the glass. He simply nodded once toward the black SUV parked at the curb and walked ahead of me.The ride home was silent except for the low, continuous growl vibrating in his chest. His hands flexed on the steering wheel hard enough that I heard the leather strain. Every few seconds his nostrils flared like he was still smelling Dargrel on my skin.When we pulled into the garage he cut the engine and sat motionless for a long moment.Then he got out, came around to my side, and opened the door.“Inside.”I walked ahead of him into the house. The second the door to the living room closed behind us, the control he had been holding snapped.His fist went through the wall.Plaster exploded outward. The framed photo
Mona POVI felt the shift in the air the moment I walked into the cafeteria.Conversations were already louder than usual. Phones were out. Nina and her group occupied their usual table like a throne, but their eyes kept flicking toward the entrance. Cici waved me over to our table, frowning at whatever she saw on my face.“You look like you didn’t sleep,” she said as I sat down.I hadn’t. Not really. My body still carried the deep, private ache from the night before—the new stretch, the way Alessandro had taken the last part of me and made it his. Sitting on the hard cafeteria chair made the residual soreness flare. I kept my thighs pressed together and tried to focus on the tray I didn’t plan to eat from.I never got the chance.Dargrel’s scent hit me a second before his hand closed around my upper arm. He pulled me up out of the chair hard enough that the legs scraped loudly across the floor. Every head in the nearby tables turned.“End of the week was yesterday,” he said, loud eno
Mona POVMom left for her night shift at sunset with a quick kiss to Alessandro’s cheek and a reminder for me to lock the doors. The second her car disappeared down the driveway the air in the house changed.Alessandro locked the front door, turned to me, and said only one word.“Upstairs.”I followed him to his bedroom—the one he still shared with her on paper, but that had started to smell more like me every time she was gone. He closed the door, locked it, and leaned back against it, watching me with those steady gold-flecked eyes.“You’ve been tense since the meeting,” he said. “Your father’s name in someone else’s mouth. Dargrel’s deadline. The witch. All of it sitting on your shoulders.”I nodded, throat tight.He pushed off the door and walked toward me. “Tonight I’m taking something I haven’t taken yet. If you want me to stop at any point, you say so. But if you trust me… I want every part of you claimed before the rest of the world tries to pull us apart.”My stomach flipped.
Mona POVThe next evening the senior members of the pack gathered in the main hall of the pack house for a closed meeting. I wasn’t supposed to be there. Unmated younger wolves were usually excluded from these sessions. But Alessandro had ordered me to stay close after the memory wipe and the public scene with Dargrel, so I sat on a chair near the wall and tried to look invisible.His scent still clung to me under the blocking soap. The claim mark on my thigh was hidden beneath black tights, but I felt every pulse of it whenever he moved. Every time our eyes met across the room the bond flared, warm and possessive, as if it was making up for the days it had been forced quiet.The Beta finished his report on the northern border. The Gamma spoke about supply caches. Then one of the oldest elders—Gray, a scarred male who had served under the previous Alpha—cleared his throat and looked directly at Alessandro.“There is another matter,” Gray said. “It concerns the girl.”My spine stiffene
**Mona POVThe argument started over something small.Mom had left for a late shift. The house was quiet. I came downstairs for water and found Alessandro in the kitchen reviewing border reports on his tablet. He glanced up, gave me that same polite, empty nod, and looked back down.Something inside me snapped.“Stop looking at me like that,” I said.He frowned mildly. “Like what?”“Like I’m no one. Like you didn’t have me bent over your desk three days ago while the pack was in the next room. Like you didn’t bite my thigh until I bled and tell me I belonged to you.”His expression darkened with confusion and the beginning of irritation. “Mona, that’s enough. I don’t know what kind of story you’ve built in your head, but you need to stop.”“It’s not a story.” My voice shook. I grabbed the hem of my skirt and yanked it up high enough to show him the dark, unmistakable bite mark on my inner thigh. “You put this on me. You licked the blood off. You fucked me right after so your cum woul
Mona POVLiving with a stranger who wore Alessandro’s face was worse than any punishment he had ever given me.He poured coffee and asked if I needed a ride to school in the same calm, measured voice he used with the younger pack members. He reminded me to take a jacket because the weather report said rain. He told Mom he would be home late because of border patrols. Every word was polite. Every glance was empty.The claim mark on my inner thigh burned like a brand.I sat across from him at breakfast and felt my wolf pacing in confused circles. She didn’t understand why her Alpha looked straight through her. My body still carried the memory of him—how he stretched me, how he tasted, how he sounded when he lost control and nearly shifted from jealousy. None of that existed for him anymore.“You’re quiet this morning,” Mom said, glancing between us. “Both of you.”Alessandro gave her a small smile. “Just a long week. Mona, you’re ready? I can drop you on my way to the meeting.”The offe







