1: Pack Stain

Jasmine

Your son and the future Alpha still hasn't found his fated mate, aren't you worried?" one of the visiting Lunas remarked, setting her porcelain teacup down with a delicate clink.

I kept my head bowed, carefully arranging the fresh pastries on the silver tiering tower, trying to blend into the shadows of the sunroom. The skin on the back of my neck was prickling. I could feel one of them staring. It had to be the guest Luna, Luna Beverly. Ever since she had arrived at the mansion, her eyes had been tracking my movements with a strange, heavy curiosity.

"The girl with the brown hair who is she?" Luna Beverly questioned. "She looks oddly familiar."

"That is the late Beta's illegitimate daughter. Jasmine," Luna Victoria muttered.

"Oh," Beverly muttered after a beat. When she spoke again, the curiosity was replaced by a thick, heavy disdain. "The one whose mother crawled into bed and seduced a fated, married Beta?"

The other high-ranking women nodded in silent, grim confirmation. My fingers trembled against the silver tray. A cold sweat broke out across my palms. There it was.

"She is so completely unlike his other daughter," another Luna chimed in, tutting softly.

"Of course she is, she's his legitimate child after all," a third woman confirmed, waving a dismissive hand. "Giselle is radiant. Elegant, graceful, and a true credit to her family's name. Not like that... mistake."

"If it wasn't for that wretched woman destroying his home, the Beta would still be alive right now."

Luna Victoria cleared her throat, eager to move on.

 "Right. As I was saying about the Alpha heir. Securing his position is paramount."

"But you know how sacred fated mates are," Beverly argued gently, leaning forward. "If he never meets her, what then?"

"If he doesn't meet her soon, he will simply have to choose a suitable one from a high-ranking lineage," Luna Victoria stated firmly.

Our Alpha had died when Garrett was still a boy. His brother had stepped in as Alpha Regent, holding the seat and ruling in his place. Garrett, our Alpha heir, was going to be of age soon, and he would finally become Alpha.

"She’s a pretty little thing, though," Beverly noted suddenly, her eyes shifting back to me as I moved to the side table to quietly chop fresh fruit for the platters. Her voice hitched with a sudden thought. "Aren't you a bit worried, Victoria?"

"About what?" Luna Victoria asked, completely amused.

"A bed mate?" one of them asked.

"That’s all a girl like her is ever good for," someone sneered softly, keeping her eyes locked on my back.

Beverly continued, "Aren't you afraid the Alpha heir might get distracted? That he might..."

"Oh, please. Like he'd even spare her a glance," Victoria chuckled, the sound dry and entirely devoid of warmth. She took a slow sip of her tea.

 "They live in completely different worlds. Garrett has absolutely nothing to do with her. In fact, he can't even stand her presence. She works here in the main house, but Garrett personally had her moved to the outer section just to keep her out of his sight. Besides, she's not even that pretty," she dismissed. "My son has taste."

I kept my back turned, the knife slicing through a strawberry with perfect, rhythmic precision. I had trained myself to act unaffected while people spoke cruel words to me.

They didn't know.

They had absolutely no idea. Garrett hadn't moved me to the outer section because he couldn't stand the sight of me. He moved me there because he said I screamed too loud. That I moaned too loud.

He moved me because there were ears everywhere in the main mansion and he couldn't control the way I whimpered when he took me from behind, his heavy hands fisted in my hair, or the way he roared, feral and unhinged, whenever he reached his release inside of me.

I was the woman he couldn't keep his hands off. I was the secret he consumed in the dark, desperate and ravenous.

A burning urge flared in my chest. I wanted to spin around, drop the knife, look Luna Victoria dead in the eye, and say those exact words to her face. I wanted to shatter her pristine, arrogant world. But the weight of my reality pressed down on my shoulders, and the words died in my throat. I just couldn't. I was a wolf-less nobody.

"Are you finished?" Luna Victoria’s sharp voice cut through my thoughts.

I bit back another reply, keeping my face carefully blank as I set the silver tongs down and turned to face the table with a smooth, unbothered posture. I let my eyes linger on Luna Victoria’s face specifically the faint, yellowish hue bruising the skin beneath her eyes, and the tight lines no amount of expensive powder could hide.

"Pardon the intrusion, Luna Victoria," I said, my voice soft, polite, and entirely devoid of fear. "I noticed you haven't touched the spiced orange preserve. Given the subtle inflammation near your jaw and the dullness in your complexion, your liver seems to be struggling with the heavy winter teas. I could prepare a dandelion and milk thistle decoction for you. It might clear the sluggishness before your next banquet."

Victoria’s jaw snapped shut. Her eyes flashed with sudden, furious embarrassment as the other Lunas subtly glanced at her face.

"I did not ask for your uneducated opinion, girl," Victoria spat, though her hand self-consciously rose to touch her cheek. "If you're finished, get out! I can't stomach my tea with your presence and stench ruining this place!"

"Of course, Luna," I replied smoothly biting down a chuckle. 

I had always known she loathed me. The rumors in the pack house ran deep. Some whispered that before my mother destroyed the Beta's marriage, she had tried to seduce the late Alpha himself. Some even swore she had succeeded, sleeping with the Alpha before finally settling for the married Beta who fathered me.

I never knew my mother. She died immediately after I was born, leaving nothing behind but an infamous legacy. I didn't have a single memory of her, yet I heard about her sins every single day. My father’s legal wife, disgusted by my existence, wanted nothing to do with me, so I was dumped straight into the pack's orphanage.

The pack's charity case.

"Jasmine Blank." That's what they called me. No last name. Just an empty space. In exchange for the pack's "charity" for the roof over my head and the stale bread in my belly I performed every menial chore demanded of me.

And today, my assignment just happened to be serving at the Alpha’s mansion.

The moment I was dismissed, I hurried down the quiet, vaulted corridors of the residential wing, empty tray in hand, heading for the service stairs.

A heavy hand shot out from the shadows.

Before a gasp could leave my lips I was seized by the waist and hauled backward. A hard, powerful body slammed flush against my back, trapping me completely. Heat radiated through the thin fabric of my uniform. The silver tray slipped from my fingers and landed softly on the carpet as he dragged me into a dark, empty guest room.

The door clicked shut.

“Hi, beautiful,” he murmured against the side of my neck, voice low and rough with hunger.

Garrett turned me in his arms and tilted my chin up. In the dim light the cold, unyielding future Alpha the pack feared looked entirely different. The rigid tension in his shoulders melted the second our bodies touched. That restless, volatile energy that always clung to him settled, as if my skin alone could quiet the storm inside him.

A breathless, helpless smile pulled at my lips. My heart hammered so hard I was sure he could feel it.

He gave me no time to speak.

His mouth crashed onto mine deep, claiming, almost brutal in its need. He tasted like mint and dark amber, and he kissed me like a man who had been starving for days. His tongue swept in, possessive and demanding, stealing every breath I tried to take. Large hands gripped my hips hard enough to bruise, fingers digging into the soft flesh through my uniform as he yanked me tighter against him. 

There was no space left between us. I could feel every hard line of his body, the thick press of his arousal against my stomach, the way his chest rose and fell in rough, controlled breaths.

He was always like this when he finally got me alone. Fast. Starved. Completely ravenous.

His mouth left mine only to drag hot, open-mouthed kisses down the sensitive column of my throat. I felt the scrape of his teeth, the damp heat of his breath, the low sound of satisfaction that vibrated against my skin.

“Shouldn’t you… be at the meeting with the elders?” I managed, voice already unsteady.

“Yes,” he muttered against my pulse point, lips brushing the sensitive spot that always made my knees weaken. “But I heard you were working the sunroom today. I knew you were here… and I couldn’t stay away.”

My heart lurched. He had risked being seen. Just to get his hands on me.

“Garrett… we shouldn’t be seen together,” I whispered, palms flat against the solid wall of his chest. I could feel the hard, rapid beat of his heart under my fingers.

I held my breath, waiting. Praying just once that he would tighten his hold, look me in the eye, and choose me out loud. That he would say *fuck everyone* and drag me into the light as his

Instead, the heavy fog of lust cleared from his eyes. Reality returned like a blade of cold air.

“Shit,” he muttered, stepping back.

His hands dropped from my body. The sudden loss of his heat left my skin aching and cold. The beautiful, dangerous delusion shattered in an instant.

“Meet me at our usual spot. Tonight,” he said, voice already returning to that low, commanding tone the rest of the world heard.

 His hand slid down, squeezed my ass hard enough to make me gasp, then he leaned in and gave me one last, lingering kiss slower this time, almost regretful before he completely released me.

Something deep inside me stirred and purred, traitorous and wanting.

“I’ll be there,” I whispered.

Of course I would.  

How could I ever say no to my mate?

I smoothed down my rumpled uniform, picked up my silver tray from the floor, and quietly slipped out of the residential wing. To clear my head, I headed toward the old dispensary at the far end of the outer grounds.

It was practically forgotten, which meant I could use it whenever I wanted. Aside from doing menial cleaning tasks, the pack elders occasionally let me handle the sorting of dry herbs.

Since I didn't have a wolf, I couldn't heal with a pack-bond touch, but I had spent years studying traditional remedies, books on botany, and holistic medicine. I knew exactly which roots stopped a fever and which crushed leaves could soothe a torn muscle after a brutal training session.

I began humming softly under my breath, the scent of dried lavender and chamomile instantly settling my erratic pulse. For a few minutes, surrounded by jars of amber liquids and neatly tied bundles of willow bark, I wasn't Jasmine Blank, the pack's ultimate shame. I was just myself.