Chapter 1

I walked into the Pack Council with my divorce papers clutched in my hand. Four years. Four years as Rebecca Clarke, the mate to Gavin Clarke, who was the alpha of the Ironpelt Pack—the strongest among the northern werewolf packs.

Today, our mating bond was going to end.

The pack clerk didn’t even look up when I walked in.

“I’d like to file for dissolving the mate bond.” I said.

He finally looked up, startled—like I didn’t belong there. And honestly, with my werewolf university hoodie and backpack, I probably didn’t.

"The Pack Council isn’t exactly student territory," the clerk said, eyeing my outfit with clear skepticism. "Dissolving a mate bond requires signatures from both of the couple."

"Just give me the document," I said, tightening my grip on my bag. "I’ll bring it back with his signature."

The Clarke compound lay eerily still under the moon's glow. The sentry wolves at the gate didn't even twitch their ears as I passed—just another scentless shadow in Alpha Gavin's domain.

I moved straight toward the Alpha's den, my footsteps absurdly loud against the stone floors. The heavy oak door stood a claw's width ajar, and through it spilled the rich timbre of Gavin's laughter—a sound that had once warmed my bones, now twined with Vivian's chuckle.

Then my nose caught it.

Roasted stag liver drenched in moonpepper and bloodwine

Gavin had banned strong cooking scents from his territory—no seared boar heart, no fermented bear bile, nothing that could overwhelm a wolf’s hunting senses.

Yet now the den reeked of the dish for Vivian’s sake, a delicacy reserved for honored pack guests.

I pushed the door open.

There he was. Gavin Clarke, my fated mate, sitting at his desk, relaxed in a way I'd never seen with me. And beside him was Vivian Brooker, his childhood best friend, back from her "diplomatic tour" of the European packs this year.

She held a slice of moonpepper-crusted stag liver to his lips. Then Gavin saw me. His smile disappeared.

“Rebecca,” he said, voice cool. “Didn’t you have an exam today? Why are you back so early?”

Vivian turned. “Oh, Rebecca! We were just having a snack. You probably don’t like strong-smelling food, right? If you want something else, we can buy it fresh.”

“I’m fine.” I cut her off, stepping forward.

I slid the document across the oak desk, the rustle of paper unnaturally loud in the silent den. Gavin barely glanced up from his whiskey. His amber eyes—glowing faintly even in human form—narrowed slightly. “What's this?”

“The university needs a signed safety liability form,” I flipped it open to the signature page.

“For my research project.” I swallowed. “It needs a parent signature, since you’re my guardian now. You know my parents can’t…”

The truth sat heavy between us. My parents had been gone for years, killed during the Moon War that first pushed me into Gavin’s world. He knew better than anyone how alone I was.

Gavin frowned, “What kind of research requires a signature?” With that, he reached to take it from me.

My nerves suddenly tightened like piano wires. Should I let him take it? Or snatch it back and claim I’d grabbed the wrong document from the university? But if he scented the lie… Would he banish me from the pack entirely?

“Oh Gavin,” Vivian laughed, placing a hand on his arm. “You're too serious! It's just a form. You remember how many forms we had to sign for the big deal last month?”

As a beta of the Moonlight Pack, one of the Clarke family's most important allies, Vivian had moved effortlessly in Gavin’s world since her return. They were always together now—at territorial moonlit conclaves, black-market silver trades, and those shadowy blood-pact negotiations where alliances were sealed with fang and claw. Everywhere Gavin went these days, Vivian seemed to appear at his elbow.

He hesitated, then grabbed his fountain pen and signed with a quick flourish, the same way he signed death warrants and business deals.

I took the papers back before he could see the bold “MATE BOND DISSOLUTION AGREEMENT” header on the first page.

Vivian smirked, “Honestly, Gavin, you treat her more like a kid sister than a luna.”

Gavin didn't deny it. Just took a sip of whiskey.

I turned and walked out before they could see my hands shake.

The door closed behind me.

I was free.

Walking through the moonstone-lined halls of the Clarke compound, I clutched the signed agreement in my hand.

I remembered how different Gavin used to be. The way his calloused warrior’s hands would map the claiming marks along my spine when he thought I was asleep. The feral way he'd corner me against the sacred standing stones during pack gatherings, his fangs scraping my throat as he growled "Mine" into my skin.

These days, his gaze slid past me as if I were a shadow on the wall.

When I was sixteen, tragedy stripped me of my family. My parents were gone in a single night, and it was William Clarke—the alpha who ruled the Clarke Pack then—who offered me shelter. He’d done it out of loyalty to my father, his former second-in-command, who had fallen with a silver blade buried in his chest during the Moon War while protecting him. That debt was the reason I found myself sharing a home with Gavin Clarke.

Gavin was a man I had no business longing for. Strategic to the bone, driven by visions others couldn’t see, and utterly ruthless when it came to choices that shaped the pack’s future. By the time he hit twenty-five, he’d carved out a powerful trade network for his wolves, sealing pacts that spanned the entire northern frontier. Human media painted him as a prodigy in business; among alphas, he was the Wolf of Wall Street—an apex predator who made his own laws and broke everyone else’s.

I kept my distance at first, making myself invisible in the shadows of the Clarke teritory. Until the Blood Moon four years ago, when the pack was gathered for the Rite of the Hunt’s Blessing—a sacred bonfire ceremony under the swollen moon—Gavin found me crouched behind the sacrificial stones, pressing a wolfsbane-soaked linen to my shoulder.

It had been a "pack welcome" from his father’s lead enforcer. No one approved of a book-raised stray sheltering in their ancestral dens.

The gash lingered, stubborn against recovery—my human heritage struggling to purge the venom.

Gavin stayed silent. A low, resonant snarl rolled from his chest, rattling through me as he ripped away the soiled wrappings. He bent, mouth closing over the injury, and the heat of his tongue worked the poison out. The healing spark ignited at last, urged on by the potent enzymes unique to our kind.

When his fangs grazed the side of my throat in a wordless mark of possession, I knew I should have stepped back.

But my body betrayed me, leaning into him with a raw, instinct-driven hunger.

Three weeks later, the Pack Council sanctioned our union. It wasn’t the sacred mate-bond—those demanded the Luna Rite I couldn’t attempt until after my studies—but a contract forged for politics.

I, the sole wolf in the north with a human education, lent his trading empire credibility. He, in turn, offered a shield against his father’s old-guard loyalists.

That was the narrative, anyway. I almost believed it—until Vivian Brooker returned.

Daughter of the Moonlight Pack’s revered beta, her family’s trade routes were lifelines for the Ironpelt Pack. Fresh from severing her bond with a French alpha, she slipped seamlessly into Gavin’s world—sitting in his war councils, riding in his convoys, filling spaces that once belonged to me.

The truth hit last month.

I’d spent six hours alone at Dante’s, waiting for our anniversary dinner. It was his beta, Paul, who finally arrived—well past midnight—handing me a diamond bracelet with some line about “urgent negotiations.”

The next day, the gossip pages made everything clear: Gavin at the Blood Moon Gala, Vivian draped against him, her claws hooked into the ceremonial belt at his waist as if she already owned it.

The Mate Bond Dissolution Agreement was my final exam. Gavin signed it without reading—too distracted by Vivian feeding him stolen glances and stolen kisses.

So that was why he never marked me—not just because our agreed time hadn’t come, but because the one he truly wanted to mark was Vivian.

Now, with me gone, he could finally claim her openly, let her take my place as his rightful Luna beneath the Blood Moon’s gaze.

And me? All I wanted was to reclaim my life.