Chapter 1: An Empty Vow

Katherine Harrington:

Sebastian didn’t even look at me when he spoke.

“Let’s get divorced again.”

His voice was mechanical, hollowed out, as if the words had been rehearsed in front of a mirror until all feeling bled away.

“I promise you, after this one, I’ll give you the grand wedding you’ve always dreamed of. The dress, the flowers, the entire pack watching. Maybe then we can finally tell them we’re married… officially.”

The promise hung between us like smoke, pretty, intangible, already dissolving.

What else could I have expected?

This was the tenth time.

Ten times he had slid those same papers across the table. Ten times he had chosen her. Helen. His moonlight. The beta’s golden daughter. The one who had rejected him years ago, left him broken under a storm-soaked sky, only to waltz back the moment his name appeared in lights and his books lined bookstore shelves.

I reached for the pen.

My fingers felt numb, distant, like they belonged to someone else.

I held his gaze for what felt like forever — searching those familiar hazel eyes for even a flicker of regret, of guilt, of anything that might prove I hadn’t spent years loving a ghost.

“Did you ever love me?”

The question escaped before I could cage it, soft and cracked.

“Even once?”

Silence.

Thick.

Merciless.

He exhaled through his nose, the sound impatient.

“Katherine, please. Don’t be cruel. Have some heart for once in your life.”

His tone turned sharp, edged with the exhaustion of explaining the obvious.

“Helen is pregnant. She needs stability right now, someone to stand in until… until things settle. And you’re seriously asking me this right now?”

My throat closed.

“But why does my husband have to be the one standing in?”

Tears escaped before I could stop them, hot tracks carving down my cheeks.

“Why is it always me who steps aside?”

He finally met my eyes then — cold, matter-of-fact, utterly empty of remorse.

“Because I don’t love you the way I love her. I never have.”

The truth landed like a blade between ribs — clean, precise, practiced.

I felt something inside me fracture, not dramatically, but quietly, irrevocably , the way old glass shatters under steady pressure.

I nodded once.

Swallowed the sob clawing up my throat.

This wasn’t new pain; it was the same wound reopened so many times the edges had calloused over.

Yet somehow it still bled fresh.

Years ago, after I lost my parents and found myself utterly alone, Sebastian remained my one constant—my childhood best friend, the boy who had always been there.

I loved him quietly, deeply, in the way that only goes unspoken. But his heart had long belonged to someone else: Helen, his white moonlight, the one he idealized and chased with unwavering devotion.

When she finally turned away from him—cold, decisive, never once looking back—I was the one who found him in the aftermath, broken and lost in the silence she left behind.

I stayed.

I held him while he wept.

I bandaged the invisible wounds she left behind.

I waited through the long, silent months when he could barely speak.

And when he finally lifted his head, looked at me with something like gratitude, and whispered, “Marry me, Kat,” I had believed — foolishly, desperately — that the Moon Goddess had seen me at last.

That my patience, my loyalty, my quiet love had earned me a place at his side.

Then came the fame.

The book tours.

The interviews.

The anniversary dinner I planned for our third year that he never showed up to — because Helen had returned, radiant and repentant, and suddenly the house we built together, had three occupants instead of two.

I became the spare room.

The background noise.

The convenient wife who signed papers and cleaned up after their reunions.

My hand moved across the page.

Signature steady even as everything else trembled.

When the last loop of my name dried, I stood slowly, legs unsteady beneath the weight of accumulated humiliations.

Sebastian was already scrolling through his phone, voice casual, as though we’d just discussed grocery lists.

“That’s good. Now go clean the main bedroom, please. Helen and I will take it — she’s been having trouble sleeping anywhere else.”

He glanced up, expression almost kind in its indifference.

“You’ll use the guest room. She’s terrified of thunder, and the forecast is bad tonight. And when she gets here… don’t make a scene. Don’t take your anger out on her. She doesn’t deserve that.”

I stood there a moment longer, staring at the man I had loved for so long it had become part of my breathing.

He didn’t notice.

He never did.

I did exactly what he asked.

Numbly, mechanically, I moved through the motions like a shadow of myself. I stripped the sheets from the main bedroom bed—the ones still faintly scented with my lavender detergent—and replaced them with fresh white linens that Helen preferred. I fluffed the pillows just so, arranged the extra blanket she always needed “for comfort,” wiped down the nightstand, and even placed a small glass of water there because she sometimes woke thirsty in the night. Every action felt like folding away pieces of my own life, tucking them into a drawer labeled *temporary*.

When the room looked perfect—untouched by me, ready for them—I turned to leave.

The door swung open before my hand reached the knob.

Helen stepped in first, one delicate hand cradling the gentle swell of her belly, her silk dress clinging softly to her curves. Sebastian followed close behind, his arm wrapped tightly around her waist. His arm. The same one that had once flinched at the slightest touch from me—*“I’m not big on physical contact, Kat, you know that”*—now held her like she was the only solid thing in his world.

They froze for half a second when they saw me.

“Oh… Kat,” Helen breathed, voice smooth as poured honey, eyes wide with perfectly rehearsed innocence. “I hope you don’t mind me borrowing your husband for a little while.”

The word *borrowing* landed like a slap wrapped in velvet.

I forced my lips into something that might pass for a smile. “No. I hope you’re okay… and the baby.”

Helen tilted her head, lashes fluttering. “Sebastian… are you sure your wife won’t be mad at me?” She leaned into him just a fraction more, as if testing the waters of his devotion.

Sebastian’s chuckle was low, indulgent—the kind he used to save for late-night talks when it was just us. Now it belonged to her.

“Come on, Helen. Of course not. She’s not worth getting worked up over.” His gaze flicked to me—brief, dismissive, like swatting away a fly. “After all, you need me by your side right now. All to yourself.”

The words carved deeper than any yell ever could.

I opened my mouth before I could stop myself, voice barely above a whisper. “What about me, Sebastian? I need you by my side too…”

He turned then, eyes narrowing into something cold and impatient. “But you have me.” The hiss cut through the room like a blade. “Helen is alone right now—carrying a child, dealing with everything on her own. So stop making this all about you.”

He didn’t wait for my response. Instead, he guided Helen forward with gentle hands on her waist, helping her ease down onto the edge of the freshly made bed—the bed I had prepared for them only minutes ago. She sank into it gracefully, one hand still cradling her belly, the other reaching up to brush his cheek in silent thanks.

Sebastian knelt in front of her for a moment, murmuring something soft I couldn’t catch, his thumb tracing a soothing circle over her knuckles. The tenderness of it twisted something inside me until I could hardly breathe.

Helen looked up at him, lashes lowered, voice turning syrupy sweet. “Sebastian… I have a favor to ask you.”

He smiled—soft, automatic, the same smile he once gave me in the quiet hours before dawn. “Okay, Helen. Anything.”

She let the silence stretch just long enough to make my pulse thunder in my ears. Then, slowly, deliberately, she lifted her gaze to meet mine across the room—eyes gleaming with quiet victory—before turning back to him.

Her next words hung in the air like a noose tightening.

“Marry me. Before the baby comes.”