CHAPTER 1: The Fever

The coffee pot slipped from my hands, but I caught it before it shattered against the cracked linoleum floor. My fingers trembled as I set it back on the burner. Three years of waitressing had made me good at catching things before they broke.

If only I'd been that good at catching my life before it fell apart.

"You alright there, hon?" The trucker at the counter squinted at me through the fluorescent haze of Rosie's All-Night Diner. His name tag said Earl, and he'd been nursing the same cup of burnt coffee for the past hour.

"Fine." I forced a smile that felt like plastic. "Just tired."

That was the understatement of the century. My feet ached in the cheap sneakers I'd bought at the thrift store. My lower back screamed from carrying heavy trays for eight hours straight. And my wolf—what was left of her—barely stirred anymore, too weak from the incomplete mate bond to do more than whimper occasionally in the back of my mind.

But I was alive. My sons were safe. That was all that mattered.

I wiped down table six for the third time, moving through the motions automatically. The diner smelled like grease and old coffee and the dreams people left behind at two in the morning. Through the window, I could see the laundromat across the street, its neon sign flickering in the drizzle. Above it was our apartment—two rooms that barely qualified as living space, but it was ours and no one knew we were there.

Three years. Three years of hiding, working three jobs, raising twin boys in a place where no one asked questions because everyone had secrets of their own.

My phone buzzed in my apron pocket.

I almost didn't answer. Mrs. Chen, the babysitter, never called during my shift unless something was wrong. My heart started pounding before I even saw her name on the screen.

"Mrs. Chen?"

"Lena!" Her voice was shrill with panic, barely recognizable. "You need to come home right now. It's Ash, he just collapsed and I can't wake him up and there's this light—"

The phone slipped. I caught it, my hands suddenly ice cold.

"What light? What do you mean you can't wake him?"

"There's something glowing under his skin, silver and gold, and he's burning up, I've never felt a fever this hot, I don't know what to do—"

I was already untying my apron. "I'm coming. Five minutes. Don't call an ambulance yet."

Earl looked up as I bolted for the door. "Hey, you can't just leave in the middle of—"

I was already gone.

The night air hit my face, cold and damp. I ran across the empty street, my shoes slapping against wet pavement. The apartment stairs had never felt so long. My lungs burned. My wolf stirred, agitated, sensing my fear.

Mrs. Chen met me at the door, her wrinkled face pale. "I'm so sorry, I don't know what happened, he was fine and then he just—"

I pushed past her.

Ash lay on the couch, his small body rigid. Even from across the room, I could see the light pulsing beneath his skin like he'd swallowed the sun. Silver and gold, threading through his veins in patterns that made my eyes hurt.

"Baby." I dropped to my knees beside him, pressing my hand to his forehead. The heat nearly burned my palm. "Ash, can you hear me?"

His eyes fluttered but didn't open. His lips moved soundlessly.

A whimper came from the bedroom. Ryder.

I ran. My youngest son sat up in his bed, his dark hair plastered to his forehead with sweat. The same terrible light glowed beneath his brown skin, pulsing in time with his heartbeat.

"Mama, it hurts." His voice was so small. "Everything hurts."

I pulled him into my arms, feeling the unnatural heat radiating from his little body. "I know, baby. I know. Mama's going to fix it."

But I didn't know how. I didn't know anything except that this was impossible. Human children didn't glow. Human fevers didn't look like liquid light in the bloodstream.

But my sons weren't human. They were werewolves. And I'd been pretending for three years that they weren't.

Mrs. Chen hovered in the doorway. "Should I call 911?"

"No." The word came out sharper than I intended. "No hospitals. I'll handle it."

"But Lena—"

"Please." I looked at her, not bothering to hide the desperation. "Just go home. I'll pay you for the full night. I just need to handle this myself."

She hesitated, then nodded slowly. I heard the front door close a minute later.

I laid Ryder next to his brother on the couch. They both burned with that impossible fever, their small chests rising and falling too fast. The light under their skin pulsed brighter, and I could swear I heard it humming, a frequency just at the edge of hearing.

My hands shook as I wet a washcloth with cold water. I pressed it to Ash's forehead, then Ryder's. It did nothing. The water evaporated into steam almost instantly.

"No, no, no." I was whispering to myself, to them, to anyone who might listen. "This can't be happening. Not now. Not like this."

But I knew what this was.

Luna Fever.

The words came back to me from a training session years ago, back when I still lived in the pack, back when I sat in the back of the room and tried to be invisible. The instructor had been talking about rare illnesses that affected werewolf children. Most of us hadn't paid attention. It was theoretical. It barely ever happened.

Except when it did.

Luna Fever only occurred in children born from fated mates. When the mate bond was incomplete or damaged, the power in the children's blood became unstable. It built up like pressure in a sealed container, and eventually—

I couldn't finish the thought.

The cure was simple, the instructor had said. Both parents had to be present during the full moon. Their combined touch would stabilize the bond and heal the children.

Both parents.

I looked at my sons, my beautiful impossible boys, and felt the weight of three years of running crash down on my shoulders.

There was only one way to save them. Only one person who could help.

The person who'd thrown me away like I was nothing.

My wolf whimpered. She knew what I was thinking. She knew what it would cost me to go back.

But what choice did I have?

I stumbled to the kitchen, dug through the junk drawer until I found it. The old phone. The one I'd kept charged all these years for emergencies, even though I'd sworn I'd never use it.

The screen lit up. The background was still the same—a photo of the Silvermoon Pack house at sunset. I'd been so happy when I took that picture. So naive.

My contacts list was pitifully short. Most of the names belonged to people who'd pretended I didn't exist even before I ran. But there was one who'd been different.

Delta Kyle.

He'd helped me sometimes, in small ways he thought no one noticed. An encouraging word during training. A sandwich left on my doorstep when my father forgot I existed. He'd even helped me sneak out the night I ran, though he'd made me promise never to tell anyone.

Would he help me now? Or would he turn me in the moment I called?

I looked back at the couch. Ash's breathing had become labored. Ryder's eyes had rolled back in his head.

My finger hovered over Kyle's name.

Seventy-two hours. That's what the instructor had said. From first symptoms to the full moon. After that, the fever would consume them from the inside out.

I had three days to save my sons' lives.

Three days to face the man who'd rejected me.

Three days to beg the Alpha who'd chosen someone else to save the children he didn't know existed.

My whole body shook. Tears blurred my vision. But I pressed the call button anyway.

It rang once. Twice. Three times.

On the fourth ring, a familiar gruff voice answered. "This number has been disconnected for three years. Who is this?"

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. How did you ask for help from people who'd watched you suffer and done nothing?

"Hello? If this is a prank—"

"Kyle." My voice cracked. "It's Lena. I need help."

Silence. Long enough that I thought he'd hung up.

Then: "Lena? Where the hell have you been?"

"That doesn't matter. My sons are sick. Luna Fever. I need to bring them home." The words tumbled out faster now. "I know Caden doesn't want to see me. I know I have no right to ask. But they're dying, Kyle. They need their father or they'll die."

Another silence. This one felt heavier.

"Sons?" Kyle's voice had gone very quiet. "Lena, what sons? How old—" He stopped. "Three years. You've been gone three years."

"I'm coming home." I was crying now, unable to stop it. "I'll be there by sunrise. Please don't turn me away at the border. Please. They're just babies. They didn't do anything wrong."

"Jesus Christ." I heard him moving, heard other voices in the background. "Lena, does Caden know?"

"No one knows. No one can know. I just need five minutes of his time. That's all. Then we'll leave again and you'll never have to see us."

"You're really coming back? After everything?"

I looked at my sons, at the light pulsing brighter under their skin, at their small faces twisted with pain they were too young to understand.

"I don't have a choice."