CHAPTER 1 – The Return

The rain hasn’t stopped for hours.

It drums against my hood, slides down my face, seeps through the old cloak clinging to my body. My boots sink into the mud with every step, but I keep walking because stopping means thinking, and thinking hurts more than the cold.

Two years.

Two years since I walked away from Bloodstone territory with nothing but a shattered bond and two heartbeats that weren’t my own.

Now I’m back.

A flash of lightning tears across the sky, lighting up the border gates of Bloodstone Pack. Iron, stone, and the heavy scent of dominance in the air. Even from here, I can smell him, that sharp mix of smoke and pine that used to make my heart race.

Delph.

The name alone sends something through me, a memory that tightens my chest. My wolf, Mira, stirs uneasily inside me, whining. He’ll know we’re here.

“I know,” I whisper. My voice cracks. “We don’t have a choice.”

The twins shift in my arms, cocooned against my chest. Their tiny breaths fog against my damp clothes. I pull them closer, tucking them beneath the cloak. Their warmth keeps me steady.

“This is for them,” I murmur, as if the wind might carry the words to the Moon Goddess herself.

I didn’t come back to beg or to love him again. I came because running isn’t living. Because the world outside these borders is cruel to omegas and even crueler to wolves without a pack.

And maybe, deep down, because part of me wants him to see what he threw away.

The guards at the border move when they see me. They recognize the scent before their eyes do. One of them stumbles forward, disbelief written all over his face.

“Luna Afnan?”

The title hits like a blade. Once, that word used to mean everything. Now it’s just a ghost.

“I’m not your Luna,” I say quietly. “Not anymore. Tell your Alpha that I seek entrance.”

They exchange glances. I can hear the whisper of their minds linking with him, their Alpha. My heart starts to pound, each beat syncing with the rain.

He’ll know in seconds. He’ll scent me before they finish speaking.

And he’ll come.

I don’t realize I’ve stopped breathing until I hear it, that low, commanding growl that shakes the ground under my feet. The kind of sound only one wolf in this world can make.

Then he’s there.

Tall. Broad-shouldered. Dressed in black that clings to him like sin itself. Even in the storm, he’s composed, regal, terrifying. The years haven’t softened him; if anything, they’ve made him sharper, colder.

Delph. Alpha of Bloodstone. My former mate.

His eyes find me through the rain steel gray, piercing, unreadable.

And for the briefest second, something flickers there. Shock. Disbelief. Maybe even pain.

Then it’s gone.

“Afnan.” My name rolls off his tongue like a curse and a prayer combined. “You dare to return?”

I lift my chin. The old me would’ve trembled. The woman standing here doesn’t.

“I’m not here for your forgiveness, Alpha,” I say softly. “I came because some ghosts can’t stay buried forever.”

His nostrils flare. His wolf is close to the surface. I can feel it, raw and dangerous. “You shouldn’t have come back.”

“Maybe,” I whisper, “but I did.”

His gaze drops suddenly to the small bundle in my arms. The twins stir, one tiny hand poking out from the cloak. Delph freezes. The air thickens.

For a heartbeat, neither of us moves.

Then his voice, low and cold: “What are you hiding?”

I step back, my wolf bristling. “Nothing that concerns you.”

His growl deepens, the rain hissing against the tension in the air. “Everything that concerns you, concerns me.”

I almost laughed at that. “Since when?”

Lightning flashes again, illuminating his face the fury, the confusion, the faint hint of something he doesn’t want to feel. His jaw tightens, and I see it, the moment realization starts to dawn. The scent of the twins, faint but familiar, cuts through the rain.

His eyes widened.

His control slips for a split second.

And in that heartbeat, I know he knows.

“You will come with me,” he orders finally, his tone leaving no room for argument. “Now.”

The guards hesitate, watching. My pulse hammers, but I don’t move.

I’ve faced rogues, hunger, and fear. I can face him.

“If I come with you,” I say, my voice quiet but firm, “it’ll be on my terms, Delph. Not yours.”

He takes a slow step forward, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating from him. His scent wraps around me, intoxicating and dangerous.

“You forget who you’re speaking to,” he murmurs.

I meet his eyes. “No. I remember exactly who I’m speaking to. The Alpha who rejected his mate for power.”

The silence after that could drown the thunder. His wolf roars beneath his skin, I can feel it in the air, wild and desperate.

Then, softly, almost brokenly, he says, “You should’ve stayed gone.”

Maybe I should have. But as I look down at the twins one with my eyes, one with his I know I couldn’t have.

Because ghosts don’t stay buried.

And some secrets… aren’t meant to be kept forever.