CHAPTER 3

"Who the hell do you think you are? You're blocking the light."

Victoria Cain didn't wait for an answer. She adjusted her diamond collar in the mirror of the gala’s powder room, her lips curled in a permanent sneer. On the main stage of the National Lycan Council, the announcement was already booming through the speakers. A breakthrough. A serum to stabilize shifting in weak-blooded wolves.

"The formula is mine, Victoria. You didn't even change the decimal points in the third line of the protein sequence."

Madison stood by the door. The silver silk of her gown clung to her hips like a second skin, the fabric cool against her legs. A black lace mask hid the fury etched into her face, but it couldn't hide the way her pulse thrummed against her throat.

"Yours?" Victoria spun around, her heels clicking sharply against the marble. She let out a jagged laugh, the kind that grated like sandpaper. "God, you’re delusional. You were a maid, Madison. A wolfless, pathetic charity case. I found those notes in the trash where they belonged. I just... polished them. The Council thinks I’m a prodigy. My father thinks I’m a god. What are you gonna do? Cry to the janitor?"

Victoria stepped closer, the scent of her cloying, expensive perfume hitting Madison like a physical blow. "Austin is out there right now, bragging about his brilliant future Luna. He doesn't even remember your name, sweetie. To him, you’re just a bad smell we finally aired out of the house."

"Stolen light doesn't just fade, Victoria. It burns the person holding it."

"Oh, shut up with the fortune cookie bullshit." Victoria shoved past her, her silk train snapping like a whip. "Watch the screens. Watch me become the most important woman in the country while you rot in whatever gutter you crawled into."

Madison didn't follow her immediately. She waited until the door swung shut. She reached into her clutch, pulling out a sleek, obsidian-colored phone. Her thumb hovered over a single icon.

"Execute the freeze," Madison whispered into the receiver. "Drain them dry."

Outside in the ballroom, the atmosphere was thick with the scent of power and champagne. Alpha Gregory Cain stood at the head of the table, his chest puffed out like a peacock. Austin was at his side, his hand possessively on Victoria’s waist.

"A new era for the Silver Moon!" Gregory bellowed, raising a golden flute. "Led by my daughter’s genius!"

The room erupted in applause, a sea of Alphas and high-ranking officials nodding in approval. But the noise died abruptly.

A high-pitched chime echoed from every tablet and phone in the hall. It was the Council’s emergency legal alert.

The main projector screen, which had been displaying Victoria’s chemical structures, suddenly flickered. The image of the serum formula was crossed out by a massive, blood-red stamp: PATENT INFRINGEMENT.

"What is this?" Gregory’s voice cracked, the glass in his hand trembling. "Victoria?"

"It’s... it must be a glitch," Victoria stammered, her face draining of color until she looked like a corpse. "Dad, I don’t—"

A man in a sharp gray suit stepped onto the stage, a tablet in his hand. "Alpha Cain. I am the Council’s Chief Auditor. We have just received a Cease and Desist from the legal team of 'Nova-Tech Industries.' It appears this serum was patented three years ago under the pseudonym 'The White Ghost.'"

A collective gasp rippled through the crowd. Austin’s hand dropped from Victoria’s waist as if she’d suddenly turned into a viper.

"Nova-Tech?" Gregory roared. "That’s a northern conglomerate! What do they have to do with my daughter’s work?"

"Everything, apparently," the Auditor said, his voice flat and clinical. "The metadata on the files you submitted matches the patented research exactly. As of thirty seconds ago, all Cain family assets—personal and pack-related—have been frozen pending a fraud investigation. You are also being fined ten million silver credits for the illegal use of proprietary intellectual property."

"Ten million?" Victoria shrieked. "We don't have that in liquid! Dad!"

Madison stepped out from the shadows of the velvet curtains, her mask still firmly in place. She watched from the edge of the room as the crowd turned on the Cains. The Alphas who had been bowing to Gregory moments ago were now whispering, their eyes cold and judgmental.

Gregory looked like he was having a stroke. He grabbed a chair for support, his knuckles white. "Who owns Nova-Tech? Who is this 'White Ghost'?"

Madison caught Austin’s eye. He looked lost, his gaze darting between the ruin of his future father-in-law and the mysterious woman in silver silk. He didn't recognize her. He didn't see the girl he had discarded.

Madison turned and walked toward the exit, the weight of her silver gown swinging rhythmically.

Behind her, the auditors were beginning to seize the Cain family’s jewelry. The humiliation was a living thing, a heavy pressure in the air.

Later that night, the adrenaline was a fire in her blood. She was back at the Clarke Estate, but she didn't go to her room. She went to the private gym in the basement where the air was thick with the smell of sweat and iron.

She wasn't alone.

Elias, her second-oldest brother, was there. He was shirtless, his back a map of scars and hard muscle, slamming a heavy bag with enough force to dent the wall. When he saw her, he stopped, his chest heaving.

"You look like you want to kill something," Elias said, wiping sweat from his forehead with a discarded shirt.

"I want more than that," Madison said, her voice low. She walked toward him, the mask gone, her eyes glowing with that unstable silver light. "I want to feel the power they tried to take from me."

Elias dropped the shirt. He didn't move as she approached. He was a mountain of a man, his presence grounding and heavy. "Then take it."

Madison didn't think. She lunged, her fingers digging into the hard planes of his shoulders. She didn't want a fight. She wanted the friction. The heat.

The air turned electric. Elias’s hands, calloused and massive, clamped onto her waist, lifting her until her feet dangled. He slammed her back against the cool stone wall of the gym, the impact knocking the breath from her lungs.

"Madi," he growled, his voice a warning and an invitation.

"Don't stop," she snapped, her teeth baring in a snarl.

He didn't. His mouth crashed against hers, tasting of salt and aggression. It wasn't a gentle kiss; it was a collision. His tongue forced its way past her teeth, reclaiming the space like a conqueror. Madison wrapped her legs around his thick waist, her heels digging into his lower back.

He ripped the silver silk of her gown, the fabric groaning before it gave way. His hands were everywhere—bruising her skin, mapping the curves the Cains had tried to hide. He hiked her up, his cock thick and rigid against the apex of her thighs.

"You're a Queen now," he hissed against her neck, his teeth grazing her pulse point. "Act like it."

He didn't wait for her to adjust. He unzipped his tactical trousers, his length springing free, dark and pulsing in the dim light. He guided himself to her, the tip of his cock slick with her own heat. With one brutal shove, he buried himself inside her.

Madison’s head snapped back, a guttural scream tearing from her throat. It was too much. He was too big, his weight pinning her against the wall, his cock filling every inch of her until she felt like she might break.

"Fuck," Elias groaned, his face buried in her hair. He began to move, his hips slamming into hers with a rhythmic, violent force.

The sound of flesh hitting flesh echoed in the hollow gym. Madison gripped his shoulders, her nails drawing blood from his traps. She felt the stretch, the stinging friction of his skin sliding against hers. Each thrust was a hammer blow, driving the ghost of Austin and the Cains out of her mind.

He changed positions, dropping her to her hands and knees against the leather weight bench. He stood behind her, his large hands gripping her hips so hard she knew there would be finger-shaped bruises by morning.

"Look at me," he commanded.

She looked over her shoulder, her hair a wild mess of white and blonde. He lunged back into her, going deep, his cock hitting her cervix. She buckled, her arms shaking as she tried to stay upright. He pounced again and again, his movement savage and unyielding.

"Mine," he grunted, the word a vibration she felt in her gut.

The heat peaked. Madison’s vision went white as her internal muscles clamped around him, pulsing in a frantic, desperate rhythm. She felt the hot splash of his cum filling her, a heavy warmth that seemed to anchor her to the earth. He let out a low, animalistic roar, his body shuddering as he emptied himself into her.

The silence that followed was heavy. Madison collapsed onto the bench, her limbs shaking, her skin stinging from the friction of the leather and his touch. Elias leaned over her, his sweat dripping onto her back, his literal weight pressing her down.

She felt the "hangover"—the dull ache in her hips, the lingering warmth between her legs, the sudden, crushing reality of what she had become.

The Cains were losing their money. But Madison was finding her teeth.