Chapter One

“Isla darling, you are not going to believe this,” my father pushed the door open and, as usual, he didn’t knock.

I was standing at my easel, brush mid-stroke on a sky that was supposed to be hopeful, when he rushed into my room all grins… and my first guess was that he had won the lottery.

The only thing that could make my father grin that wide was money and more money.

“Hello father. You look happy.”

“Of course I look happy my girl! What father wouldn’t be?” He laughed, “Your marriage alliance has been finalized. You will be getting married in three days, Isla!”

I froze, my grip on the brush tightening. “What did you just say?”

He held up a cream envelope and waved it with a grin. A shiver ran down my spine when I saw the black wax seal on it and even from across the room, I could see the Thornwick wolf pressed into it.

“To Alpha Kael Thornwick,” father gushed, “His council chose you themselves… of course being the Beta’s daughter was a plus when the votes were made but they all personally commended you… out of all the ladies who were picked… you were chosen specifically. Oh my dear child this is such an honour.”

The brush slipped from my fingers… as I gaped at my father with wide eyes.

Was he kidding me?

‘Out of all the ladies chosen.’

Somehow my name was added in the list of eligible ladies for the alpha… a whole vote went on and I was picked and I would be getting married in three days and I was not made aware of this ever?

And my father was here grinning like he was expecting me to do a victory dance with him? He… and a group of other old men sat around a table and arranged my whole future without even a word to me?

“You’re insane.” I muttered, “Tell me you’re insane and this is some sick joke—”

“Do I look like I’m joking?” He crossed the room, stopping so close I could smell the tobacco on his breath. “The decree arrived from the palace an hour ago. Signed by the Alpha. Sealed by the council. You, Isla Brennan, will be the next Luna of the Northern Territories.”

“No.” The word came out strangled. “No, I won’t. I’m not some… some broodmare you can just sell off…”

“Sell off?” He laughed, “That is what you call that? I am selling you? What I did was secure our family’s survival. Do you have any idea what the Thornwick name means? Being a Luna? Wealth that spans generations. Council seats. Military protection. Your children will be royalty, Isla. Royalty.”

“I’m twenty-two! I haven’t even finished my degree and you’re already planning children I never agreed to have!”

My chest was heaving now and I was shaking… as I stared at him in disbelief. He knew how much my dreams meant to me… he knew I never ever wanted…

“That stupid art degree is over. The palace doesn’t need a painter playing with colors.” He dropped the envelope onto my paint-splattered table like a judge’s gavel. “They need a virgin Beta’s daughter with good breeding and the sense to keep her mouth shut. Congratulations. You’re perfect.”

I recoiled at his words.

Virgin? I was picked because I was a virgin and can ‘breed?’

It was one of the barbaric old laws I never agreed with. A law that stated an Alpha’s bride MUST be a virgin… pure and untouched. A blank page for him to write his legacy on.

It was considered a huge taboo punishable by exile if an Alpha married a woman that was not considered ‘pure.’

I had been saving myself for my own personal reasons, not to get picked by the Alpha.

“You knew,” I whispered, stumbling back until my hip hit the easel. “You knew this could happen. That’s why you never let me date. Why you tracked my every move. You were keeping me packaged and pristine for this.”

“I was preparing you for opportunity.” His voice rose, sharp and unyielding. “Do you think I enjoyed watching you waste your time on canvases no one will ever buy? Playing artist while our pack loses influence every year? This marriage saves us, Isla. It saves everything.”

“At what cost?! I told you a hundred times I didn’t want marriage. I wanted school. I wanted my art. I wanted a life that wasn’t measured by how many pups I could push out for some man who sees me as a transaction…”

“Enough!” His palm slammed down on the table, rattling paint tubes and brushes. “This isn’t up for debate. Refusing the Alpha is treason and you know this. You will smile. You will sign the contract. And in three days, you will walk down that aisle in white and say the vows. That’s final.”

He was halfway to the door when he paused, glancing back. His voice softened, which somehow made it worse. “I know you’re scared. But this is bigger than your feelings, sweetheart. This is about family. Legacy. The kind of future your mother would have wanted for you.”

“Father the Alpha is paralyzed. You would really marry me off to a paralyzed man because of money?”

He sighed, “Your focus should be on being the queen… being powerful, not on what your husband looks like.”

The door clicked shut behind him.

I stood there, blue paint pooling around my foot, staring at that envelope like it was a death sentence and almost broke down in sobs. Because that’s what it was.

Three days.

I had three days until I threw away every dream I had nurtured for years.

This is how it was over here. Women were not allowed to hold onto their dreams for too long because to them… the ultimate prize for us was marriage and bearing children… we should not dare to dream of anything other than being good wives and mothers, building our home.

But I had dreamt… always had ever since I was a child no matter how foolish it was. I had always wanted something more… to go to school, to become an artist, to travel the world and not stay cooped up forever, tied to one man.

But of course those dreams were not meant to be relevant because once again, the men had the right to dictate how a woman’s life should go.

Tears spilled down my face… hot and wet.

No… I can’t… I can’t just give in that easily… not after all my sacrifices, all I had done to come this far… working double shifts just to be able to afford the things I want because my father had refused to sponsor anything about my dreams.

I can’t just let it go… I can’t just succumb to their will without putting up a fight.

My hands were shaking as I dug out my phone from my purse and dialed the first and only person that always came to my mind at a time like this.

My boyfriend… my best friend in many ways, one of the very few people who had ever believed in me and my dreams.

Elias picked up on the first ring. “Isla?”

I sobbed, “Eli…”

“Babe, what’s wrong? You sound—”

“I need you to listen to me.” My voice came out steadier than I felt. “Something happened. Something really bad.”

I told him everything. The decree. The forced marriage. The virgin clause they’d written into the contract like I was livestock being inspected. My words tumbled over each other, desperate and raw.

When I finished, the silence on his end stretched so long I thought the call had dropped.

“Elias? Are you still there?”

“I’m here.” His voice sounded hollow. “Isla, this… Goddess, this can’t be legal. There has to be a way out. We’ll find a lawyer, or…”

“You know very well that lawyers cannot help in this case, you know that.” I took a deep breath, gripping the phone so hard my knuckles went white. “But there is a way out. The law is ancient, but it’s absolute. If I’m not pure when they examine me before the ceremony, the contract becomes void. They can’t force me to marry him.”

His breath caught. “What are you saying?”

Elias only knew so much about the werewolf world because he was a human himself so sometimes he might not understand.

“I’m saying I need you.” My voice cracked. “Tonight. I need you to sleep with me. It’s the only way to break this contract, Elias. The only way I stay free.”

He said nothing for some seconds… and the silence was so thick it felt like drowning.

“Isla…” He exhaled slowly. “You know I love you. You know that, right?”

“I know and I love you too… but help me. Please. I’m begging you…”

“But this… taking your virginity just to ruin you for another man? Just to destroy some contract?” His words came faster now, defensive. “That’s not how I imagined our first time. That’s not sacred. That’s not honoring the Goddess or the bond we’re supposed to…”

“Honoring the Goddess?” I couldn’t breathe. “I’m being sold like cattle and you’re worried about honoring vows?”

“My vows matter to me!” His voice rose. “I made a promise to wait until it was right. Until it was blessed. Taking you now, like this, in desperation—it would taint everything we are. It would be wrong, Isla. Dirty.”

Wrong. Dirty.

The words sat in my chest like shards of glass.

“I see.” My voice came out flat. Dead. “Your vows matter more than my freedom.”

“That’s not fair—”

“You’re right. I’m being completely unfair expecting the man who claims to love me to actually help me when I’m drowning.” Tears burned behind my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. Not for him. “We’ll find another way. I’ll figure it out.”

“Isla, please, just listen…”

“I have to go.”

I ended the call before he could say my name again. Before I could hear him choose his precious vows over me one more time.

The room felt too small. The walls pressed in. I curled onto my bed, knees to chest, and finally let the tears come—silent, useless tears that solved nothing.

I must have cried myself to sleep, because the next thing I knew, my phone was buzzing against my hip.

Unknown number.

I almost ignored it. Almost.

I swiped.

A video file downloaded. My thumb hovered over it for a heartbeat before I pressed play.

The screen lit up with dim red light. A bedroom I didn’t recognize. Crimson silk sheets. A man kneeling in the center of the bed, completely naked, hands bound behind his back with black rope, a silk blindfold covering his eyes.

Elias.

My Elias.

His head tilted back as a woman in a leather corset and thigh-high boots trailed her tongue down his chest. Her hand moved between his legs, slow and deliberate, while her other hand held a riding crop.

“Please,” Elias gasped, his voice raw with need. “My God, please, harder—”