Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Amara’s POV

The silence of the guest room was the heaviest thing I had ever carried.

I sat on the edge of the mattress, my knees pulled tightly to my chest, staring blankly at the beige carpet. The door was locked. It had been locked since yesterday, ever since I walked out of my own bedroom and left my husband and my sister tangled in my sheets.

Knock. Knock.

"Amara? Please open the door." It was Naya, one of the older pack maids who had always looked out for me. Her voice was muffled, thick with worry. "You haven't eaten in twenty-four hours. Just a little soup, please?"

I didn't move. My inner wolf was coiled tightly at the back of my mind, her spirit bruised and weeping, completely exhausted from the endless suffocating grief.

"Amara, listen to me," Naya whispered, her forehead pressing against the wood on the other side. "Don't let them do this to you. Don't let them look at you and see a broken woman. You are the Luna of this pack. If you lock yourself away, they win."

They win.

The words sparked a tiny, jagged flame deep in my chest. She was right. Right now, down the hall, Chloe was probably smiling. Michael was probably going about his day, handling pack business as if he hadn't shattered my entire existence into pieces.

I slowly stood up. My legs felt like lead, but I unlocked the door. Naya stood there holding a tray, her eyes widening slightly at the hollow look on my face. I didn't take the food. I walked past her, my bare feet making no sound on the hardwood as I stepped back into the hallway.

I didn't go to Michael. I walked down to the end of the hall, toward the room we had spent the last six months decorating.

The nursery.

When I pushed the door open, the scent of fresh paint and lavender hit me, and my throat tightened so badly I couldn't swallow. I walked inside, my hand trembling as I reached out to touch the smooth white bars of the empty crib. On the mattress lay a soft, hand-knitted blue blanket.

I picked it up, pressing it against my face. It smelled like nothing. It didn't smell like a baby. It just smelled like laundry detergent and broken promises.

A choked sob escaped my lips. I pulled a tiny pair of knit shoes from the dresser, clutching them to my chest as I collapsed onto the floor beside the crib. I cried until my chest burned, burying my face in the clothes my son would never wear, surrounded by toys he would never touch. The grief wasn't a dull ache anymore; it was a physical tearing of my flesh, a violent storm that left me empty.

But when the tears finally ran dry, the emptiness didn't feel soft. It felt cold. Hard.

I looked up at the walls, at the beautiful life I thought I was building for six years. It was all a lie. Michael’s love, Chloe’s gratitude, the loyalty of this pack—all a complete, fabricated lie.

I stood up, wiping my face with the back of my hand. The sadness was gone, replaced by a raw, desperate need to purge every single trace of the man who had destroyed me.

I walked out of the nursery and down the grand staircase into the main living room. The afternoon sun filtered through the massive windows, illuminating the pristine, luxurious space.

I started with the mantelpiece.

Michael’s framed community leadership awards. I grabbed the heavy silver frames and hurled them directly into the roaring stone fireplace. The glass shattered instantly, sparks flying into the air as the paper began to curl and blacken in the flames.

"Luna?" One of the young kitchen maids, Maya, gasped from the doorway, her hands flying to her mouth.

I didn't answer her. I didn't care who was watching. This wasn't malice; it was a desperate, suffocating survival instinct. I needed to breathe, and I couldn't breathe with his ghost surrounding me.

I walked over to the grand piano and snatched our five-foot-tall wedding portrait. It was a beautiful photo—Michael smiling down at me, his hand resting possessively on my waist. I dragged it over to the hearth and slammed it against the stone. The heavy wooden frame cracked. I ripped the canvas right down the middle, throwing the pieces into the growing fire.

Expensive crystal vases he had bought me for our anniversaries, decorative silver trinkets, framed pack milestones—I threw them all. The fireplace was a roaring, angry beast now, devouring the physical remnants of my six-year prison sentence.

"Amara! What are you doing?!"

I spun around. Chloe was standing at the edge of the room. She was wearing one of my old silk robes, her blonde hair perfectly styled. She looked horrified, but as she glanced toward the hallway where several servants were now gathering, I saw the subtle shift in her eyes. The calculative gleam.

"I'm done pretending, Chloe," I said, my voice eerily calm, though my chest was heaving. "I'm done acting like this house is a home."

"You've completely lost your mind," Chloe whispered loudly, stepping backward toward the heavy velvet drapes near the fireplace. "The baby... oh goddess, the grief has made her completely unstable! Someone call Michael!"

I turned my back on her to grab another frame from a side table.

Behind me, I heard a strange rustle. A soft, distinct click of a lighter.

Before I could even process the sound, a sharp, terrifying hiss cut through the room. I whipped my head around. The heavy velvet curtains were suddenly engulfed in bright, orange flames. Chloe was stumbling backward, her face twisted into a mask of pure terror, but her eyes were locked onto mine.

She had done it. She had thrown a lighter right into the fabric while my back was turned.

"Fire! She's trying to burn the mansion down!" Chloe screamed at the top of her lungs, her voice echoing down the corridors. "Amara, stop! Please, don't kill us all!"

"You lying bitch—" I started, but my voice was drowned out by the absolute chaos that erupted.

"Fire! Get the fire extinguishers!"

Thick, black smoke instantly began to fill the room, coughing and choking the air. Servants rushed in, screaming, throwing water, dragging furniture away from the hearth. The heat blasted against my face, blinding me as the smoke stung my eyes.

Through the haze of black smoke, the heavy front doors slammed open.

Michael stormed into the room, flanked by four pack guards. His alpha aura flared, a heavy, suffocating weight that made the weaker wolves in the room instantly drop to their knees. His eyes burned with a furious, dark amber color as he took in the roaring flames and the shattered glass on the floor.

"What the hell is going on here?!" he roared, his voice shaking the very foundations of the room.

Chloe instantly threw herself into his arms, sobbing violently against his chest. "Michael! Thank goddess you're here! She just snapped... she started throwing everything into the fire, and then she set the curtains on fire! I tried to stop her, Michael, I swear I did! She's out of control!"

Michael’s furious gaze locked onto me through the smoke. "Amara. Look at what you've done."

"I didn't touch the curtains, Michael," I said, my voice hoarse from the smoke, though I refused to back down. "Your pathetic little mistress set them on fire herself."

Chloe peeked out from his chest, her face tear-stained, but as Michael looked away to order the guards to help put out the flames, she caught my gaze. The tears vanished from her eyes. She leaned slightly closer, her voice a tiny, sharp whisper meant only for my ears.

"Maybe it's a good thing your broken body couldn't keep that baby alive," she murmured, a twisted, smug smirk stretching across her lips. "With a mother this crazy, the pup never stood a chance."

The world went completely white.

My inner wolf didn't just howl; she roared. Every ounce of grief, every ounce of pain, every single day of the last six years melted into a searing, blinding rage.

SMACK.

The sound of my palm connecting with Chloe's cheek echoed like a gunshot through the chaotic room. The force of the blow sent her crashing into the side table, her lip instantly splitting open.

"Amara! Enough!" Michael roared, stepping forward and clamping his massive, heavy hand around my wrist. His grip was like iron, bruising my skin as he yanked me away from her. "You will not touch her!"

The pain in my wrist was nothing compared to the fire in my blood. I didn't think. I didn't hesitate.

I brought my knee up, driving it directly and brutally into Michael’s groin with every single ounce of strength I had left.

Michael gasped, his eyes going wide as the air was instantly forced from his lungs. His iron grip shattered, freeing my wrist as he doubled over in pain, sinking to his knees on the carpet, his face turning a dark, dangerous shade of purple.

The entire room fell into a dead, terrifying silence.

The servants stopped moving. The guards froze. Nobody moved a muscle. In the history of the Blood Moon pack, no one—let alone a female wolf—had ever laid a hand on the Alpha and lived to tell the tale.

Michael stayed on his knees for several agonizing seconds, his breathing ragged and shallow. When he finally forced himself to stand up, his eyes were completely black with alpha rage. The sheer pressure of his command made my knees tremble, but I forced my chin up. I refused to bow.

"Everyone out," Michael hissed, his voice vibrating with a lethal, quiet fury. "Now."

"Alpha, should we secure the Luna?" one of the guards asked hesitantly, his hand resting on his silver cuffs.

"I said OUT!" Michael roared, his voice cracking like thunder.

The room cleared in less than five seconds. Even Chloe scrambled to her feet, wiping the blood from her lip as she scurried out the door, throwing one last fearful, hateful look over her shoulder.

When the heavy doors clicked shut, leaving just the two of us in the smoke-damaged room, Michael stepped closer to me. He didn't touch me. He didn't need to. His presence alone was suffocating.

"You are unstable," he whispered, his jaw clenching so hard a vein throbbed in his temple. "Publicly, I will not have my Luna dragged out of this mansion in chains. I will not let you ruin my reputation or this pack's standing. But privately? My patience with you is completely finished."

I stared at him, my heart a cold stone. "Good. Give me a divorce."

"No," he snapped. "A divorce is messy. A divorce brings questions I don't want to answer right now. You are leaving, Amara. Tomorrow morning, a car will take you to the airport. You are going to my family’s private villa in Ravello, Italy."

A cold dread pooled in my stomach. "I'm not going anywhere you send me."

Michael leaned in, his dark eyes narrowing into cruel slits. "You will get on that plane, you will keep a low profile, and you will stay in that villa until I decide what to do with you. If you disobey me, if you try to run, or if you cause a single scene... you will never see your son's ashes again. I will scatter them into the pack river myself."

My breath hitched. The cruelty of his words felt like a physical blade twisting in my gut. He was using our dead baby as a hostage.

"You're a monster," I whispered.

"I'm an Alpha," he corrected coldly, turning his back on me. "Be ready by 5:00 AM."

I locked myself in the library for the rest of the evening, staring out the window into the darkness. I wouldn't go. I couldn't let him exile me like a criminal while the real criminals ran free in my home.

The heavy doors opened quietly, and a soft, elegant woman stepped inside. Martha . She was a senior pack elder and the closest thing I had ever had to a mother figure in this place , she keeps the house running and the staff.

"Amara," she said softly, walking over and placing a gentle hand on my shoulder. "I heard what happened."

"He's sending me away, Martha," I choked out, a single tear escaping my eye. "To Italy. He's using my baby's ashes to force me."

Martha didn't look angry. Instead, a sharp, knowing gleam appeared in her wise eyes. She knelt down in front of my chair, taking my cold hands in hers.

"Listen to me very carefully, child," Diana said, her voice dropping to a low, intense whisper. "Going to Italy is not a defeat. It is an opportunity."

I frowned. "How?"

"Look at yourself. You are exhausted, broken, and surrounded by enemies who know your every move," she explained, her grip tightening reassuringly. "If you stay here and fight right now, they will destroy you. They expect you to break. But if you take this exile? Treat it like a temporary retreat. Go to Italy to heal your body. Think clearly. Gather your strength, and plan your revenge while Michael and Chloe are completely convinced they have won. Let them get comfortable. Let them think you are defeated. That is when you become dangerous."

Her words felt like a cold splash of water to my face. The logic was undeniable. I couldn't fight an Alpha and a manipulator when I could barely stand on my own two feet. I needed time. I needed space.

"Okay," I whispered, my jaw hardening. "I'll go."

Before the sun could even rise, I slipped out of the mansion and walked down the cold stone steps into the pack crypt. The air was freezing, smelling of old earth and stone. I needed to see him one last time. I needed to promise my baby boy that I would come back for him.

I reached the small alcove where his temporary urn was supposed to be resting until the permanent memorial was built.

The stone shelf was completely empty.

My heart stopped. "No... no, no, no."

"Luna Amara?" The elderly caretaker shuffled out from the shadows, holding a brass lantern.

"Where is it?" I gasped, my hands frantically sweeping across the empty stone. "Where is my son's urn?"

The old man looked down at his boots, shifting uncomfortably. "The Alpha came down here before dawn, Luna. He took the urn himself. He said it was being moved to a secure, private location for safekeeping."

Another lie. Michael had already moved him. The promise to let me see him if I complied was nothing but a sick leash to keep me under his control. He never intended to let me have him back.

A cold, dark finality settled over my soul.

I didn't cry. I didn't scream. I turned around and walked back up the steps into the fading night.

I went to my small dressing room and packed a single, small leather suitcase. I didn't touch the designer dresses Michael had bought me. I didn't touch the expensive diamond jewelry. I packed a few simple shirts, a pair of jeans, and my mother’s faded wool shawl.

Then, I walked into the kitchen. I opened the bottom drawer and pulled out my heavy canvas knife roll, checking the perfectly sharpened chef’s knives inside, alongside my worn, handwritten recipe notebook. Long before I was a Luna, I was a culinary student with dreams of my own. It was the only part of myself I had left.

I checked my wallet. Every single one of the black pack credit cards had been frozen. I checked the small zipper compartment in my purse where I kept cash from my old baking sales.

A single twenty, a fifty, and a ten.

Total cash: eighty dollars.

The airport terminal was loud and chaotic, a stark contrast to the suffocating silence of the pack lands. Diana stood beside me near the security line, her eyes heavy with sadness as she pulled me into a tight, warm hug.

"Keep your head held high, Amara," she whispered in my ear. "Your time will come."

"Thank you, Diana," I murmured, pulling away.

Michael hadn't come to see me off. He hadn't even looked at me when I got into the car. As the vehicle had pulled away from the estate, I had looked up at the mansion windows. Chloe had been standing there, sipping from a porcelain cup, watching my departure with absolute triumph.

I turned my back on the security gate and walked down the terminal tunnel, boarding the plane without looking back once.

The flight across the Atlantic was a blur of static noise and dark clouds. By the time the wheels slammed onto the tarmac, the captain’s voice crackled over the intercom, welcoming us to the International Airport of Naples, Italy.

I dragged my small suitcase through the bustling, noisy arrivals terminal, my eyes scanning the crowd of drivers holding up signs. It didn't take long to find it.

Near the front of the barricade stood a tall, stone-faced man in a pristine black suit. He held a sleek, professional electronic sign that read:

LUNA AMARA — BLOOD MOON PACK

He had been sent by Michael’s family. He was waiting to put me in a private luxury car, drive me up the winding cliffs to the isolated villa in Ravello, and lock me away in a beautiful, gilded cage where Michael could control my every breath from thousands of miles away.

I stopped walking, staring at the sign.

I looked down at my worn leather suitcase. I felt the weight of the eighty dollars in my pocket. I remembered the empty shelf in the crypt, my sister's victorious smile, and the bruises on my wrist.

If I got into that car, I was playing Michael's game. If I went to that villa, I was still his prisoner.

A slow, dangerous spark ignited in the dark corners of my soul.

I took a deep breath, tightening my grip on the handle of my suitcase. I didn't break my stride. I didn't even slow down. I walked right past the driver, my shoulder brushing past his expensive suit as I headed straight for the crowded airport exit.

"You don't control where I go anymore," I whispered into the cool Italian air.

I stepped through the sliding glass doors, completely alone, with eighty dollars in my pocket and nowhere to go.