CHAPTER 3: Dinner from Hell

"To what do we owe this gathering, son?"

Alpha Thornwell's voice fills the dining room like a thunderclap. Deep and commanding. The kind of voice that expects silence to follow it.

Twenty chairs around the table. I've never felt smaller.

I sit near the far end, hands folded in my lap where no one can see them shaking. The chandelier throws warm gold light across polished mahogany and gleaming silverware. Everything looks expensive. Curated. Perfect.

I don't belong here. Three years of sitting at this table and I still feel like someone's about to realize the mistake and escort me out.

Damon sits near his father at the head. Not beside me. Never beside me at these gatherings.

Clarissa sweeps in three minutes late. The room shifts when she enters. She's wearing red, deep and rich, a dress that fits like it was made for her specifically. Blonde hair down in waves. She smells like expensive perfume and something warmer underneath.

She takes the seat beside Damon.

He pulls her chair out for her.

He didn't look up when I came in tonight.

Damon rises from his chair when the soup arrives. His hand moves to Clarissa's shoulder. Casual. Practiced.

"Clarissa is pregnant."

The room erupts. Chairs scraping, voices rising, congratulations crashing together like waves. Beta Rowan pumps Damon's hand. Gamma Clark raises his glass before anyone calls a toast. Pack members lean toward Clarissa, who receives the attention with a glowing, tearful smile.

I watch it all from the other side of glass.

"Finally." Alpha Thornwell's fist hits the table hard enough to rattle the silverware. Pure satisfaction on his face. "An heir. Well done, boy."

Damon accepts the praise with a nod. He doesn't correct anyone. Doesn't clarify the situation. Just lets the assumption settle over the room like a comfortable blanket.

They all think they know what this is.

And they're right. They do know. I was the only one who didn't understand what was happening under my own roof.

My hand finds my purse. The test is still there. Hard plastic edges against my fingers through the fabric of the purse which I paired with the shapeless beige dress he chose for me this morning. Appropriate for a Luna, he said.

It makes me invisible. Which I suspect was the point.

Glasses rise around the table. I lift mine because not lifting it would be noticed. The water is cold and tasteless.

Alpha Thornwell's gaze sweeps the length of the table and lands on me like a hammer finding a nail.

"And what about you, girl?"

The celebration stutters. Forks stop halfway to mouths. Twenty pairs of eyes swing toward me with the slow, inevitable weight of a tide turning.

"Three years mated." His voice carries the mild curiosity of someone who has never been embarrassed in their life. "Where's my grandchild from the Luna?"

The silence that follows is the loudest thing I've ever heard.

My mouth opens. Closes. The words I practiced this morning have completely disappeared.

Damon's jaw tightens. The muscle jumps in his cheek. His eyes stay on his plate.

Not on me. Never on me.

"Oh, don't pressure her, Alpha." Clarissa's voice cuts in, smooth and warm as honey poured over something sharp. Her expression tilts toward me, soft with false sympathy. "Some wolves just aren't built for motherhood."

The words land gentle as a feather and cut like a blade.

Nervous laughter ripples around the table.

My fingers press hard against the test in my purse. I could end this right now. Pull it out. Show them the two pink lines and watch her soft smile fracture.

But my fingers won't move.

Because even if I showed them, nothing would change. This table made their choice the moment they started celebrating without looking at me.

"An omega Luna." Alpha Thornwell shakes his head like he's identifying a structural flaw. "I told you it wouldn't work, Damon."

"Father." Damon's voice is flat. No heat. No defense.

Just the single word, spoken to make him stop. Not because he disagrees.

"Weak bloodlines produce weak pups." The Alpha reaches for his wine glass. Calm. The verdict of a man who has never been wrong. "If she can produce at all."

I stare at the pattern on my plate. Blue flowers around the white rim. Small and easy to overlook.

My eyes are burning. I press it down, hard. I will not cry at this table.

I look at Damon. Find his face through sheer force of will, begging him silently to say something. To look at me. To acknowledge that I'm sitting ten feet away while his father laughs at my expense.

He picks up his wine glass and takes a slow sip.

He has never defended me. Not once in three years.

Conversation flows back into pack business and territory and things that have nothing to do with me. I push food around my plate and count the flowers on the china.

"Excuse me." I set my napkin down and push back my chair.

Damon's hand shoots out.

His fingers wrap around my wrist. The bruised one. The pressure lands exactly on the place that already aches.

Pain sparks up my arm, sharp and immediate.

"Sit down." His voice is low, controlled, not loud enough for anyone else to hear. "Don't be rude."

Our eyes meet. His are flat and completely certain.

I sit.

His grip stays tight. Four seconds. Five. He holds on until the tension leaves my body. Until I stop pulling. Until I submit.

Then he releases me and turns back to Beta Rowan like nothing happened.

I fold my hands in my lap and press my wrist against my thigh to muffle the throbbing.

Across the table, Clarissa glows. She laughs at the right moments, listens at the right moments, touches Damon's arm to emphasize a point. People orbit her naturally, pulled in by something warm that I have never possessed.

She catches me watching. Her smile doesn't waver. But her eyes sharpen into something that has nothing to do with warmth.

The chocolate dessert in my mouth tastes like sawdust.

Under the table, hidden from everyone, I press my palm flat against my stomach.

Against the life growing there that no one at this table knows about. The baby Damon told me this morning to get rid of.

Tomorrow, he said. Handle it before it becomes a problem.

I look at Clarissa glowing in her red dress. At Damon laughing with his father. At the pack that has never once seen me.

My jaw tightens.

I am not getting rid of this baby.

And I am not sitting at this table for one more dinner.