Rejected by the Alpha, Claimed by the Crown

"No wolf. No bloodline."

"You can't even hold a full shift."

"And you think you're worthy of the Luna title?"

"The Moon Goddess played a sick joke on me."

Casbian climbed off me and wiped his hands on the sheets. "You actually believe you deserve the word 'mate'?"

My hands were shaking. Shaking so hard I couldn't grip the sheets.

Three years.

Three years.

I pricked my fingers on sewing needles to feed him my blood. A remedy. A sedative. Anything to calm the rage.

I told myself—be good enough, be useful enough—and eventually he'd claim me in front of the pack.

I believed I was his future Luna.

Turns out I was just a tool he was too ashamed to name.

"In three days—"

"Lydia will officially take her place as the pack's Luna."

"Ashford blood. Pure line. A true wolf form."

"The entire pack already believes she's my mate."

The Alpha rose and adjusted his cuffs.

A stranger was about to take the crown that was mine.

Casbian paused at the door and glanced back.

"You will attend the ceremony."

His gaze dragged over my bruised and marked body.

No guilt in his eyes. No disgust.

Nothing.

"You'll stand in the back row of the gallery. Kneeling. With the servants."

"You will bow to the new Luna."

"If you make a scene—if Lydia, or anyone else, discovers what you really are—"

He didn't finish. He bent low and patted my sweat-slicked face.

"I'll tear your tongue out with my own hands, you worthless little thing."

The door clicked shut.

The room swallowed into black.

I curled up on the crumpled sheets. Every inch of me felt crushed.

The tears wouldn't come. Not because it didn't hurt. It hurt too much.

Too much for tears to mean anything.

I was his fated mate.

I should have been this pack's Luna.

I don't know how long I lay there.

My thighs still sticky. The air thick with two Alphas' pheromones—sweat and dominance—so heavy it turned my stomach.

My phone buzzed.

A message from a neighbor in the Grey Zone. Five words.

"Your sister Maya is dying."

Barefoot, I scrambled off the bed and ran, bolting through the mess on the floor.

The shack smelled of blood. Thick, spoiled blood.

Maya was curled on her worn mat, dark liquid seeping from the corners of her mouth, her nostrils.

Her body convulsed in violent, wrenching spasms.

"Maya!"

I dropped to my knees beside her, hands frantic, trying to wipe the blood away, but it wouldn't stop. It just kept coming.

The pack doctor was already packing his kit, ready to leave.

"The wolf bite's gone to the bone."

He barely glanced her way.

"Unless you can get Alpha's blood as an antidote, she's finished."

Alpha's blood.

Casbian.

His blood could save her.

But he wouldn't even admit I existed.

I shut my eyes and reached for the thread. The mate bond. The thin, fraying line that still tied me to him.

Three years of pulling one way, and it had worn down to almost nothing.

But it was still there.

No matter how much he loathed me, the mate bond was the Moon Goddess's mark.

It couldn't be severed while we both drew breath.

"Casbian. Please. Just one drop."

"Maya's dying."