Chapter 3

Three days before my ceremony, Mom finally agreed to meet Adrian.

I thought maybe she had finally realized she knew almost nothing about the man I was about to bond with.

Maybe, for once, she wanted to know who would be standing beside me for the rest of my life.

I booked a private room at one of Moonstone’s best restaurants and told Adrian my family had agreed to come.

He arrived ten minutes early in a dark suit, carrying a bottle of wine for Dad and a carefully wrapped box of herbal tea for Mom.

At two, the server reheated the food.

At three, Adrian quietly paid for another hour in the private room without telling me.

By four, the restaurant had turned on its evening lights.

Only then did Mom finally reply.

[Mom: Something urgent came up. We can’t make it. Another time.]

At the same moment, Selena posted a picture in the family group chat.

She stood in a private bridal atelier wearing her white rehearsal dress while Mom fastened a pearl-gray ceremonial cloak around her shoulders. The Moonstone wolf crest glittered in crystals across the back.

[Selena: Mom stayed after my final fitting to help me choose my ceremony cloak. Doesn’t the Moonstone crest look gorgeous?]

[Noah: Our princess looks perfect.]

[Dad: Beautiful.]

So the emergency was helping Selena choose between two ceremonial cloaks.

I stared at the photograph until the crystal wolf crest blurred.

“I’m sorry I made you wait.”

Adrian reached across the table and turned my phone facedown.

“You didn’t.”

“Look at me, Eve.”

I raised my eyes.

“Our ceremony is in three days. Northlake’s council, my guards, and every senior family in the pack have already confirmed.”

My throat tightened. “That isn’t the same as having my own family there.”

“No,” he said. “It isn’t.”

He didn’t insult me by pretending it was.

“But their absence will not make you less honored. You will not walk into that hall alone, and no one will look at you with pity.”

His voice carried the quiet authority of an Alpha who had already decided that no one would be allowed to diminish his mate.

He reached into the inner pocket of his jacket and placed a narrow black velvet box on the table.

My breath caught.

“What is that, Adrian?”

A trace of amusement softened his expression.

“You’ll see it at the ceremony.”

I looked at the box again.

It was too long for a ring and too narrow for a necklace.

My eyes burned before I could stop them.

“Did you—”

“Yes,” he said quietly.

My family had taken the moonstones meant for my bonding bracelets.

Adrian had noticed the empty place they left behind.

“I told you I didn’t need new ones.”

His fingers closed around mine.

“You never said you wanted to stand beside me with bare wrists.”

For several seconds, I couldn’t speak.

He slid the box back into his jacket.

“Three more days,” he said. “Then you never have to ask anyone to choose you again.”

I lowered my eyes so he wouldn’t see how close I was to crying.

“Once the ceremony is over, we leave for Vancouver the next morning,” he continued. “The house is ready. My mother has changed the guest room twice because she can’t decide whether you prefer soft pillows or firm ones.”

Despite everything, a small laugh escaped me.

Adrian’s expression gentled.

“If you never want to come back to Moonstone, we won’t.”

“I’ll drive you home.”

“Okay.”

When I returned home that evening, the living room was buried beneath everything my family had bought to fill Selena’s new home.

Dad knelt beside three open suitcases, trying to force them shut. Mom packed bedding, dishes, robes, candles, and toiletries into matching sets.

Mom frowned the moment she saw me.

“Where have you been? Selena moves out in four days, and you keep running around instead of helping us pack.”

I stayed by the door.

“Adrian and I waited for you for four and a half hours.”

Her face tightened.

“I told you something urgent came up. I’ve barely had time to breathe while arranging both ceremonies. What more do you expect from me?”

“Was helping Selena choose a second ceremony cloak really important enough to skip meeting my mate?”

Noah shot to his feet.

“Mom spent all afternoon shopping for both of you. Your things are already in your room. Why are you obsessed with one stupid lunch?”

His eyes narrowed.

“Adrian isn’t going to disappear. He can meet us after the ceremony.”

A cold pulse of anger moved through me.

Adrian was the Alpha of Northlake, yet Noah spoke about him as though he were some unimportant man who should wait until the Grey family found time for him.

If Adrian had been standing beside me, Noah would never have dared use that tone.

Selena curled against her as if my question had frightened her.

Dad watched in stern silence.

It was the same performance they had staged my entire life.

Whenever I pointed out their favoritism, Mom became the victim, Selena became fragile, and I became the monster ruining everyone’s peace.

The old me would have apologized. I didn’t anymore.

Three more nights.

Then I would wear Northlake’s bracelet.

Then I would leave this house.

Then these people would no longer decide what I deserved.

I went to my room.

A paper shopping bag sat beside the bed.

Inside was a discounted towel set and a cheap electric kettle. The clearance stickers were still attached.

That was everything my family had prepared for the life I was about to begin.