Chapter 1

KELLY

The smell of frosting and balloons filled the kitchen, all pinks and sparkles for Nevaeh’s fourth birthday.

She twirled in her socks, hair full of glitter and questions.

“Mommy, is Daddy coming soon?”

I kept my smile steady, though my hands were trembling over the knife I used to trim the cake.

“Of course he is,” I lied lightly. “He wouldn’t miss your big day.”

She grinned, trusting, and ran off to check on her new dress again. I wished I had her certainty.

Ezekiel had been… elsewhere lately.

Not gone, just gone from me. Calls unanswered. Eyes glazed when I spoke.

Even his scent felt distant, like smoke thinning in cold air.

I told myself not to ruin today. Not her day.

But when the clock struck an hour past his promised arrival and the pack members that were invited for the party began whispering among themselves, something in me cracked.

I told the beta to stall the guests and made my way to the Alpha’s office, which was a few buildings away from the pack house.

The door was half-closed, light spilling through the crack.

I heard a laugh, high, breathy. A woman’s. Not mine.

The air left my lungs as I pushed the door wider.

Ezekiel sat back on the couch, shirt half-buttoned, his fingers tangled in Eve’s hair. My sister.

Her lipstick smeared across his jaw.

For a heartbeat, the world slowed. I heard the faint pop of a balloon from outside, Nevaeh’s laughter in the distance, absurdly bright against the wreckage inside me.

“Ezekiel.” My voice came out hoarse. “Tell me this isn’t what it looks like.”

He didn’t even flinch. Just met my eyes, calm as if we were discussing pack strategy.

“You shouldn’t walk into places uninvited, Luna.”

Eve turned, cheeks flushed, dress slipping off one shoulder. “Kelly, I..”

“Save it,” I cut in. “You never could stand seeing me with something you wanted.”

Her lips twisted. “You mean someone I was promised.”

That hit like ice water.

The old arrangement. The marriage she’d refused because Ezekiel wasn’t heir then.

She’d sent me instead, the convenient substitute.

And now she’d taken him back.

“You were always too soft for him,” she whispered. “He needs a wolf with bite.”

I laughed, but it sounded broken. “And you think that’s you?”

Ezekiel rose, buttoning his shirt with infuriating calm.

“Enough, Kelly. Don’t embarrass yourself. You’ve given me a daughter, and that’s… fine. But the pack needs an heir.”

The word heir landed like a slap.

Then Eve touched her stomach. I noticed it, the protective gesture, the gleam in her eyes. My knees almost buckled.

“No,” I breathed.

“Yes,” Ezekiel said, lips curling. “A son. My successor.”

Outside, the wind carried Nevaeh’s voice, calling for her father to come see her cake.

He didn’t move.

I did. Straight out the door, heart hammering, vision swimming.

Because if I stayed one more second, I wasn’t sure who I’d destroy first, him, her, or the version of me that still loved either of them.

The party lights blur as I walk out of his office. She could hear the music, the laughter, the thump of children’s feet.

When Nevaeh spotted me, I forced a smile so tight it hurt. The wolf in my chest howled beneath the surface, but the mother instincts answered first.

“Go on, baby,” I whispered. “Blow out your candles.”

I watched my daughter’s face glow in the candlelight, trying to memorize the joy I might not be able to protect much longer.

My wolf stirred restlessly beneath my skin, growling low. Mate or not, it whispered, we bleed him for this.

My wolf is considered weak, suppressed by a curse I never asked for.

When we were children, Eve had fallen deathly ill. Our parents sought a witch in secret. The price for her healing was my wolf’s strength. Her life for my power.

They called it mercy. I called it theft.

All my life, the pack whispered that I was Luna with a sleeping beast.

Tonight, that beast began to wake.

A gust of wind rushed through the open window, snuffing out the birthday candles.

The lights flickered. The wolves outside went still, ears twitching toward the forest.

Something shifted in the air, ancient, electric, wrong.

I looked down at Nevaeh. Her pupils had gone silver.

“Mommy,” she whispered. “Do you hear it?”

“Hear what, baby?”

“The voice,” she said, head tilting, a strange calm washing over her face. “It’s calling your name.”

The guests’ chatter faded into silence.

I followed her gaze toward the dark tree line beyond the pack grounds.

There, just for a heartbeat, a pair of golden eyes watched us through the fog, eyes that weren’t Ezekiel’s, or any wolf I knew.

And then they vanished.

The hairs on my arms rose. My wolf pressed against my skin, snarling, ‘That’s no stranger.’

I didn’t know what she meant. Not yet.

But I felt it, the curse unraveling.

Whatever was coming for me had just arrived.

After the party, the guests drifted out with uneasy smiles. They could smell tension the way wolves smell blood.

Our kind always could.

The Beta lingered by the gate, his eyes flicking toward me, then the dark windows of the Alpha’s office.

“Everything all right, Luna?”

I nodded too quickly. “Perfectly.”

But as soon as the last guest left, I slid down against the wall and let the truth crash over me.

My wolf pounded against my ribs, snarling. My palms split open with faint blue light, signs of the curse breaking, or maybe consuming me.

I didn’t know which.

I composed myself a few minutes later, the whole encounter fading like a mirage, but one thing was for sure, I still had the curse.

Knowing Nevaeh's nanny had put her to bed minutes ago, made my mind at ease.

I approached her room, but Ezekiel's presence in the hallway caught my attention.

My emotions boiled over, and the words tumbled out.

“So, you'd rather miss your daughter's birthday because of your affair? Nevaeh waited up for you.'"

Ezekiel's eyes blazed. “Nevaeh's nothing but a footnote in my book compared to my true successor.”

“At least Nevaeh gets love and respect, unlike some people,” I shot back.

“She's your daughter, and Luna's, for crying out loud! She deserves so much better than being brushed off like yesterday's trash.”

Ezekiel's face twisted in disgust. “You mean the kid of a fragile, pathetic wolf? You're nothing special, just a consolation prize I regret making my Luna.'"