Chapter 3

I found a hotel twenty minutes from pack territory.

The room was nothing special, but it beat the storage room my parents expected me to sleep in.

I left my suitcase beside the bed, printed my release application in the lobby, and brought it upstairs.

Rowan called as I was filling out the last page.

I watched his name flash across the screen.

Then I answered.

“Alice, you left the chat.”

His voice sounded tired.

“Yes.”

“Can you stop? It’s been a long day.”

I’d spent that day watching him stand beside my sister at the altar, but somehow I was the one asking too much.

I’d thought he might be calling to explain. Tell me why he’d let me walk into that ceremony without warning, then ask me to understand, the way he always did.

But I was done trying to understand.

Rowan loved me, but whenever it came to Bianca, he made me feel guilty until I gave in.

“Where are you?”

“A hotel.”

He exhaled.

“You didn’t need to leave. I talked to Bianca. She’s willing to wait until the weekend for the studio.”

As though she were doing me a favor.

It was my bedroom. Had everyone forgotten?

Rowan continued.

“She got hurt saving you. And it wasn’t a real bonding ceremony. Once she’s better, we’ll have our own. Everything will go back to normal.”

He sounded so patient, as though I were being unreasonable and he was trying to help me see sense.

I had nothing left to say.

I closed my eyes.

“I’m tired, Rowan. I can’t keep doing this.”

He spoke as though I hadn’t meant it.

“Look, there’s an easy way to fix this.”

I waited.

“Come home for dinner tomorrow,” Rowan said. “We’ll all sit down together.”

My grip tightened around the phone.

“I’m not coming.”

“Baby, don’t be like that. Bianca’s been asking about you. Come reassure her. You don’t have to stay angry with everyone.”

His voice softened.

“I’ll have them make shrimp cocktail. Your favorite.”

I went still.

Bianca was the one who loved shrimp.

I hated it.

He’d sounded so certain he remembered what I liked.

For a moment, I listened to him breathe.

I could have reminded him. Asked how he’d forgotten something he used to check with every waiter before I ordered.

But I didn’t have the energy to explain one more thing.

“Good night, Rowan.”

“Wait. Are you coming—”

I ended the call, picked up my pen, and signed the release application.

A message from Rowan appeared.

Baby, get some sleep. You’ve had a rough day. We’ll talk tomorrow.

There would be no talk. No dinner.

Tomorrow, I would leave.

The next morning, I took the paperwork to the pack administration building.

Bianca was waiting outside.

The notebook was in her hand.

“There you are.”

I stopped at the foot of the steps.

She came toward me so fast I barely had time to register the two council elders behind her.

Her palm cracked across my face.

My eyes watered.

Before I could recover, she threw the notebook at my chest.

“How dare you go after my mate?”

People turned.

The notebook fell open on the pavement.

“My own sister.” Her voice shook. “You stood there helping me plan our ceremony while you were fantasizing about taking him from me?”

“Bianca—”

“Don’t.”

She backed away as though I’d threatened her.

“I trusted you. Rowan trusted you.”

Members leaving the building slowed. A warrior stepped out from beneath the portico.

Bianca wiped at her eyes.

“I thought you were happy for us.”

“What happened?” someone asked.

“She’s been writing about herself and the Alpha,” Bianca said. “Dates. Gifts. A proposal.”

A woman’s gaze dropped to the notebook.

“Oh, that’s sick.”

My cheek throbbed.

One of the elders stepped forward, must be from the council

“Your sister filed a complaint this morning,” he said. “She alleges you’ve been pursuing Alpha Rowan and interfering with their relationship.”

“I haven’t.”

“Then explain the journal.”

I picked it up.

“If you’d actually read it, you’d know Rowan wrote this for me. I didn’t write it.”

Bianca let out a disbelieving laugh.

“There. That’s exactly what I told you she’d say.”

She turned toward the elders.

“She wrote it as if Alpha Rowan were talking to her. That’s the whole point.”

I stared at her.

“She made up all these things she wishes he’d done.” Bianca’s lip curled. “And now she’s trying to pass them off as real.”

A man behind her scoffed.

“Leave the Alpha alone.”

Someone else said, “Your sister just had her ceremony. Have some shame.”

My fingers tightened around the notebook.

A hush settled over the steps.

The elder spoke.

“Under pack law, harassment of a declared mate and interference with an announced union are grounds for formal censure.”

My stomach dropped.

“What mate? They haven’t—”

But he won’t let me finish and continued. “If the complaint stands, you’ll kneel before the Moon Goddess’s altar for three nights and make a public apology to the couple.”

Three nights.

In front of the pack.

For keeping the only thing they hadn’t managed to take from me.

“Unless,” he continued, “the complainant withdraws.”

Bianca looked at me.

She wasn’t crying anymore.

A faint smile touched her mouth, waiting for me to beg her.

The same smile she’d given me beneath the ceremonial mantle.

My wolf pushed against my skin. I was shaking.

I couldn’t take it anymore.

They wanted me to kneel and apologize for loving the man who had asked me to be his Luna.

I’d given up my home, my ceremony, and every photograph that proved we’d been together.

Now I was supposed to pretend none of it had ever happened.

I swallowed against the ache in my throat.

I couldn’t stand there and let them call me a liar for it.

“She’s not Rowan’s mate,” I said, my voice shaking. “I’m—”

Before I could finish, Bianca clutched her chest and fell backward.

Someone screamed her name.

Mom rushed through the crowd and caught her.

“Enough.” Dad shoved past a warrior and grabbed my wrist.

“Dad, listen—”

A warning growl rose in his chest.

I tried to pull free. Behind him, Bianca started crying again.

His grip tightened.

Everyone was staring.

He leaned toward me, his eyes hard with anger.

“Apologize to your sister. Now.”

Then I saw Rowan approaching.

He took one look at Bianca in Mom’s arms, then turned to me.

The disappointment on his face was unmistakable.