Semua Bab THE CONTRACTED LUNA SECRET TRIPLETS : Bab 1 - Bab 7

Not the sharp sting of a cut. Deeper than that. The kind of burn that settled into bone and stayed there, quiet and cruel, reminding Ava Sterling with every breath that she was not leaving this stage on her own.The warehouse smelled like motor oil and sweat and alpha dominance — thick, competing scents that pressed against her from every direction. Industrial lights overhead blasted white heat down onto the platform. Thirty feet below, men in expensive suits sat in folding chairs like they were watching a livestock show.Because they were.Ava kept her chin up. She wouldn't give them the pleasure of watching it drop.Her father stood at the edge of the platform in his pack Alpha sash, the golden threads catching the light. He hadn't looked at her once since they chained her wrists. He was looking at the crowd, at their hands, at the numbered bidding paddles lifting one after another as the auctioneer called out figures that climbed like temperature on a fever chart."Sixty million."

Not the temperature — the heating worked fine, the kind of expensive, invisible warmth that costs more per month than most people earned. Cold in the way a room gets when no one has ever laughed in it. Black marble floors. Floor-to-ceiling windows running the full length of the east wall. The city spread out below, a grid of orange and white light sixty stories down, indifferent and distant.Ryder's bedroom looked like a war room that had been given a bed as an afterthought.The bed itself was enormous. King-sized, black-framed, pushed against the far wall with a precision that suggested it hadn't been moved an inch since the day it was delivered. A single lamp burned on the left side. The right side was bare.Ava stood in the doorway with her bag at her feet and forced herself to take a full breath."You'll sleep here," Ryder said from behind her.She turned.He'd already shrugged off his coat. He stood at the foot of the bed in a black shirt, fingers working the buttons from the col

Ava had noticed that about the rooms Ryder chose — he preferred walls, controlled space, exits he could account for. The dinner table was set for two. No staff lingered. Whatever this was, he'd cleared the floor.She sat across from him and picked up her fork and told herself this was simply the next item on the contract's list.*Public affection. Pack appearances.*This was practice."You're not eating," he said."I'm eating.""You're moving it around."She took a deliberate bite and chewed it without tasting a thing.He watched her the way he watched everything — like he was solving a problem that had more variables than he'd initially expected. It was aggravating. It was also, in the privacy of her own skull, something else she didn't have a name for yet.He reached across the table and poured water into her glass."The Whitmore Alliance is hosting a function Friday," he said. "They'll be watching us. If the bond doesn't read as genuine, we'll have three neutral packs question the

The rooftop garden didn't look like something Ryder Kane would own.That was the first thing she thought when he pushed open the door and the warm amber glow of string lights hit her face. Raised wooden planters ran along both sides. Lavender grew in dark clusters. A pergola framed the far edge, overlooking the city, and below it sat two chairs and a small table with a pot of tea already waiting.Ava stepped out.The evening air smelled like the plants and the city and the last heat of a setting sun. She turned once, slowly, taking it in."I didn't have you down as a gardener," she said."I'm not." He came to stand beside her. "The previous Luna designed it. I kept the plants alive."She looked at him sideways.He was looking at the lavender."How long ago?" she asked."Eight years." A pause. "She died in the border campaign. Year three of the war."Ava turned that over carefully."I'm sorry," she said. And she meant it.He gave a short nod — not dismissing the sympathy, just acceptin