Chapter Two

But the moment I stepped onto the top floor, I knew we’d come to the wrong place.

The New Moon Hotel’s rooftop level was blazing with light. The air was thick with champagne, expensive perfume, and an ocean of flowers—sweet to the point of nausea, sweet and fake.

This was not the setup for a little girl’s birthday party.

Kael stood on the stage in a crisp black formal suit, hair perfectly in place. Under the spotlight, he looked handsome—and distant. Selene stood beside him in a silver gown, her smile loud, her hand looped possessively through his arm.

It was their engagement ceremony.

The elder’s voice boomed. “…On this beautiful night, we witness Kael becoming Shadowmoon’s new Alpha. And—” He paused, then spoke the sentence that made bile rise in my throat. “Our future Luna, Selene, is already carrying the Alpha’s heir!”

The roar of cheering nearly lifted the roof.

My body went colder than it had ever been.

She was pregnant. With my husband’s child.

In that instant, I understood why the rose scent had sunk so deep into him it felt like it was leaking out of his soul.

In the cheers, Selene looked up at him, eyes brimming with adoration. Kael smiled back, opened a velvet box, and took out a ring.

Silver, wrapped in a wolf’s head and vines, a deep green gem at its heart. The symbol of an Alpha’s mate—the proof of a Luna. He’d told me that when “the time was right,” he’d put it on my finger.

Now he held it, and under everyone’s gaze, slid it steadily onto Selene’s ring finger.

“Daddy!”

A childish, bright cry cut straight through the cheers. Somehow Mina had slipped free of my hand and dashed to the front of the stage.

A dead, icy silence spread outward from me and my daughter.

“Her again? The woman the Alpha picked up?”

“How dare she show her face here?”

“That kid’s calling the Alpha ‘Daddy’? She’s insane…”

Whispers gathered into a cold tide.

I saw Kael’s smile freeze. Shock flashed in his eyes, then gloom and embarrassment piled in fast. He stood there, silent.

“And the Alpha’s just accepting it? He won’t deny it?” someone murmured, baffled.

Someone else lowered their voice. “So are they really—”

“Enough!”

“Who let you in?” Madam Rowan pushed through the crowd, her face carved from frost. Her gaze speared Mina like an ice pick, as if she were appraising a defective object.

“There is no father for you here. Get out. Now!”

Mina flinched at the vicious tone. Instinctively she turned toward the one familiar person on the stage, reaching out, her voice trembling toward a sob.

“Daddy…?”

And almost instantly, Kael took a step back.

He avoided Mina’s hand—he even lifted his own to block her.

Mina went rigid. She stared up, mouth open, tears clinging to her lashes. Those glassy eyes so like his filled with huge, bewildered fear and hurt.

“Mina!”

I lunged forward and gathered her into my arms, holding her tight. My voice shook. Inside me, rage burned hot enough to incinerate—and cold enough to freeze.

I lifted my head. My vision blurred, but I locked onto Kael’s eyes.

“Kael! It’s her birthday!”

His pupils tightened.

He’d forgotten. I’d told him a thousand times. I’d reminded him the night before. But he didn’t even know what day it was. He’d only tossed me that “yeah, I know” to get to another woman faster.

When he saw my tears and my red-rimmed eyes, a fissure opened in his cold authority—revealing startled panic and something like reluctance. He even moved, almost unconsciously, a fraction in my direction.

“Kael,” Selene’s soft voice cut in at the perfect moment.

She lifted her hand, hooked it around the arm he’d just started to raise, and drew him back to her side. There was no surprise in her eyes—only smugness and disdain. In that second I knew: the text had been hers.

“I know about you,” she said, pitying and condescending. “The poor outsider and her… ‘little burden.’ But…”

“The Alpha saved you because humans can’t survive out there. He offered you shelter out of kindness. But a child with no wolf soul—some unknown thing from nowhere—has no right to be called Shadowmoon Alpha blood. Do you understand?”

“She is not some unknown thing!” I cut her off, my voice hoarse, each word like a nail dipped in ice. I lifted my head and let my gaze pass, calm, over Madam Rowan, over Selene, and finally onto Kael’s profile as he turned away again.

The last bit of warmth in my chest went out.

“She isn’t a child nobody wants.”

“Her father is someone far greater than an Alpha. She doesn’t need to beg for some stupid bloodline.”

I hugged Mina tighter and heard myself announce, cool and steady:

“From today—this moment on—”

“She is my child. Mine alone.”

“She has nothing to do with any of you anymore.”