After My Former Mate Crashed My New Bond

The bond broke at 10:14 on a Tuesday morning two years ago, but tonight it's going to finish dying.

Victor's truck hums beneath me as rain drums the windshield. My wolf Lune won't stop pacing. Not scared—just restless, like she knows what's waiting at the end of this road. The Silverfang pack house. The Harvest Banquet. Victor's mother. His entire pack watching me walk in on his arm like I belong there.

Like I'm his.

My hands are shaking in my lap. I curl them into fists so Victor won't see, but he sees anyway. He always does.

The truck slows. Gravel crunches under the tires as he pulls onto a narrow shoulder beneath dripping pines. The engine cuts. Rain fills the silence.

"Colette."

I don't look at him. If I look at him, I'll say something stupid like *I'm not ready* or *What if they don't want me* or *What if I'm not enough*—

His hands cup my face and turn me toward him. Warm. Steady. His thumbs brush my cheekbones.

"Breathe," he says quietly.

I try. It comes out shallow.

Victor leans closer. His scent—smoky pine and warm leather—floods the small space between us, deliberate and thick. It wraps around me like a blanket, and Lune finally stops pacing. She goes still. Then she leans into it, and I feel the tension in my shoulders start to unravel.

"The Moon Goddess didn't wait a decade for tonight to go badly," Victor murmurs.

His mouth finds mine. Slow. Claiming. Not rushed, not desperate—just certain. Like he's reminding me of something I keep forgetting: that this isn't a test I can fail. That I'm not walking into that house to prove anything.

I'm walking in because I already belong.

When he pulls back, my hands have stopped shaking.

"Okay," I whisper.

He kisses my forehead once, then starts the engine.

---

The pack house glows through the rain like a lantern. Warm light spills from every window. I can smell roasted game and pine smoke and the layered scent of dozens of wolves gathered inside.

Victor parks near the front steps. He comes around to my door before I can open it myself, offers his hand. I take it. His fingers lace through mine, and we walk up together.

The foyer is all golden candlelight and polished wood. Voices hum from deeper in the house—laughter, the clink of glasses. Victor's hand moves to the small of my back as we step across the threshold, warm and possessive, and I feel Lune rise to the surface, pleased.

Then I freeze.

Standing in the great room, holding an expensive bottle of wine like he's supposed to be here, is Duke Evans.

My Duke. My *former* Duke.

Alpha of the Ironmaw Pack. The man I spent two years trying to love. The man I walked away from without ever speaking the rejection vow.

His jaw is tight. His eyes—hazel when I first met him, hazel when he told me he'd chosen me—shift to amber the second they land on Victor's hand at my back.

On the scent already threaded through my skin.

His wolf snarls through his expression before he schools it smooth again. Polished. Charming. Like he's here for some perfectly reasonable reason and not because his pride couldn't let me go.

"Victor," Duke says easily, lifting the wine bottle slightly. "Courtesy delivery from the northern packs. Thought I'd drop it off personally."

Liar.

The word sits heavy in my chest, but I don't say it. I don't say anything. My throat has gone dry.

Victor's hand at my back presses fractionally harder. Not pulling me closer—just anchoring me. His voice, when he speaks, is calm. Measured. But I feel the Alpha aura rolling off him like heat.

"Duke," Victor says. "I wasn't aware you'd accepted the invitation."

"Last-minute addition." Duke's smile doesn't reach his eyes. "You know how these things go. Pack diplomacy."

The ambient conversation in the room drops half a register. Every wolf here can feel it—the collision of two Alphas' auras on Victor's home ground. The tension pulling taut like a wire about to snap.

Duke's gaze slides to me. Lingers.

"Colette," he says softly. "You look well."

Lune bristles. The fine hairs on the back of my neck rise before I can stop them.

I force myself to meet his eyes. "Duke."

His jaw tightens again. He can smell it now—Victor's scent woven into mine, deeper than any casual touch could explain. The fated bond we haven't spoken aloud yet but can't hide.

His wolf knows.

And it's killing him.

"Well," Duke says lightly, setting the wine on a nearby table. "I'll leave you two to enjoy the evening."

He doesn't leave. He stays exactly where he is, amber eyes locked on Victor's hand at my back, and I realize with a cold, sinking certainty that tonight is going to be worse than I thought.