The music from the packhouse thrummed through my chest as I navigated the crowd, searching for Ace. Tonight was supposed to be perfect—his Alpha succession ceremony had gone flawlessly, and I wanted to congratulate him before the night ended. Three years. Three years I'd hidden who I really was, living as a low-ranking omega in this pack, all because I believed love should be about the person, not the title.

My wolf stirred restlessly inside me, which was strange. She'd been quiet for weeks.

"Have you seen Ace?" I asked a passing Delta, but he barely glanced at me before shaking his head and moving on. Story of my life here.

I caught his scent then—cedar and rain, distinctly him—leading away from the main celebration toward the garden sheds. My heart picked up speed. Maybe he'd stepped away from the chaos for a moment of peace. I could give him my gift, the hand-carved wolf figurine I'd spent months perfecting.

The shed door stood slightly ajar, golden light spilling onto the grass. I pushed it open with a smile.

That smile died instantly.

Ace had Saylor pressed against the workbench, his hands tangled in her hair, her dress pushed up around her thighs. They were so consumed with each other they didn't even notice me frozen in the doorway.

My best friend. My mate—no, not my mate. Just... Ace. Just the guy I'd fallen for despite every warning my father had given me about trusting too easily.

The clock in the distance began to chime. Midnight.

On the twelfth strike, something inside me exploded to life. My wolf surged forward with a force that nearly drove me to my knees, and suddenly the world sharpened into crystal clarity. Ace's scent hit me like a physical blow—cedar and rain and something wild and mine, mine, MINE.

The mate bond snapped into place with the subtlety of a lightning strike.

"No," I gasped, the word torn from my throat.

They sprang apart. Saylor's eyes went wide, but not with guilt—with calculation. Ace's face cycled through shock, realization, and then something that made my stomach drop.

Revulsion.

"Aurora," he said, my name like a curse. He could feel it too, I realized. The bond pulling taut between us, singing with recognition.

"Ace, I—" I couldn't even finish the sentence. What was I supposed to say? Surprise, the Moon Goddess chose me, the omega you've barely looked at for three years?

He grabbed my arm, his grip bruising, and dragged me out of the shed. I stumbled, trying to pull free, but his Alpha strength was too much.

"Ace, stop—"

"Shut up," he snarled, hauling me through the garden and back toward the main party. The crowd parted as he shoved through, his Alpha aura rolling off him in waves. Wolves stopped mid-conversation, mid-dance, mid-drink. All eyes turned to us.

To me.

He released me in the center of the crowd, and I nearly fell. The music cut off abruptly. In the sudden silence, I could hear my own ragged breathing, the thundering of my heart.

"Listen up," Ace commanded, his Alpha tone forcing every wolf present into submission. Heads bowed automatically. Mine didn't—I was too shocked, too hurt. "I want everyone to witness this."

No. No, he wouldn't—

"I, Ace Robinson, future Alpha of the Silvermoon Pack, reject you, Aurora Montgomery, as my mate." His voice carried across the stunned crowd, each word a hammer blow. "You are nothing but a weak omega who doesn't deserve to stand beside an Alpha."

The bond shattered.

I'd heard about rejection pain, but nothing prepared me for this. It felt like someone had reached into my chest and ripped out my heart with their bare hands. Fire and ice and agony raced through every nerve. I collapsed, my knees hitting the ground hard enough to bruise.

Through the haze of pain, I saw Saylor emerge from the shadows. For one desperate second, I thought she'd help me. We'd been friends since I arrived here. She knew everything about me—well, almost everything.

She walked past me and wrapped herself around Ace's arm, a smirk playing at her lips.

"I—" I forced the words through gritted teeth, tasting blood. "I accept your rejection."

The bond snapped completely, and the pain somehow got worse before it started to fade to a dull, throbbing ache. I pushed myself to my feet, swaying. Every wolf was staring at me—some with pity, some with disgust, most with indifference.

I met Ace's eyes one last time. "You're right," I whispered, loud enough for only him to hear. "I don't deserve this."

I turned and ran. Through the crowd, past the packhouse, toward the border. Behind me, I heard laughter. Saylor's voice carried on the wind: "Did you see her face?"

My wolf whimpered, wounded but not broken. At the border, headlights flashed twice. The black SUV, right on schedule. I'd made the call three days ago, finally ready to go home.

I just hadn't expected it to hurt this much.

As I slid into the back seat, I touched the moon pendant at my throat—my mother's pendant, the only thing I had left of her. The driver met my eyes in the rearview mirror.

"Welcome home, Miss Montgomery," he said gently.

I closed my eyes as we pulled away, leaving my false life in the dust.

They had no idea who they'd just rejected.

But they would.

The training room floor was cold against my palms as I pushed myself up for the hundredth time. Sweat dripped down my face, stinging my eyes.

"Again," my father commanded from across the mat.

I wanted to collapse. Every muscle screamed. But I forced myself to my feet, settling into a fighting stance. This was month three, and the bruises had bruises.

He moved like lightning. I barely blocked the first strike, twisted away from the second, but the third caught me in the ribs. I hit the ground hard, gasping.

"An Alpha doesn't stay down," he said, not unkindly. "An Alpha rises."

I rose.

The months blurred together after that. Combat training until my hands bled. Diplomatic lessons where I learned that words could cut deeper than claws. Strategy sessions that lasted until dawn. My father was relentless, but fair. He pushed me because he believed I could handle it.

Slowly, I started to believe it too.

My wolf grew stronger with each passing week. Where she'd once been timid, uncertain, now she was a force of nature. The first time I shifted after returning home, I barely recognized myself—my silver-white fur gleamed like moonlight, and I stood nearly as tall as my father's wolf. Alpha-born, through and through.

But the nights were harder.

I'd wake up gasping, phantom pain lancing through my chest where the mate bond used to be. I'd reach for my mother's pendant, only to remember Ace had destroyed it. My father had the pieces collected and had it restored by the pack's finest craftsman, but it wasn't quite the same. The delicate moon had a hairline crack now, visible only if you knew where to look.

Like me, I suppose. Repaired, but not quite whole.

"You're ready," my father said one morning, exactly one year after I'd come home. We stood in his office, sunlight streaming through the windows. He held an envelope—thick, cream-colored paper with an embossed seal.

I took it, my hands steadier than they would've been months ago. "The Grand Alliance Gathering."

"Your debut." He watched me carefully. "The Silvermoon Pack will be there."

My fingers tightened on the envelope. Of course they would be. "I can handle it."

"I know you can." He moved to the window, hands clasped behind his back. "But Aurora, this isn't about revenge. This is about showing the werewolf world who you truly are. What you've become."

I joined him at the window, looking out over our territory. Our pack. "What if I'm not ready?"

"Then you fake it until you are." He smiled slightly. "That's what being an Alpha means half the time."

The day of the Gathering arrived too quickly and not quickly enough. I stood in my room, staring at the dress my father had commissioned. It was stunning—deep midnight blue that seemed to shimmer silver in the light, with intricate beading that caught and reflected like stars. The neckline was elegant, the cut designed to command respect rather than attention.

I touched my mother's pendant, the crack barely visible against my skin.

"You've got this," I whispered to my reflection. The woman staring back at me looked nothing like the girl who'd fled Silvermoon a year ago. This woman had steel in her spine and fire in her eyes.

The drive to the neutral territory took three hours. I sat in the back of our SUV, watching the landscape blur past. My father rode in the lead vehicle with his Beta and Gamma. I was in the second car, windows tinted so dark I could see out but no one could see in.

The hotel was massive—a sprawling estate that screamed old money and older power. Luxury vehicles lined the circular drive. Wolves in formal attire moved through the entrance, their various pack scents mingling in the air.

My wolf stirred, alert.

"We'll wait here," my father's voice came through the mind-link. "I'm going in first. When I give the signal, you make your entrance."

"Understood."

I watched him exit his vehicle, his Alpha presence immediately commanding attention. Heads turned. Conversations paused. He moved through the crowd like a king, which, in our world, he essentially was.

Then I saw them.

The Silvermoon delegation emerged from a sleek black car. Ace stepped out first, and my traitorous heart stuttered. He looked good—confident, powerful in his formal suit. Acting Alpha now, I'd heard through the grapevine. His father had stepped down early.

Saylor slithered out after him, wrapped in a dress that was trying way too hard. She clutched his arm like a lifeline, laughing at something he said.

My wolf snarled. I placed a hand on my chest, breathing slowly.

They had no idea I was here. No idea what was coming.

My phone buzzed. A text from my father: "Ready?"

I looked at my reflection in the tinted window one last time. The crack in my pendant caught the light.

I typed back: "Ready."

It was time to show them exactly who Aurora Montgomery really was.

I should have taken the main entrance.

The thought hit me the second I turned the corner into the narrow service corridor, my heels clicking against marble that had seen better days. This hallway was supposed to be empty—a shortcut the hotel staff used, one that would let me slip into the ballroom without causing a stir before my father's signal.

Instead, I walked straight into my past.

Ace stood there, Saylor draped on his arm like an expensive accessory. They were laughing about something, his head tilted toward hers in that intimate way that used to make my chest ache. Now it just made my wolf bare her teeth.

I froze. They looked up.

For a heartbeat, nobody moved. I watched recognition flicker across their faces—confusion first, then shock, then something uglier.

"Aurora?" Saylor's voice pitched high with disbelief. She straightened, her grip on Ace's arm tightening. "What are you doing here?"

I kept my face blank, my aura locked down tight. My father had taught me that—how to shield my presence, make myself seem like nothing more than a regular wolf. It was harder than it looked, like trying to hold your breath underwater.

"Excuse me," I said quietly, moving to step around them.

Ace shifted, blocking my path. His eyes raked over me—over my midnight blue gown, my carefully styled hair, the way I held myself now. Nothing like the broken omega who'd fled his pack a year ago.

He laughed. Actually laughed.

"Did you sneak in?" He leaned closer, and I caught his scent. Cedar and rain. My wolf snarled, but I held her back. "What are you, a servant? Or did you come back hoping to spread your legs for a real Alpha this time?"

The words hit like a slap. Saylor giggled, the sound grating against my nerves.

"I need to pass," I said, my voice steady despite the fury building in my chest.

"Oh, I don't think so." Saylor released Ace's arm and stepped toward me, her eyes glittering with malice. She snatched a glass of red wine from a passing waiter's tray—he squeaked in protest but scurried away when Ace shot him a look.

I knew what was coming. I could have moved. Should have moved.

But I stood my ground.

Saylor's smile turned vicious. "Oops."

She tipped the glass, and red wine cascaded down the front of my dress. The liquid was cold, soaking through the delicate fabric instantly. It spread like blood across the midnight blue, ruining hours of careful preparation.

"Saylor!" I gasped, stumbling back.

"Oh no," she cooed, her voice dripping false concern. "I'm so clumsy. But then again, trash like you shouldn't be wearing white to a formal event anyway. Were you trying to look like a bride? How pathetic."

I tried to step around her, my hands shaking as I assessed the damage. The dress was ruined. Completely ruined.

Saylor moved with me, her heel coming down hard on the hem of my gown.

The fabric ripped with a sound like tearing paper. The delicate beadwork scattered across the floor, tiny stars dying on cold marble.

"Look at that," Saylor said, examining her nails. "Cheap material. Just like the girl wearing it."

My wolf was screaming now, demanding I shift, demanding I show them what I really was. But not yet. Not yet.

Ace stepped forward, and for one stupid second, I thought he might actually stop this. Might show a shred of the man I'd once thought I loved.

Instead, his eyes locked on my throat.

On my mother's pendant.

The crack in the silver seemed to catch the light, a thin line of weakness in something that should have been whole.

"Is that—" His hand shot out, fingers closing around the chain. "You stole from the pack treasury?"

"What? No, I—"

"This belongs to Silvermoon." He yanked, hard.

The chain snapped. I felt it break, felt the weight of my mother's memory torn from my throat.

"Ace, don't—"

He held the pendant up, examining it with mock curiosity. Then his eyes met mine, cold and cruel.

"Thieves don't deserve treasures," he said.

He dropped it.

The pendant hit the marble with a delicate clink. And then his boot came down, grinding the silver filigree into the stone. I heard it crunch, watched the delicate metalwork crumple and break.

Something inside me cracked too.

My phone buzzed in my clutch. My father's signal.

I looked up at Ace, at Saylor, at the ruins of my dress and my mother's pendant scattered at their feet.

"You're right," I said softly. "Thieves don't deserve treasures."

I stepped past them, my ruined dress trailing wine and torn fabric.

"But Alphas do."

I pushed open the ballroom doors, my father's presence washing over me like a tidal wave. Every head in the room turned.

It was time.