Alexandra POV:

"I have to check the northern perimeter tonight," Anthony said the next evening. He was adjusting his cufflinks in the mirror, looking too polished for a patrol through the muddy woods. "Rogue wolves have been spotted near the border."

"Be careful," I said, handing him his coffee. I had mastered the art of keeping my hand steady, even when I wanted to throw the scalding liquid in his face.

"Always, babe. Don't wait up."

He kissed my forehead. It felt like a brand of shame.

As soon as his SUV pulled out of the driveway, I didn't go to bed. I went to the garage and uncovered my old motorcycle. I hadn't ridden it in years, not since I became the "respectable" Luna.

I pulled on a black hoodie and a helmet. My scent was naturally faint-a side effect of my condition-but I sprayed myself with a scent-masker just to be safe.

I followed him. Not to the northern woods, but straight into the city.

He pulled up to the Moonlight Hotel. It was a boutique establishment owned by the pack, reserved for high-ranking members.

I parked two blocks away and moved through the shadows.

I didn't need supernatural powers to get in. I managed the pack's logistics. I knew the shift schedules, the blind spots in the cameras I had paid to install, and the master code for the service entrance.

I reached the hotel's rear entrance. A service door. I punched in the code: 0412. Jacob's birthday. Anthony was predictable.

Inside, I focused. I couldn't use the Mind-Link to find him-he would sense me probing. Instead, I reached out with my bond, trying to feel him.

It was faint. A dull, muffled static. The Bond-Blockers were working.

But I could still smell him. And her.

I took the stairs to the penthouse floor. My legs burned, my weak constitution protesting the exertion, but I pushed through.

At the end of the hallway, room 505. I heard laughter.

I pressed my ear to the door.

"Stop it, Anthony!" a female voice giggled. "You're going to ruin my makeup."

"You don't need makeup, Katia. You need to be marked."

Katia.

The name hit me like a physical blow. Katia Shepherd. The pack's school counselor. The woman who had been "helping" my son Jacob with his pre-shift anxiety for the last six months.

I pulled out my phone, slid it under the gap at the bottom of the door, and activated the camera.

The angle was low, but clear.

They walked into the frame. Anthony was shirtless. Katia was wearing a silk robe that definitely didn't belong to her.

She turned, and I saw it.

On the junction of her neck and shoulder, the skin was raw and red. A fresh bite mark.

A Marking.

In wolf culture, a bite on the neck is a claim. It tells every other male, "She is mine." An Alpha cannot Mark two females. By Marking her, he was effectively overwriting our bond. He was declaring our marriage void in the eyes of biology, if not law.

Katia reached up and traced the bite, smirking. She leaned in and nipped at Anthony's jaw.

"Does she suspect?" Katia asked.

"Alex?" Anthony laughed, a cruel, dismissive sound. "She suspects nothing. She's too busy baking cookies and dusting the furniture. She's... domesticated. Weak."

"And Jacob?"

"Jacob is on board," Anthony said.

I almost dropped the phone.

"He thinks you're cool," Anthony continued. "He told me yesterday that he wishes you were his mother. He says Alex is embarrassing. A Luna with no wolf scent? He calls her a defect."

The hallway seemed to tilt.

My son. My baby boy. The boy I had sacrificed my very soul to save.

He knew. He wasn't being groomed. He was an accomplice.

Tears pricked my eyes, hot and stinging. But I didn't let them fall. I couldn't. If I broke down now, they would hear me.

I gently pulled the phone back. I saved the video.

I had the proof of the affair. I had the proof of the Marking.

I turned to leave, but my foot brushed against a decorative vase in the hallway. It wobbled.

I caught it just before it hit the floor, but the ceramic scraped against the wall. Scrrrtch.

"Did you hear that?" Katia's voice was sharp.

"Probably room service," Anthony grumbled.

I didn't wait. I moved with the practiced silence of a woman who had spent two decades trying not to be noticed. I melted into the stairwell just as the door clicked open.

"Hello?" Anthony's voice echoed.

I was already two floors down, my heart pounding a rhythm of war.

They thought I was weak. They thought I was a defect.

I touched my chest, feeling the jagged scar beneath my shirt.

They were about to learn exactly where my strength had gone.

Alexandra POV:

Anthony came home at 3:00 AM.

I was in bed, pretending to sleep. I controlled my breathing, keeping it slow and rhythmic.

He slid into bed beside me. He reeked of soap, but under that, the metallic tang of Katia's arousal still clung to his skin.

Then, I felt a prick on my arm.

I didn't flinch. I let him inject me.

It was a micro-dose of Calming Pheromones. Alphas use it to soothe distressed pack members, but in high doses, it makes the recipient compliant, foggy, and docile. He was drugging me to keep me manageable.

Joke was on him. My metabolism burned through sedatives four times faster than a normal wolf. It was a trait of my bloodline-the bloodline he knew nothing about.

I waited until his breathing deepened into sleep. Then I slipped out of bed.

I needed to know the extent of the rot. I needed to hear it from Jacob.

I crept down the hall to my son's room. The door was ajar. The blue light of a gaming monitor spilled into the hallway.

He was on a video call.

"Yeah, Dad just got back," Jacob said, laughing. He was wearing his headset, spinning in his chair.

"Did he tell her?" A female voice. Katia.

"No way," Jacob scoffed. "Mom would freak out. She's so emotional. It's pathetic."

I stood in the shadows of the doorframe, my hand gripping the wood so hard I left indentations.

"She's just... she's not Luna material, Katia," Jacob continued, his voice filled with teenage arrogance. "A Luna is supposed to be strong. Fierce. Mom is just... a human in a wolf's skin. I'm ashamed to introduce her to my friends."

"Don't worry, sweetie," Katia cooed through the speakers. "After the Gala, things will change. Your dad promised."

"I can't wait," Jacob said. "Imagine having a Luna who actually looks good in a dress. Who has power. You're going to help me train for my shift, right? Mom can't teach me anything. She doesn't even use her wolf."

My knees gave out. I slid down the wall, silent tears streaming down my face.

It wasn't just that he preferred her. It was the contempt. The utter lack of respect for the woman who had wiped his tears, healed his scrapes, and sat up with him through every fever.

He measured worth solely by power. By aggression.

He was exactly like his father.

I crawled to the bathroom, locking the door behind me. I leaned over the toilet and dry heaved. The pain in my chest was unbearable. It felt like the scar tissue around my heart was tearing open.

Let us out.

The voice in my head was louder this time. Clearer.

I looked in the mirror.

My reflection was pale, dark circles under my eyes. But my eyes...

Usually, they were a soft hazel. Now, they were flashing. A brilliant, iridescent silver.

My Inner Wolf was clawing at the surface.

They betrayed us, Alex, she growled. The mate. The pup. They threw us away.

"I know," I whispered to the mirror.

We do not weep for traitors, she hissed. We hunt them.

A knock on the door made me jump.

"Alex?" Anthony's voice. "Are you okay in there? I heard a noise."

I closed my eyes. I forced the silver back. I pushed the wolf down, locking her behind the mental bars I had built years ago.

"Just a stomach ache," I called out, my voice trembling only slightly. "Go back to sleep."

"Make sure you're better by Saturday," he said through the door. "The Gala is mandatory. I need you there to smile and wave. The Elders are watching."

"I'll be there," I said.

I opened my eyes. They were hazel again, but cold. Dead cold.

"I wouldn't miss it for the world," I whispered.

Alexandra POV:

For the next week, I was a ghost.

I cooked breakfast. I ironed shirts. I smiled when Jacob ignored me and when Anthony lied to my face. I played the part of the oblivious, weak Omega perfectly.

But in the hidden moments-when they were at work or school-I was at war.

My phone buzzed. A message from Zara, a Beta female who worked in the pack's administrative office. She was one of the few who remembered that I had designed the pack's security grid.

Zara: Sent the files. You won't believe this.

I opened the attachment. It was a dossier on "LunaWannabe," a private social media account.

Katia.

I scrolled through the posts. It was a shrine to her narcissism.

Video 1: Katia holding a diamond bracelet. Caption: "My Alpha spoils me. Old wife thinks he lost it at the gym. LOL."

I recognized that bracelet. It was an heirloom from my grandmother. Anthony told me he had sold it to pay for Jacob's private tutoring.

Video 2: Katia in the school gym, wearing top-tier tactical gear. Caption: "Training the future Alpha. Jacob has so much potential, unlike his genetic donor."

Genetic donor. That's what she called me.

I saved everything to an encrypted cloud drive.

Then I opened the financial records I had pulled from the server. Anthony thought hiding the transactions under "Consulting Fees" was clever, but he was lazy. He used the same shell company name-"Shepherd Holdings"-for everything.

Anthony wasn't just cheating on me; he was cheating the pack.

He had been siphoning funds from the "Widows and Orphans" relief fund. Thousands of dollars a month. And where did the money go?

Lease payment: Moonlight Hotel Penthouse.

Transfer: K. Shepherd - Consulting Fees.

Purchase: Porsche Cayenne (Registered to K. Shepherd).

He was stealing from the most vulnerable members of our pack to fund his mistress's lifestyle. This was treason. If the Council saw this, he wouldn't just lose his title. He would be exiled. Or executed.

I heard the front door open. It was dinner time.

I walked into the dining room. Anthony and Jacob were already sitting, waiting to be served.

"What's for dinner?" Jacob asked, not looking up from his phone.

"Roast chicken," I said, placing the platter down. "And I have a surprise."

Anthony looked up, wary. "What kind of surprise?"

"I was thinking," I said, putting on my most innocent, naive smile. "Since Ms. Shepherd has been helping Jacob so much, we should invite her to sit at our table for the Gala. As a thank you."

The silence was deafening.

Anthony and Jacob exchanged a look. A look that said, She is so stupid.

"That... that sounds like a nice gesture," Anthony stammered, trying to hide his excitement.

"Yeah, Mom. That would be cool," Jacob added, smirking.

"Great," I beamed. "I'll send the invite tonight. I want everything to be perfect."

"You're finally stepping up, Alex," Anthony said, reaching for a drumstick. "Maybe you're not useless after all."

I watched him eat. I watched the grease stain his chin.

Eat well, husband, I thought. It's your last meal as an Alpha.

Later that night, I made a call to a burner number.

"Hello?" a gruff voice answered. It was Marcus, the head sound engineer for the Gala venue. He was a low-ranking Gamma I had helped years ago when his daughter was sick.

"Marcus. It's Alex."

"Luna? Is everything okay?"

"No, Marcus. But it will be. I need a favor. A big one."

"Name it."

"I need total control of the AV system at the Gala. Specifically, the main projector and the microphone override."

There was a pause. "You planning a show, Luna?"

"I'm planning a revolution, Marcus."

"Consider it done."

I hung up. I looked at the dress hanging on my closet door. It wasn't the modest beige gown Anthony had picked out for me.

It was deep crimson. The color of blood. The color of revenge.

My Inner Wolf paced in my mind, her tail swishing in anticipation.

Soon, she whispered.