Chloe POV:

"You'd better answer that," I said, my tone cool. "It sounds urgent."

Jackson glared at me, annoyed at my failure to show jealousy. He pulled out his phone and deliberately pressed speaker.

"Jackson!" Michelle's voice pitched to a theatrical whine. "I'm so exhausted from training. Take me to the VIP Pack bar tonight?"

I folded my arms and leaned against the doorframe, observing the scene as one might watch a poorly rehearsed play.

Jackson saw his crude stratagem had failed. He ended the call and stepped closer, his voice dropping to a low growl. "Don't push your luck, Chloe. An Omega like you should be on your knees thanking the Goddess I even look your way."

I did not grant him a reply. I turned my back and walked deeper into the apartment.

Later, in my small bedroom, I let last month's full moon festival rise unbidden.

The festival had been a riot of firelight and sound. Jackson had insisted I sit on the far side of the square, a chasm of public space separating us. He was terrified that some stray glance might betray the bond that tied the future Alpha to a creature of no standing.

While I remained in the shadows, Michelle had approached him with the easy confidence of her station. She let her pheromones drift toward him as she pressed her arm against his. They laughed together, discussing pack expansion as if they were already its joint sovereigns. The pack elders beamed at the prospect of their union.

I had screamed at him through our Mind-Link. Jackson, tell them the truth! Tell them you have a Mate!

Cease this melodrama, Chloe. It is a matter of politics. Do not ruin this for me.

Unable to watch any longer, I had fled the firelight, running toward the dark fringe of the forest. I kept looking back over my shoulder, my eyes fixed on the sight of his hand brushing a stray lock of hair from Michelle's face.

My gaze was fixed behind me. So I did not see the disturbance in the earth. The ground simply gave way, and I fell into a steep, rock-strewn ravine. My ankle twisted with a sound like green wood snapping.

I lay in the damp soil, screaming his name until my lungs burned.

I saw him at the lip of the ravine—a dark silhouette against the fire-lit sky, looking down at me. But instead of leaping down, he hesitated. He glanced back toward the bonfire, a flicker of panic in his posture at the thought of Michelle or the elders seeing him aid an Omega.

He took one step back from the edge. Then turned and walked back toward the celebration.

It was Sophie, my fellow Omega, who heard my cries and scrambled down to drag me from the mud. She rushed me to the pack hospital in her rattling car. I sat in the passenger seat, my body wracked with silent shudders. I looked at her through a blur of tears and confessed the secret I had carried for weeks.

I told her I had just discovered I was pregnant with the Alpha's pup.

*As I whispered those words, a single tear slid down my cheek—and froze into a fleck of ice before it hit my hand. Sophie didn't see. I stared at the tiny crystal melting on my skin. Something deep inside me was waking up.