Chapter 1

Viya's POV

I adjusted my hair one last time in the silver-framed mirror of our penthouse bathroom.

The woman staring back at me looked softer than I felt. My loose black waves fell over my shoulders, my makeup was delicate, and the crimson dress beneath my black cashmere coat made my skin seem even paler. It was bolder than anything I usually wore. Not vulgar. Not desperate. Just brave enough to say what I had been too afraid to say for three years.

Tonight was our third wedding anniversary.

Three years of being Luna Wilde. Three years of sleeping beside Lucius without ever receiving his mark. Three years of pretending the distance between us was patience instead of rejection.

Serena, my wolf, stirred weakly in my mind. "You look beautiful."

"Do you think he'll notice?" I whispered.

She was silent for a second too long.

I smiled at my reflection anyway. "He has to notice eventually."

Even the coldest Alpha could soften, couldn't he? Even a marriage that began for politics could grow into something real.

At least, that was what I told myself as I drove to the private club where Lucius had gathered with several ranked members of the Wilde Pack. I had prepared his anniversary gift. I had planned a quiet dinner after the meeting. I had imagined, foolishly, that tonight he might look at me not as a suitable Luna, not as a useful alliance, but as his wife.

The hostess recognized me the moment I entered.

"Luna Viya," she said with a respectful bow. "Alpha Wilde is in the Moonstone Room."

"Thank you."

My smile was calm. My hands were not.

As I approached the private room, I heard Lucius's voice through the half-open door.

"I don't know how much longer I can keep pretending."

I stopped.

His tone was raw, intimate, filled with a tenderness I had begged the Goddess to hear from him even once.

A woman answered with a soft laugh. "Then stop pretending."

My blood turned cold.

Lucius exhaled heavily. "Every night I go back to her, I feel like I'm betraying myself."

Her. Me.

My fingers curled around the edge of the wall.

"Lucius," the woman murmured, "you're married."

"I never loved Viya."

The words did not explode. They sank. Quietly. Deeply. Like a silver blade pushed between my ribs.

"She is your fated mate," the woman said, though her voice sounded too pleased to be truly concerned.

"There is no bond," Lucius said coldly. "There never was. She was convenient. A respected wolf doctor. Obedient. Well-connected. The Wilde Pack needed stability, and marrying her gave me exactly that."

Serena whimpered inside me.

I pressed a hand over my mouth.

Convenient.

That was what I had been. Not wife. Not mate. Not Luna in his heart. Just a solution to a political problem.

The woman sighed. "And when will you divorce her?"

"Soon." Lucius's voice lowered. "The herbs are working. In a few more months, her wolf will be too weak to carry pups. Once the pack doctor confirms she cannot provide heirs, I'll have legal grounds to end the marriage."

For one terrifying moment, the hallway disappeared.

The tea.

The special tea he personally prepared every evening. The one he said would strengthen Serena. The one I drank because I trusted him.

"You're sure she won't suspect?" the woman asked.

Lucius gave a low, dismissive laugh. "Viya? She is too eager to please me. Too grateful for scraps. She would drink poison from my hand if I told her it was medicine."

My nails dug into my palm until pain cleared my head.

The woman whispered, "You are still too kind to her."

"I'm not cruel," Lucius replied. "When this is over, I'll compensate her. She has been dutiful."

Dutiful.

I almost laughed.

He was stealing my health, my future, my chance at motherhood, and still wanted to believe he was honorable because he planned to pay me afterward.

Then the woman asked, "Have you thought about names? For our baby?"

"Our baby?" Lucius sounded stunned. "I thought the child was Alexander's."

Alexander.

His dead brother.

The world narrowed to one name.

Miranda.

My sister-in-law. The grieving widow I had comforted. The woman I had brought soup to after the funeral. The woman whose hand I had held while she cried into my shoulder.

A bitter calm settled over me.

So that was why Lucius had never truly seen me. His heart had not been empty. It had been occupied by his brother's widow.

Serena snarled weakly. Record it.

My shaking fingers found my phone. I opened the recorder and let the truth continue to spill from the room.

Miranda's voice turned sweet again. "If Viya refuses the divorce?"

"She won't." Lucius sounded certain. "She avoids conflict. She will cry quietly, sign whatever I put in front of her, and thank me for not abandoning her with nothing."

Something inside me snapped cleanly in half.

No.

I would not cry quietly. I would not thank him. And I would not let either of them decide how my story ended.

I stopped the recording, forwarded it to Sophia, my closest friend and the sharpest divorce attorney in the werewolf community, and typed only one line.

[I need you. Divorce papers. Now.]

Her reply came almost immediately.

[FINALLY! On my way. Meet me at Moonlight Bar in 30.]

I looked once more at the half-open door.

Inside, my husband was planning my ruin with the woman he loved.

Outside, I straightened my coat, lifted my chin, and walked away.

For the first time in three years, I did not feel like Alpha Lucius Wilde's neglected Luna.

I felt like his biggest mistake.