Chapter 1: Betrayal in the Temple of the Moon
Hilde Kane's POV
This was the first Winter Solstice celebration I'd officially presided over as Luna. And it had gone perfectly.
I wore my last smile of the evening as I accepted the elders' praise and bid them goodnight.
Then a violent pain ripped through my chest—so sudden and so savage that I nearly blacked out. I grabbed the nearest tree to keep from collapsing.
"What's happening, Sonia—" I gasped for air. "I feel... I feel agony."
"Betrayal. He has betrayed us! Go back—now!" My wolf Sonia's voice was a furious scream inside my skull.
What?
My mind went blank, as if someone had taken a sledgehammer to it.
Sonia was sensing betrayal from my husband—Alpha Stuart?
That was impossible.
Barely an hour ago, Stuart had pinned me against the wall of the Moon Temple, kissing me with such hunger that if my brother Gareth hadn't barged in, we would have been making love right now—the most romantic night of our marriage.
"No. Stuart would never betray me." I finally clawed my way back from the pain. "Sonia, you must be wrong."
"I am NOT wrong. Go. NOW!" She was thrashing, nearly feral.
I had never seen her like this.
Sonia was not a wolf who panicked easily. Even on the night of my first shift—the first time I ever truly met her—she had been far calmer than I was.
But now she was like a bomb about to detonate, slamming against the walls of my consciousness, desperate to tear free, to take wolf form and drag me back on four legs.
I forced her down.
"Sonia, I can handle this myself. Where is he?"
"The Moon Temple!"
I seized fistfuls of my gown and ran. My heels cracked against the flagstones in a frantic, staccato rhythm.
Outside the Moon Temple, the bonfire had burned low. Only a handful of people still lingered on the lawn, drinking. I charged straight for the main doors and shoved them open.
Empty.
"There's no one here, Sonia. Are you sure—"
"Upstairs! Keep going up!" She cut me off, frantic.
I turned toward the staircase. The only sound in the entire temple was the echo of my heels on stone. Without meaning to, I lightened my steps and held my breath.
At the top floor, there was a single door—wooden, slightly ajar. A sliver of warm amber light leaked through the gap, and with it—
Sound.
My feet froze to the floor.
Panting. Low, stifled, seeping through that narrow crack in steady waves—wet and ragged. Not one person's breathing, but two, their rhythms overlapping, tangled together, sawing at my nerves like a dull blade.
"My little sweetheart, you love it when I punish you like this, don't you? Take my big cock."
In that instant, every drop of blood in my body turned to ice. My scalp prickled. I knew that voice—knew it in my bones. It was my mate, Stuart Dormer.
He was calling someone else "sweetheart." The raw, undisguised lust dripping from those words hit me like a slap across the face.
"He has betrayed us." Sonia let out a low, strangled howl.
I bit down hard on my trembling lip and slammed the door open.
On the floor—two bodies, tangled together.
Stuart saw me first. His pupils contracted sharply, and in the next second he shoved himself up, snatching at the clothes scattered around him, pulling them on in a haphazard rush. The flush hadn't fully left his face, yet when he spoke, his voice already carried the controlled calm of an Alpha.
"Hilda, what are you doing here?"
My gaze moved past him to the other person. I had expected to see a woman—some faceless female lurking in the shadows who had stolen my mate. But when I actually made out that face, I nearly stopped breathing altogether.
It was my brother, Gareth Kane.
He sat half-turned away from me, shoulders trembling slightly, fumbling to grab his clothes.
When I saw the angry red marks scored across the back of his neck and shoulders, I felt my blood boil.
Stuart stepped forward, blocking my line of sight.
I shoved him aside.
"Look at me, Gareth." I heard my own voice shaking.
He turned his head slowly. The corner of his mouth twitched; he seemed to have bitten through his own lower lip—it was bleeding. His reddened eyes flickered over me, then darted away. But in that single glance, I thought I saw something like helpless despair.
"Hilda, I'm sorry." Stuart finished buttoning his shirt and stood before me again.
"You—what did you do to him? He just turned eighteen. He's barely more than a pup—" My throat clenched. I pointed at Gareth.
"It was just an accident."
"Did you force him?"
"Are you serious? I'm an Alpha!" Stuart's brow furrowed, displeasure darkening his expression. "I don't need to force anyone."
He glanced sideways at Gareth.
Gareth had dressed by now and stood behind him.
"I've admired Alpha Stuart since I was a child. You know that." He wouldn't look at me. His voice was low, as though he were crushing something down with sheer force. "I... I love him. I'm the future Beta. The Alpha and I... we were always meant to be one."
My brother loved my mate? The Beta and Alpha were "meant to be one"?
What kind of nonsense was this? What about me? Where did I fit? Did I deserve to suffer their betrayal?
You two were the people I loved most in this world.
My head buzzed as though starved of oxygen. A suffocating pressure closed around my chest.
I clutched at my collar, struggling to turn, and bolted for the stairs.
I hadn't taken two steps before a pair of hands seized my shoulders.
"Hilda, you are the one I love. Please believe me."
I spun around, raised my hand, and with every ounce of strength I had, slapped him across the face.
Stuart's head snapped to the side. A faint handprint surfaced on his cheek, but his grip on my shoulders didn't loosen.
"Let me explain."
I wrenched free, chest heaving. "Shut up."
I pointed back toward the room, my voice trembling. "This is the Moon Temple. This is where we swore before the Moon Goddess to be faithful to each other forever. And you—here, of all places—you betrayed me."
Stuart's expression shifted.
Gareth followed him out, head bowed, dark hair falling over his eyes. I couldn't read his face.
He murmured, "Dear sister, just accept reality. Otherwise, you..."
Stuart whipped around, crimson flashing in his irises, and his Alpha aura crashed down on Gareth like a physical weight. "Gareth. You've said far too much tonight!"
Gareth staggered, pinned against the wall behind him, shoulders shaking violently.
The next second, Stuart turned back to me, his face rearranging itself into something gentle.
"Hilda, darling, believe me—tonight was just an accident. Forgive me."
I looked at Gareth. He had barely recovered his breath, head still lowered, fingers twisting the hem of his shirt. The corners of his eyes were red, his features still contorted with the ghost of pain.
No. This wasn't simple.
Something had been wrong with Gareth for a long time.
We'd been close growing up. Raised as the Beta heir, he used to cling to me and say he'd protect me, take care of me when we were older.
But that closeness had ended abruptly one day. Which day?
My eighteenth birthday.
The day I confirmed my mate bond with Stuart. After that, my brother became a different person. He'd watch me with anguished eyes, and when I caught him looking, the anguish would harden into resentment. Then came the cruel words—mocking me, belittling me. Once, drunk, he'd snarled at me: "Why do you have to be the goddamn Luna? Why don't you just get lost—the farther the better?"
At the time, I'd chalked it up to teenage rebellion—difficulty adjusting to his sister having a mate.
But what if it wasn't rebellion? What if, in Gareth's eyes, I had never been his beloved sister—only an obstacle standing between him and Stuart?
My body trembled involuntarily.
So all that hostility toward me had been rooted in jealousy. Deep, consuming jealousy.
"Hilda, are you listening to me? Please forgive me and Gareth for this one moment of madness."
I snapped back to the present and found Stuart holding my hand, his expression tender, as though what had just happened was nothing more than a misunderstanding.
"Stuart," I said slowly, "do you dare swear? Swear here, in the sacred Moon Temple, that this was truly the one and only time."
