Werewolf

My daughter died on her fifth birthday.
Her first real wish—the first one she was old enough to make herself—was to go to the beach with Daddy.
Gideon promised he would take her.
She waited for him all day. She was still asking for him when she took her last breath.
He never came.
I brought her ashes to the beach she'd always dreamed of. Let her finally see the ocean.
That's when I heard it—a woma...

The surgical knife missed my heart by half an inch.

I lay on the cold operating table, listening to the steady beep of the monitor. "Why?" Dr. Wilson's voice trembled as he held my bloody chart. "Why did you try to kill yourself, Lena?"

I stared blankly at the ceiling. "Was there another choice?"

For eighteen years, I was the "wolfless freak." I was the punching bag for my family, the scapegoat...

They called me a hellcat. A she-wolf tyrant. The Luna who made her Alpha husband obey.
I held him together when his father died. Built his dying pack into a powerhouse while he flirted with she-wolves.
Then he brought home his "fated mate."
Everyone waited for me to explode.
Instead, I smiled. "I'll help you prepare the ceremony."
That's when my wolf—dormant for years—began to wake.