Before my mating ceremony, I found out my Alpha Damon had thirty Luna candidates. He spent a month with each one, scoring them. Only the highest scorer would become his Luna.
And me? His Head Beta, his lover of six years, the woman who gave him everything?
I lost to a soft, submissive Omega.
The door to my office slammed open.
“Elysia!” A sharp voice cut through the silence.
I looked up. The Omega, Lydia, strutted in on her high heels.
Her cloying perfume was mixed with another scent I knew all too well.
Damon’s. The smell of sex.
“You didn’t knock,” I said coldly.
She ignored me, walking straight to my desk and slamming a small box down.
“The Alpha asked me to bring this to you.” Her voice was poisonously sweet, dripping with smug satisfaction. “He said you’ve been working so hard lately.”
I stared at the box, not moving.
“Aren’t you going to open it?” Lydia leaned forward, letting her scent—a mix of her and Damon—wash over me. “It’s a very pretty necklace. Of course, not as expensive as the diamond one he gave me last night.”
My fingers drummed on the desk.
“Last night?” I kept my voice neutral, but the word was a razor blade on my tongue.
“That’s right.” Her smile widened. “We spent another wonderful night together. Elysia, he said he wanted to fuck me to death.”
Her words were a blade, carving vile images into my mind. I wanted to scream, to claw the pictures from my head.
But I couldn’t.
Damon and I met at the shifter academy.
His Alpha presence was still raw then, untamed. During a training session, I suddenly felt it—the bond between us.
Fated Mates.
As I watched him, as I grew closer to him, we fell in love.
I followed him back to his pack, helped him secure his Alpha title, and became his Head Beta.
For six whole years, we shared his bed countless times.
Everyone assumed I was the pack’s Luna, that we just needed the official ceremony.
I thought so, too.
But for six years, every time I asked about the ceremony, he put me off. The time wasn't right, he’d say.
He would pull me into his arms, his lips finding mine, his whispers a soothing balm.
“I’m not the strongest Alpha yet,” he’d murmur. “I can’t risk losing you. But the day our pack is in the top three, I will give you the grandest ceremony this continent has ever seen. I’ll tell everyone you are my one and only Luna.”
I believed him.
So I worked even harder, expanding our pack’s territory and businesses.
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