Chapter 1
Chapter 1
The first time I shifted, it felt like my body was unraveling–bone by bone, thought by thought. My muscles snapped into place in ways they were never meant to, and yet… I had never felt so whole.
Mika, my wolf, came alive that night under a silver moon, and she was glorious. She was strong. Fierce. And she felt like home.
I was sixteen.
Most wolves waited for this moment with excitement, but I had only felt fear. Not of the pain–no, that was fleeting–but of the unknown. What would I become? Who would I be once I shifted?
I got my answer before the moon set.
Ruben Severius Black.
The moment my bones stilled, my breath caught. My wolf went silent in awe, in recognition. And deep inside me, something pulsed with the clarity of fate. My fated mate was here. Close.
I didn’t see him at first–I felt him. The pull. Like gravity, but warmer. Stronger. My heart thundered, then stilled the moment my eyes found his across the training field.
Ruben Black. Son of the Head Warrior. Trusted right hand of the Alpha. The most powerful young male in our pack–smart, skilled, charming. And three years older than me.
Our eyes locked.
It was supposed to be magical.
He looked at me… and then he looked away.
Just like that.
Like I wasn’t even there.
Mika whimpered inside me, confused and hurt. I stumbled toward him, hoping I was wrong. Maybe he hadn’t seen me. Maybe the bond hadn’t clicked for him yet. Maybe-
But no…
He turned his back to me like I didn’t matter.
And then she walked out of the packhouse, Kaithlin Powel… He gives her a wide smile when he saw her, a smile that I thought he will give to me, it’s for another woman.
She is the Alpha’s daughter. Beautiful. Elegant. And already wrapped around Ruben’s arm.
They kissed.
Oh my God…. I could feel Mika whimpers in pain.
Not a shy, awkward thing. No. A real kiss. The kind of kiss that breaks illusions.
I stood there, still half–wolf, heart pounding in/my chest, as my world cracked open and spilled everything I believed in.
He felt it. I knew he did.
I could see it in the flicker of guilt behind his eyes before he buried it.
1/2
but no,
10.40
Chapter 1
I was his mate.
And he didn’t care.
Not because he couldn’t. But because he wouldn’t.
Because I wasn’t good enough.
I was just Ellaine Rollin–El. A pack orphan with no title. No lineage. My parents died in a rogue ambush when I was only seven, and I’d been passed around ever since. The “charity case” of Blackpine Pack. Useful enough to work in the kitchens, quiet enough not to make noise.
Ruben could’ve had anyone.
But he wanted the Alpha’s daughter.
And I? I was in the way.
So, he pretended the bond didn’t exist.
And I stayed silent. Because I didn’t know what else to do.
Mika howled for him in the dark, night after night. I tried to soothe her, to lie to her, but she wasn’t stupid. She felt it. The pain. The rejection. The slow unravelling of the bond we never got the chance to complete.
Still, I hoped.
I hoped he’d come to his senses.
That maybe, just maybe, he would choose me.
Days, weeks, months into years, I keep waiting for him to open his eyes…
Three years later, only to find out the hard truth…
That he chooses another woman, Kaithlin, the Alpha daughter, he was truly reject me and didn’t want me.
A
