After My Mate Chose the Lycan Princess

The numbers on the Blackmoor Pack’s ledgers never lied, even if their Alpha did.

It was past midnight on Tuesday. My eyes burned from staring at unpaid vendor invoices under the harsh fluorescent lights of the pack house office. For five years, I had kept this pack afloat. I poured in my personal savings, managed their logistics, and gave every hour of my youth to Ryder Brooks. He had promised that once Blackmoor was solvent, we would have our marking ceremony. He told me the Moon Goddess had made me for him. I believed him.

A knock broke the quiet.

A human courier stepped into the lobby, panting slightly. "Delivery for Alpha Brooks. Sign here."

I signed the slip and took the heavy envelope. It was thick cream linen, sealed with crimson wax pressed into the Lycan royal crest. Curious, I broke the seal and slipped out the card.

The gold embossed lettering stared back at me:

*You are cordially invited to celebrate the fated mate ceremony of Ryder Brooks, Alpha of the Blackmoor Pack, and Princess Skylar Patterson.*

*The Patterson Estate, Southampton. Three weeks from Saturday.*

The room seemed to drop twenty degrees. Deep inside my chest, my inner wolf went completely still. It wasn’t a whimper or an angry growl. It was a cold, terrifying silence.

"You shouldn't be opening my personal mail, Waverly."

I turned. Ryder stood in the doorway, loosening his silk tie. His signature scent—cedar and ash—filled the room. For five years, that scent had made my heart race with comfort. Tonight, it just smelled suffocating. Like smoke trapped in a locked room.

"What is this?" I held the invitation up, my fingers trembling slightly. "Skylar? The intern you brought in last month?"

Ryder didn't flinch. He walked over to the desk, poured himself two fingers of scotch, and looked at me with chilling calm.

"Her father is the Lycan King," he said, taking a sip. "The Patterson family is putting fifty million dollars into Blackmoor the moment the ceremony concludes. We are drowning in debt, Waverly. This saves the pack."

"You’re bonding another woman." My voice shook. "You're taking her mark."

"The mark is just a signature. The bond is just a contract," Ryder dismissed, waving a hand. He stepped closer, his dark eyes hardening as his voice dropped into an unmistakable, heavy vibration—his Alpha tone. "*You* are the only woman I will ever truly belong to. You know that. She's a political necessity. You will wait quietly off the books until the inevitable severing."

The Alpha command pressed against my skull, trying to force my knees to bend, trying to make me submit. But beneath the shock, something inside me hardened like iron.

"Off the books?" I whispered. "You want me to be your dirty little secret?"

"I'm keeping you safe," he said smoothly. "Just stay invisible for a while."

"Let me go, Ryder," I said, looking him dead in the eye, resisting the push of his aura. "End it cleanly. Sever our bond right now and let me walk away."

Ryder scoffed. He reached into his leather briefcase, pulled out a manila folder, and dropped it onto the ledger.

"Don't be dramatic," he said. "Pack legal drafted this yesterday. You get a two-bedroom in Manhattan—under my name, of course. A generous monthly allowance. All you have to do is sign the non-disclosure agreement."

I looked down at the paperwork. Non-disclosure. Monthly allowance.

I wasn't his future Luna. I was an unpaid employee being handed a severance package to become a kept mistress.

My phone buzzed on the desk. A travel confirmation popped up on my screen, forwarded from Ryder's assistant. He had booked me a hotel room in upstate New York for the weekend of the ceremony. Sixty miles away from the Hamptons. He had planned my erasure down to the minute.

"Sign it tomorrow," Ryder said, turning toward his private quarters. "Get some sleep."

I didn't sleep.

By eight the next morning, the pack house buzzed with activity for the upcoming assembly. I logged into the pack portal to pull the quarterly reports. My access was denied.

I walked into HR, where the clerk wouldn't meet my eyes. My title had been quietly changed from Operations Director to "Outside Logistics Consultant." Every single vendor contract I had spent five years negotiating had been reassigned to Gamma Daniel Whitfield—a sycophantic yes-man who couldn't balance a checkbook to save his life.

"Morning, Waverly," Daniel sneered, leaning against the counter with a coffee cup in hand. "Alpha Brooks said you'd be stepping back to focus on off-site tasks. Don't worry, I'll handle things from here."

Before I could answer, the glass lobby doors swung open.

Skylar Patterson strode in. Her blonde hair fell in perfect waves over a pastel Chanel suit, her four-inch designer heels clicking sharply against the marble floor. She took off her sunglasses and looked around the room with an easy, entitled smile.

She stopped in front of my desk and tapped her manicured acrylic nail against the wood. "Excuse me. Could you run down to the corner and grab me an iced oat latte? Two pumps of vanilla. Thanks."

I stared at her, my hands balling into fists at my sides.

The door to the Alpha office opened. Ryder stepped out, his suit immaculate, looking every bit the proud leader. He caught Skylar’s eye and smiled warmly.

Then he looked at me. There was no remorse in his face. No guilt. Only a cold warning.

"Don't mind Waverly, Skylar," Ryder said smoothly, placing a possessive hand on the small of the Lycan princess's back. "She's just one of our contractors."