Contract Over: I Rejected My Alpha Husband First
When her father fled with his mistress, leaving crushing debts behind, Freya Gilbert had nowhere to turn. Crashing Alpha Jonas's welcome ceremony in desperation, she never expected to find her fated mate there. But it wasn't gentle Jonas who made her wolf howl "mate." It was the dangerous, devastatingly powerful Niklaus Lockwood.
One scorching night of passion sealed her fate.
Niklaus already had his perfect chosen mate, the elegant Rebekah. Unwilling to abandon his plans, he offered Freya a cold business deal: be his contract Luna for three years, play the perfect wife in public, and he'd clear her debts. When their arrangement expired, she'd accept his rejection and disappear quietly.
Freya thought she could survive a loveless marriage. She was wrong.
Three years later, she's fallen hopelessly for the Alpha who sees her as nothing more than a gold-digging Omega. On their anniversary night, the very day their contract expires, Niklaus chooses Rebekah.
The message couldn't be clearer.
But when Freya files for divorce and moves out first, Niklaus's carefully controlled world shatters. The mate bond he's suppressed for years, and he never expected his obedient, compliant wife to actually leave him.
"I, Freya Gilbert, reject you, Niklaus Lockwood."
The words that should have set them both free only ignite a fire that threatens to consume them both.
Can a love born from a business contract survive the flames of pride and betrayal? Or will the most powerful Alpha in the territory lose his true mate because he was too blind to see what was right in front of him?
When the contract ends, the real battle for love begins.
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Chapter 11
Niklaus stared at Freya, utterly stunned. Three years of marriage, and she had never dared speak to him like this before. She had always been the perfect Luna. Dutiful and polite.
"What did you just say?" he asked. His voice was dangerously low.
Freya crossed her arms over her chest defiantly. Her heart hammered against her ribs, but she refused to back down.
"I said your smell makes me sick."
Even in the hospital, Rebekah hadn't given up her luxurious lifestyle, filling her entire room with citrus-scented aromatherapy. Niklaus didn't understand Rebekah's behavior, but she insisted it helped stabilize her emotions, so he'd stopped questioning it. he had no idea this was Rebekah's deliberate provocation against Freya.
His jaw clenched like a steel trap. "I was at the hospital."
"For hours? Does comforting her require you to bathe in her perfume?" Freya raised an eyebrow with cutting sarcasm. "Or were you doing more than just comforting?"
Niklaus took a menacing step forward. "Watch your fucking tongue."
"Or what?" Freya challenged, refusing to give an inch. "You'll punish me? Our contract is over, Niklaus. I can say whatever I want."
He reached for his shirt buttons with deliberate slowness. He loosened them one by one while staring at her. This action had once made her heart flutter. Now it made her want to scream.
"Help me undress," he ordered. He had said this hundreds of times before.
"Help yourself," Freya replied with ice in her voice. "I'm not your personal servant."
Niklaus's eyes narrowed to slits. He stalked to the bathroom without another word. He slammed the door so hard the frame shook. The sound of the shower running followed moments later.
Freya exhaled shakily. The adrenaline coursing through her body made her tremble.
She opened the closet to find something to sleep in. Then she froze in horror. All her modest pajamas were gone. They had been replaced by silky negligees and sheer nightgowns. One black lace piece had a plunging neckline that would leave nothing to imagination.
A note was pinned to it in Margaret's elegant handwriting: "For a special night."
"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Freya muttered.
Margaret was desperate for grandchildren. Three years of marriage with no pregnancy had obviously driven her to desperate measures.
In wolf culture, cubs strengthened pack bonds. A child from fated mates would be considered invaluable.
Freya sank onto the edge of the bed, clutching the silky garment in her trembling hands. How many sleepless nights had she spent dreaming of having Niklaus's children? But the cold reality of their loveless arrangement had always crushed those dreams. How could she bring an innocent child into this emotional wasteland?
The bathroom door opened with a bang. Steam poured out like fog. Niklaus emerged with only a towel wrapped dangerously low around his waist. Water droplets clung to his sculpted chest like jewels.
His eyes fell to the negligee clutched in her hands. Then they moved to her face. His expression turned absolutely lethal.
"Planning to seduce me into signing those divorce papers?" he asked. His voice dripped with venom. "Is that your pathetic strategy now?"
"Don't flatter yourself," Freya shot back with equal venom. "Your mother replaced all my sleepwear with these ridiculous things."
She tossed the negligee onto the bed like it was contaminated. She walked to his dresser and pulled out one of his white shirts. She held it up and examined it before nodding in satisfaction.
"This will do perfectly."
Niklaus's eyes went completely black. "Put that back. Now."
"No." Freya turned her back to him and began unbuttoning her blouse with deliberate slowness.
"What the hell are you doing?" he demanded.
"Changing. Turn around if you're too shy to watch."
She heard his sharp intake of breath but didn't stop. She slipped her blouse off with fluid grace, then her skirt. She stood in only her underwear. She didn't look to see if he was watching. She didn't need to. She could feel his gaze burning into her skin like fire.
Freya pulled his shirt over her head. It fell to mid-thigh. The shirt covered her adequately but revealed more leg than her usual nightwear. She turned to face him and lifted her chin in pure defiance.
Niklaus's eyes were darker than a moonless night. His pupils were completely dilated. His knuckles were bone-white where he gripped his towel.
"Happy now?" she asked with arctic coolness.
"That's my shirt," he growled like a wild animal.
"And this is still my bedroom too," she countered. "Unless you'd prefer I sleep completely naked?"
His jaw worked frantically as he fought for control. Finally, he turned away abruptly. He grabbed clothes from his dresser and disappeared into the bathroom again.
---
In the kitchen, Margaret hummed cheerfully as she stirred a pot of soup. The rich aroma filled the air--it smelled of chicken broth and mysterious herbs.
"Are you absolutely sure about this, Luna Lockwood?" Olivia asked nervously. She watched her former Luna add a small vial of amber liquid to the soup. "Alpha Niklaus has an incredibly sensitive nose."
"That's exactly why I added extra garlic and herbs," Margaret replied with complete confidence. "It's a family recipe."
"But if he finds out..."
"What's he going to do? Yell at his old mother?" Margaret laughed and continued stirring. "Besides, they're fated mates. Sometimes mates just need a little... chemical encouragement. Their wolves know exactly what they want, but these two are too damn stubborn."
She poured the soup into two elegant bowls.
"If Alpha Niklaus asks, I'll take full responsibility," Margaret assured the nervous servant. "Trust me. By morning, they'll be thanking me profusely."
Olivia still looked terrified. "But Luna Freya seemed so furious..."
"Passion is passion, whether it manifests as anger or love." Margaret winked conspiratorially. "Besides, I raised that stubborn boy. I know exactly what he needs."
She lifted the tray with purpose. "Now, let me deliver this personally."
---
A sharp knock on the bedroom door shattered the tense silence. Freya had been sitting rigidly on one side of the bed. She looked up as Margaret entered with theatrical cheerfulness.
"I thought you two might be hungry," Margaret announced with suspicious brightness. "I made my special chicken soup."
Niklaus was now dressed in pajama pants and a t-shirt. He frowned suspiciously at his mother. "We already had dinner."
"Nonsense. You probably barely touched your food," Margaret said. She set the tray on the nightstand with ceremony. "Besides, this is my famous healing soup. Excellent for... the heart."
"Thank you, Margaret," Freya said with forced politeness.
Margaret beamed like she'd won the lottery. She handed a bowl to each of them. "Now, I want to see you both finish every single drop."
Niklaus sniffed the soup with obvious suspicion. "What exactly did you put in this?"
"Just herbs from my garden," Margaret replied with practiced innocence.
Margaret planted herself at the edge of the bed. She watched them with laser focus. "Well? Drink up while it's hot."
Freya pushed her bowl away. "I can't drink anymore."
Niklaus looked at his mother's expectant expression that clearly said she wouldn't leave until they complied. Then he looked at Freya's stubborn refusal. "I'll drink both."
He lifted the bowl to his lips with a long-suffering sigh and took a substantial gulp. "Satisfied?"
Margaret studied them both carefully. "Now, I expect you two to stay in this room tonight and work things out like adults. I need to know you're making a real effort before I can rest easy."
"Mother," Niklaus began. His tone was pure warning.
Margaret suddenly pressed a hand to her chest. Her expression became dramatically pained. "Please, Niklaus. The doctor said I absolutely must avoid stress. Knowing you two are at each other's throats... it's terrible for my weak heart."
Freya shot Niklaus a look that clearly screamed, See what you're doing to her?
He clenched his jaw so hard it could have cracked teeth but nodded. "Fine. We'll talk."
"Wonderful!" Margaret's recovery was miraculously instantaneous. She headed for the door, then paused with her hand on the knob. "Remember, darlings, there's no problem between fated mates that can't be solved by a good night together."
She closed the door behind her with a knowing smile that could have lit up the room.
Freya immediately turned her back to Niklaus. She switched off the bedside lamp and squeezed her eyes shut, pretending to sleep. The distance between them was wide enough for two more people.
But after what felt like hours, Freya could sense something changing in Niklaus beside her. His breathing was becoming irregular, slightly faster than normal.
"Niklaus?" Freya asked. She noticed the shift in his energy. "Are you okay?"
She turned to look at him and gasped in shock. His eyes were glowing with an unnatural golden light.
Something was very, very wrong.
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9.3
Born into privilege, Eleanor never imagined her life could shatter in a single night. Then her father disappeared with his mistress, her mother fell from a building and slipped into a coma, and everything she once owned turned to dust.
Determined not to ruin Jonathan's future with her family's disgrace, she ended their relationship and became the bride of a man trapped in a vegetative state.
She believed that was the last time their paths would cross. But two years later, Jonathan pinned her in the dark and whispered, "Long time no see, my sister-in-law."
7.6
To pay for her father's life support, Haleigh sold herself into a marriage with Fabian Blackburn, a ruthless billionaire in a deep coma.
But on her wedding day, she caught her boyfriend cheating with her stepsister, laughing about how they would steal the inheritance the second Fabian stopped breathing. Cornered and desperate, Haleigh secretly underwent IVF using her comatose husband's frozen sperm to secure the family trust.
Weeks later, a miracle happened. Fabian woke up.
But instead of gratitude, he treated her like trash. He threw annulment papers at her face, completely disgusted by the arranged marriage.
"If you try any dirty tricks to get pregnant, I will personally drag you to a clinic and have that bastard scraped out of you."
Terrified, Haleigh hid her positive pregnancy test and desperately tried to hack her way to enough cash to escape. But while using his computer, she accidentally opened a highly classified folder.
Inside was a medical file and a photo of a severely disabled girl who looked exactly like Fabian.
Before she could process it, Fabian walked in. Seeing the screen, his cold mask shattered into pure, unhinged madness. He lunged across the room, lifting her off the floor by her throat, completely ignoring her desperate gasps for air.
"Lock her in the basement," he roared to his guards. "No food. No water."
Curled on the freezing concrete, clutching her newly pregnant belly, Haleigh didn't understand what she had just seen that turned him into a murderous monster.
But she knew one thing: if she didn't escape this terrifying estate, both she and his unborn heir would die in the dark.
8.5
For five years, I was tech billionaire Alden Maxwell' s secret. A pretty accessory on his arm, a deal I made to save my father' s life. I played my part, quietly planning my escape for the day our contract ended.
But then his first love, Amanda, came back.
At a lavish auction, he spent ten million dollars to outbid me for my own mother' s heirloom bangle, only to place it on Amanda' s wrist, calling it a "token of his undying affection."
Later, he told me I was just practice. A "little bird" he could use to learn how to be gentle before he went back to his true love.
That' s when the last of my foolish hope died. I was never a person to him, just a transaction he could buy and discard.
So I disappeared. I took a five-year, off-grid research position and cut all ties. When he finally tracked me down, begging me to name my price, I faced him through the sterile glass of the facility and gave him my final answer.
"We' re done."
9.5
Bridget left the office early on her anniversary, her pocket heavy with a custom velvet ring box meant for her fiancé.
But when she pushed open the bedroom door, she found him tangled in their bed with her best friend, Chloe.
"Bridget! Wait, it's not what it looks like!" Jacob stammered, his eyes wide with panic.
"Evidence," Bridget stated coldly, snapping a photo of their naked bodies before fleeing into the freezing New York night.
Desperate to numb the betrayal, she got blackout drunk at an underground lounge and threw herself at a dark, terrifyingly handsome stranger.
She woke up in a penthouse suite alone, finding only a limitless black credit card left on the nightstand.
Humiliated and feeling like a cheap escort, she ran away, swearing to forget the nightmare.
But the nightmare had just begun. When she rushed into the office, she discovered the stranger was Jevon Rocha—the ruthless billionaire CEO of her company.
He didn't fire her. Instead, he trapped her in a twisted, obsessive power game, forcing her into his private life and demanding she report to his penthouse.
Bridget couldn't understand why a ruthless billionaire was so dangerously fixated on a low-level employee.
Until she stumbled upon his secret social media account and saw a crayon drawing of a little kid, captioned with a single word: "Finally."
A wave of absolute horror washed over her. He wasn't just playing games; he was hiding a secret child and a messy, high-stakes family drama.
She refused to be the naive collateral damage in a billionaire's twisted life.
Trembling, Bridget hit "Block" on his profile, determined to escape his dangerous web.
7.2
I spent my whole life trying to fit into the "Kensington aesthetic," dyeing my hair blonde and playing dumb just to earn a crumb of my father's approval. But when the manor went up in flames, I realized I was never a daughter to them-I was just an inconvenience.
I lay pinned under a heavy oak beam, the smell of copper and burnt sugar filling my lungs. My father, Arthur, stood in the doorway with my brothers, looking like a phalanx of saviors, but their eyes weren't on me.
They rushed past my outstretched, bloody hand to save my sister, Karly, who was huddled in a corner without a scratch on her. My brother Archer scooped her up like spun glass, stepping over my crushed leg without a second glance. Just before they crossed the threshold, Karly looked back at me and smiled-a small, victorious, terrifying smile. My father didn't offer help; he just shouted that I was an arsonist and slammed the door, sentencing me to burn alive in my own bedroom.
As the crystal chandelier melted and crashed toward me, I didn't feel fear anymore. I felt a guttural, distilled hate for the family that left me to die because of a lie. I had spent my life begging for scraps at a table that was never meant for me, and I died realizing they never loved me at all.
"If I come back," I promised into the void, "I will burn you all down."
I gasped for air and woke up in my bed, the smell of lavender replacing the smoke. It was September 14th, five years before the fire, the exact week I had started ruining myself to please them. I looked in the mirror, scrubbed off the pathetic makeup mask, and realized the old, desperate Kala was dead. If I was going to burn, I'd make sure they were the ones who felt the heat first.
"Queen is back online," I whispered.
9.5
Zara grew up with nothing but resilience and ambition. Raised in an orphanage, she fought her way into the corporate world, believing education would be her salvation and love her reward. When she married Dante, a powerful CEO, she thought she had finally found both.
She was wrong.
Behind closed doors, Zara's marriage became a nightmare of cruelty, betrayal, and calculated malice. Stripped of her career, manipulated through her own child, and nearly killed by the very family she married into, Zara is forced to face a devastating truth: she was never meant to survive.
When she walks away from everything with no money, no protection, and only her dignity Zara makes one promise: she will return.
What she doesn't expect is to uncover a shocking secret about her past one that reveals she was stolen as a child, her life destroyed by a conspiracy rooted in greed and revenge. Reclaimed by her real family and armed with power she never knew was hers, Zara rises from the ashes stronger than ever.
This time, she isn't fighting for love.
She's fighting for justice.
And revenge will be delicious.