The Alpha's Lost Luna: Too Late for Redemption

For nine years, I was the "Wolfless Wonder," the shame of the Reyes Pack. I swallowed bitter suppressants every morning to hide my identity as a rare White Wolf, enduring my husband’s coldness just to stay by his side. But tonight, Alpha Dominick shattered whatever bond we had left. He walked into the Annual Gathering with his mistress, Chastity, clinging to his arm, pregnant and smug. When Chastity staged a miscarriage and blamed me, Dominick didn't ask for the truth. He dragged me to the hospital. "She needs blood," he snarled. "O-Negative. Like yours." He used the Alpha Command to force me onto the table. He watched as they drained me dry to save the woman destroying my life. "Alpha, her heart rate is dropping!" the doctor warned. "It will kill her!" Dominick didn't even flinch. "Keep going," he ordered. "Take what you need until Chastity is safe." As the machine beeped and darkness took me, the submissive wife died. I woke up in the morgue holding cell and made a choice. I signed the divorce papers, set the penthouse on fire, and vanished into the night. He thought I burned to death. He didn't know I escaped. Months later, he tracked a ghost to a vineyard in London. But he didn't find the broken girl he sacrificed. He found the White Wolf, glowing with silver magic, standing beside a new mate who actually cherished me. Dominick fell to his knees, tears streaming down his face. "Annis, come home. I command you." I looked down at him and smiled. "Your voice doesn't work on me anymore, Alpha. You killed the part of me that listened." Chapter 1 Annis POV: The scent of champagne and roasted venison was suffocating, a heavy velvet shroud over the sharp, metallic tang of my own anxiety. Tonight was the Annual Gathering of the Reyes Pack. By rights, I should have been on the dais, wearing the Luna's crest. Instead, I stood in the shadows near the kitchen doors, gripping a tray of empty glasses until my knuckles ached. "Look at her," a whisper drifted from a group of high-ranking she-wolves. "The Wolfless Wonder. Nine years and nothing. It's pathetic." "Dominick is a saint for keeping her," another sneered. "If the Goddess saddled me with a dud, I'd have rejected it on the spot." I kept my head down. They saw the surface. They didn't see the suppressants I swallowed every morning-bitter little pills that kept my wolf in a chemical coma. They didn't know I was a White Wolf, a biological anomaly hunted for her potent blood. To them, I was just Annis the cripple. The mistake. The ballroom went dead silent as the heavy double doors swung open. Dominick walked in. My heart betrayed me, slamming against my ribs. Even after nine years of ice, he was power incarnate. Six-foot-four of corded muscle, radiating an aura that tasted like ozone and incoming storms. He was the Alpha Supreme of the East Coast. But he wasn't alone. Clinging to his arm, draped in shimmering red silk that accentuated a slightly rounded belly, was Chastity. The collective gasp sucked the air out of the room. Bringing a mistress to the Gathering was an insult. Bringing a pregnant mistress while your lawful wife stood in the corner was a declaration of war. Dominick scanned the room. His eyes-cold, hard amber-locked onto me. There was nothing there. No warmth. No flicker of the bond. He raised his hand. Silence fell like a guillotine. "Annis," his voice boomed. It wasn't a request. It was laced with the Alpha Command. The power hit me like a sledgehammer to the gut. My knees buckled. The tray clattered to the floor, shattering glass everywhere. "Clean that up," Dominick said, his voice devoid of emotion. "And then take your place at the servants' table. You do not belong among the wolves tonight." The servants' table. He was demoting me. Publicly. "Dom," I whispered, the word scraping my throat. "Please." "Do not speak to me," he snarled. "You are a shame to this pack. A Luna must be strong. A Luna must carry the next generation. You are neither." Chastity smirked, resting a hand on her stomach. "Easy, Dom. Poor thing can't help being broken." Heat scorched my cheeks. My inner wolf stirred, fighting the drug-induced fog. A low growl vibrated in my chest, but I swallowed it down. I knelt. I picked up the shards. One slice cut into my thumb, and a drop of bright red blood welled up. Dominick's nostrils flared. He smelled the blood. For a second, his eyes darkened with instinct, but then he looked at Chastity, and the moment was gone. I stood up, trembling, and walked out the side door. I didn't go to the servants' table. I went to our room-no, his room. I pulled a suitcase from under the bed. No clothes. Just the essentials: my passport, a stash of cash I'd hidden in a hollowed-out book, and the last of my suppressants. "Going somewhere?" I spun around. Dominick stood in the doorway, blocking the light. Chastity was behind him, looking like the cat who ate the canary. "I'm leaving, Dominick," I said, my voice shaking. "You have your heir. You have your woman. You don't need a slave anymore." He laughed. A dark, dry sound. "You don't get to leave until I say so. You owe my family a debt, Annis. Your grandmother lost our sacred relic. You pay with your life." "I have paid!" I screamed, nine years of abuse boiling over. "Nine years of servitude! Nine years of your bed but never your heart!" "Give me the charm," Chastity said suddenly. She pointed to the simple silver bracelet on my wrist. My grandmother's legacy. A Moon Goddess charm. "No," I said, clutching my wrist. "It will protect my baby," Chastity lied, her eyes gleaming. "Dom, make her give it to me." Dominick looked at me. "Give it to her, Annis." "It's mine!" "Give it to her." The Alpha Command slammed into my mind. My body betrayed me. My hands moved on their own, unclasping the bracelet. Tears streamed down my face as I handed it to Chastity. She took it, examined it with a sneer, and then- Crash. She threw it onto the marble floor. The delicate silver filigree shattered. "Oops," she giggled. Then, her face twisted. She grabbed her throat. "Dom! My throat... it burns! She put something on it! Wolfsbane!" It was a lie. A clumsy, theatrical lie. But Dominick didn't check. He didn't sniff the air. He just reacted. He backhanded me. The force sent me flying across the room. I landed hard on the scattered shards of my grandmother's bracelet. The silver dug into my knees, burning like fire. "You tried to harm my heir," Dominick roared, his canines extending. "Kneel! Submit!" I knelt on the broken silver. The pain was blinding. "I didn't..." I gasped. "Silence!" Chastity was fake-coughing in the hallway. Dominick turned his back on me to rush to her side. That was his mistake. My phone buzzed. A text from Haven. Black SUV. North Exit. Run, Annis. Now. My wolf, sensing the imminent threat, punched through the haze. She didn't have the strength to shift, but she gave me speed. I didn't look back. I jumped from the second-story balcony, landing in the bushes with a bone-jarring thud. I ignored the pain in my knees and ran toward the dark car waiting in the shadows.