My Mate Left Me for the Enemy Pack’s Omega

I have stood at the head of this pack for seven years.

Seven years of early mornings and late nights, of border disputes settled before dawn, of warriors trained until they bled and healers stretched past their limits. Seven years of carrying the Moonveil Pack on my back without once letting my knees buckle. I know what it means to lead. I know what it costs.

I am Louisa Nelson, Alpha of the Moonveil Pack, and I have never once broken in front of my people.

Tonight will not be the first time.

The bonfire is at full height when I hear the disruption at the tree line. I am mid-address, standing on the raised platform at the center of the gathering ground, when the murmur moves through the crowd like a current. Heads turn. I do not turn. I finish my sentence, let the silence settle, and only then do I look.

Declan walks in like he owns the ground beneath him. He always does. That easy, broad-shouldered swagger, the kind that parts a crowd without asking. He is late — forty minutes late — and he has brought her with him.

Emerson Shaw.

I know her scent before I see her face. Something sweet and overworked, like a candle burning too hot. She is pressed against Declan's side, her fingers curled into the front of his shirt, and he is smiling. Not at me. Not at the pack. Just smiling, the way a man smiles when he wants everyone to see what he has.

He walks her straight to the Beta's elevated seating.

The pack goes quiet in the particular way that means everyone is watching me to see what I will do.

I do nothing. I wait.

Declan settles into his seat, pulls Emerson down beside him, and then — only then — looks up at me. There is something in his expression I have seen before. The look of a man who has rehearsed this moment and is pleased with how it is going.

"Alpha." His voice carries easily over the fire. "I think we're overdue for a conversation."

I hold his gaze. "I was speaking."

"And now I am." He stands. The firelight catches the angles of his face, and for one involuntary second, something old and buried moves in my chest. I press it flat. "I'm done, Louisa. With the bond. With the pretense. I want it severed — formally, tonight, in front of the pack. So I can make Emerson my chosen mate and my Luna."

The silence that follows is absolute.

I am aware of every face turned toward me. I am aware of the fire crackling, of the night air carrying pine and cold earth, of the weight of seven years pressing down on this single moment. I feel the mate bond between us — that thin, fraying thread the Moon Goddess tied without asking either of us — and I feel, with a clarity that almost surprises me, that I