Chapter One

Cora’s POV

  My husband is not a good man, but I’d hardly be considered a good woman, so maybe we deserve each other after all. 

     Tonight, there’s a plan. I’ve plotted a cheating scandal to get my Alpha husband to reject me and divorce me. 

     Finally. 

     I smooth out the front of my dress and look up at the man in front of me. He isn’t my husband. My husband Alexander is away. He’s always away, and I’m sick of being his invisible-but-waiting luna. 

     Half an hour ago, I placed an anonymous tip to various tabloids and gossip columns telling them the Alpha’s Luna was having an affair and they’d be able to see the evidence for themselves if they camped outside his villa. They’re out there now–every few moments, through the crystal-clear windows, I can see the odd camera flash. 

     The man in front of me is the last piece of the puzzle. He’s no one important–some Omega prostitute I’ve paid handsomely to be my partner in crime. I look the part of a cheating wife–I’ve applied my makeup with a bold, heavy hand, and kept my auburn hair worn loose and wavy. 

     My dress is skintight, wickedly low-cut. The necklace I’ve had for as long as I can remember, a large garnet stone set in silver with spirals curling around its facets, rests against the base of my throat like always. And the prostitute I’ve hired is exactly what you’d expect the sidepiece to look like: handsome enough, sure, well-muscled and square-jawed, but there’s nothing behind those blue eyes of his. 

     “Are you ready?” I whisper to him with a faint smile.

     He nods. “Just making out? Nothing else?”

     “That’s all I need from you,” I say. 

     A moment after the words pass my lips, his mouth is crushed against mine. My gasp is muffled as his hands tangle in my hair, pulling gently from the roots. I close my eyes and kiss him back. I know it’s an illusion, just for the press, but still. I haven’t been kissed like this in a long time. 

     And, of course, we’re standing right in front of the massive glass window that takes up a third of my bedroom’s north wall. I almost always keep the curtains drawn. Tonight, they’re wide open.

     We stay tangled together for long enough that I’m sure the paparazzi have gotten their fair share of photographs. He smells nice. Like lavender. I pull away from him and grin a little at the vibrant smudge of cherry-red lipstick I’ve left on his lips. 

     I take his hand and pull him very deliberately towards the bed until we’re well out of the window’s view. I let go of him as soon as we’re out of sight. 

     “...and scene!” I flop backwards onto the bed, hair splaying out underneath me, and start to laugh. 

     The prostitute shifts uncomfortably back and forth. I can feel the weight of his gaze on me. “Now what?” He asks. 

     I think for a moment. “Oh, I don’t know. Wait downstairs for forty-five minutes or so, but don’t go anywhere the cameras can spot you. Then leave through the back. There’s makeup wipes in the bathroom if you want.”

     “Oh-okay…”

     He walks out of my bedroom, closing the door gently behind him. 

     And so the waiting begins. 

     My husband comes home just past midnight–around three hours, I’d guess, after the photos have leaked. 

     He slams my bedroom door open with a deafening bang. I sit up straight and clasp my hands together neatly. The look in his steely gray eyes is as bleak and cloudy as a thunderstorm. 

     “Alexander!” I beam, enthused.

     He glowers at me. “What in Goddess’s name is happening here?”

     “I mean.” I tilt my head playfully. “You saw the pictures, didn’t you? Should give you some indication.”

     “Cora, what is the meaning of this?”

     I can’t help but let out an exasperated laugh. “To embarrass you, of course!”

     “And why would you want…” Alexander trails off, all that anger melting into something a bit more sad. 

     “You don’t want me, Alexander. You don’t love me. You marked me and married me because I’m your mate, and nothing else. You’d never really accept an Omega like me as your mate. I don’t have a wolf–I can’t reject you. I can’t break the mark between us myself. So it has to be you.” 

     My hair is still mussed, my lipstick still smeared. I hope it’s enough to sell the story.

     Alexander sighs. He’s still dressed in his work clothes. There are drops of sweat on his brow–did he run here?

     “Is this really the ending you wanted?” He asks plainly. Calmly. I can’t read him. 

     It isn’t. Not by a long shot. I don’t feel anything but sadness when faced with the truth of this situation. But in the three years we’ve been married, he’s been nothing but cold, distant, and uncaring–when he’s even around at all. 

     I didn’t want this.

     It had to happen, though. 

     “It is,” I tell him just as cooly. He isn’t the only one who can play at apathy. 

     Alexander purses his lips. “Then I’ll break the bond.”

     “Good.” I suck in a deep breath. “Tomorrow’s headlines will be that I, the Omega Luna of the Black Moon Pack, despite my incredible luck in being mated to the Alpha himself, still wasn’t content. I cheated on you. I embarrassed you. But it’s not all bad for you, because in your wisdom, grace, and kindness, you didn’t even kill me for the humiliation I brought to your name. All you did was break the mate bond.” I try for a smile, but it’s more sad than anything else. “Congratulations. You will henceforth be free of your shameless, gold-digging wife.”

     “How do you know I won’t kill you?” He asks.

     Bluffs, more like.

     I meet his eyes, tilt my head up towards him, and hold up the hair around my neck. “Do it, if you’d like.”

     He stares at me intently, pupils blown. I can see the quick, frantic rise and fall of his chest.

     He doesn’t move. 

     I lower my hair. “That’s what I thought.”

     Alexander glares at me again and stuffs his hands in his pockets. “Fine. I, Alpha Alexander Brutus Black Moon of the Black Moon Pack, reject you, Omega Cora of the Black Moon Pack, as my mate.”

     His words echo around the room. 

     It’s like everything in the world has become perfectly still. 

     I brush my fingers against my collarbone, left exposed by the low cut of my dress. It’s where the mark is. It should vanish now that he’s broken the bond.

     He’s broken the bond, right? 

     I don’t feel any different, I should feel different–

     “What are you up to now?” Alexander asks, voice so thick with disgust it actually knocks me back a step. I gape up at him. “Your mark, it’s still there–” he reaches towards me.

     I slap his hand away. “Don’t touch me,” I snap. “I don’t know why it’s still there! Maybe it’s because we don’t know my last name, so you can’t say it, maybe it has to do with my missing memories–either way, I don’t want to stay here anymore. I’m not staying. We’re done, Alexander. I’m leaving.”

     I push past him and walk towards my open bedroom door. 

     “More of your fucking tricks!” He shouts after me as I leave. 

     I bite my tongue, resisting the urge to dignify him with a response. I make it almost all the way out of the house before I feel a hand close around my wrist. 

     I whirl around, teeth bared. It’s not Alexander–no, the hand is too small, bones too frail. I find myself glaring at Alexander’s younger sister Ali, instead.

     “How could you!” Ali screams at me, expression twisted into one of pain. “You’ve betrayed us, you–”

     “I know, I know, I’m awful and terrible and traitorous–” I roll my eyes, jerking my wrist away from her. “–which is why I’m trying to leave, so if you could just let me do that–”

     Ali lets out a shrill shriek. Before I quite know what’s happening, she’s grabbed both my shoulders and shoved me against the wall, hard. My head thuds against the luxurious wallpaper with a dull thump. 

     Three years ago, Alexander saved my life. He says I was attacked by rogue wolves. I don’t know. All I know is that I woke up with no memory of my past–just a mate-bond that spiraled into a loveless marriage and the knowledge of my own first name. 

     But when Ali shoves me against the wall, something comes rushing back in a burst of pain. The sharp clasp of my necklace jabs into my neck, then I hear the heavy pendant drop to the ground at my feet. I hear a voice–a man’s voice, one I know inherently is my father’s voice. A pack’s name flashes through my mind–the White Claw pack. I see a huge white wolf, muzzle raised elegantly to the full moon. A creature of legend, surely, because a wolf with fur that white is too rare to ever be spotted in real life. Still, there’s something familiar about her. What could it have to do with me?

     I remember.

     Not much, but just enough. 

     My eyes light up a violent shade of red. The world is bathed in crimson.