“Seven minutes,” the moon priest murmured, glancing from the silver altar to the Super Full Moon above them. “If Alpha Julian does not arrive before the moon reaches its peak, the blessing window will close.”
Naomi Hardin drew a slow breath and tightened her fingers around the bouquet in her hands, careful not to crush the moon lilies she had spent hours arranging.
This was the ninth time she had stood beneath the ceremonial arch waiting for Julian Ravencrest to claim her as his Luna.
Eight times, he had offered her an explanation. The first ceremony had been canceled after rogues attacked Ravencrest’s eastern border, while the fourth had ended before it began because his father had supposedly suffered a heart seizure. At the eighth, Priya Kade had fallen down a staircase only hours before the ceremony, and Julian had remained at her bedside until dawn.
Every excuse had sounded reasonable when it came from the man Naomi loved, so she had defended him when the pack whispered and forgiven him when he failed to apologize.
Tonight, however, there could be no tenth chance.
Once the moon passed its peak, the season’s final blessing window would end, leaving their mate bond unregistered before the Werewolf Council. Naomi would lose the Luna title she had spent five years preparing to carry, and her younger brother, Leo, would lose his chance at permanent enrollment in Ravencrest’s cardiac program.
“Five minutes,” the priest warned.
Uneasy whispers traveled through the ceremonial clearing, where hundreds of pack members had gathered to witness what was rapidly becoming another public humiliation.
“Maybe the Alpha finally came to his senses,” a she-wolf said from the front row. “No Ravencrest heir should have a wolfless Omega for a Luna.”
Her companion laughed behind one hand. “Assuming she could give him an heir.”
Naomi kept her back straight even as their amusement pressed against wounds that had never fully healed. She had endured their contempt for five years, always believing Julian’s eventual claiming would prove that the Moon Goddess had chosen her despite everything she lacked.
A sudden creak silenced the crowd.
The tall oak doors at the entrance of the ceremonial grounds swung open, and relief rushed through Naomi so swiftly that her knees nearly gave way.
Julian had come.
Dressed in a black ceremonial suit, he strode toward the altar with the commanding confidence of an Alpha who had never needed to question whether others would obey him. His broad shoulders filled the jacket perfectly, and his handsome face looked as composed as it always did before a Council meeting.
Naomi almost smiled before she noticed the woman holding his arm.
Priya Kade wore a white dress that fell loosely around her slender body, while one hand rested over her stomach in a gesture that seemed too deliberate to be innocent. Silver gleamed at her throat, drawing Naomi’s attention to a crescent-shaped pendant set with pale blue diamonds.
It was the Ravencrest Luna necklace.
Five years earlier, Julian’s mother had shown Naomi the heirloom and promised to fasten it around her neck after the marking ceremony. Every Luna in the Ravencrest bloodline had worn it, yet now it rested against Priya’s skin as if it had always belonged there.
By the time they stopped before the altar, the relief inside Naomi had hardened into dread.
“Julian, why is she wearing that?”
He looked at her without answering, his expression holding none of the guilt or urgency she had expected.
Priya gave Naomi a gentle smile that never reached her eyes. “We thought it would be kinder if you heard the news from us.”
From her purse, she removed a folded medical report embossed with the Ravencrest crest, holding it where the priest and Council witnesses could see it.
Naomi ignored the document. “What news?”
“I’m pregnant.”
The clearing became so quiet that the rustle of leaves in the surrounding forest sounded unnaturally loud.
Naomi turned to Julian, searching his face for confusion, denial, or anything that would prove she had misunderstood. “What does her pregnancy have to do with our ceremony?”
His jaw tightened before he answered.
“The pup is mine.”
The words hit her like a physical blow. Naomi staggered back a step, the silk of her dress rustling loudly in the silence.
"What... what the hell did you just say?" she whispered. Her mind resisted their meaning and searched for another explanation.
Then she saw Priya’s hand covering Julian’s, their fingers intertwined beneath the fall of her white sleeve, and the truth tore through every lie Naomi had used to survive the last five years.
“How long have you been sleeping with her?”
“Naomi, watch your tongue.”
A brittle laugh escaped her. “You brought your pregnant mistress to our marking ceremony, and you’re blaming my tongue?”
Several wolves lowered their gazes, although whether from embarrassment or pity, Naomi could not tell.
Julian exhaled as his patience thinned. “What happened between Priya and me was an accident, but the child is innocent, and Ravencrest needs an heir."
"We cannot allow a personal disagreement to destabilize the entire pack.”
A personal disagreement.
He spoke as though her heartbreak were an administrative problem he could settle with the correct terms.
Priya stepped closer, touching the Luna necklace as she adopted an expression of practiced regret.
“I have no intention of taking your place. Julian says you can still complete the ceremony and remain Luna, while I stay out of your way until the baby is born.”
“While wearing my necklace?”
A flicker of satisfaction crossed Priya’s face before she lowered her eyes. “Julian thought the mother of his heir should wear it tonight.”
Naomi’s jaw tightened as the moon lilies crumpled between her fingers.
Priya stroked her stomach. “Once my son is born, you may help raise him. He will need guidance from the pack’s official Luna, and perhaps caring for him will give your life a purpose.”
Naomi stared at her. “You want me to raise the child you conceived with my mate?”
“Enough,” Julian said, stepping between them as the priest glanced anxiously at the moon. “The blessing window is closing, so we will settle this now.”