The sun filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows like an unwanted guest, brushing golden light over silk sheets tangled around Emma's bare legs. Her lashes fluttered open, and for a moment—just one—she forgot where she was. Then the weight of silence hit her. Cold. Wide. Empty.
Sebastian Vale was gone.
Not that she expected a good morning kiss or sweet nothings. The man barely looked at her last night after… claiming her like a possession. No words. Just hands like fire and eyes like ice. Their wedding night was a transaction written in blood and bruises.
Emma sat up slowly. Her muscles ached in protest—some from stress, some from what came after the vows—and her heart ached from everything else. Her wrists bore faint red marks where he'd pinned her, and her lips still felt the sting of his kiss—if it could even be called that. There was no tenderness in it. Just ownership.
The scent of him still clung to the sheets. Expensive cologne, whiskey, and the barely restrained wildness of a predator in disguise.
She wrapped the sheet around herself and swung her legs off the bed, her bare feet brushing cool marble. The bedroom was elegant, dark, and far too sterile for someone with so much fire beneath the surface. Just like him.
A knock came, brisk and cold.
She didn't answer. The door opened anyway.
A woman in a crisp gray uniform stepped inside—middle-aged, perfectly groomed, and judging Emma with a single glance. "The Alpha expects you downstairs for breakfast. You have fifteen minutes." No smile. No welcome.
Emma stood. "And if I don't feel like eating?"
The maid's lips twitched. "It's not about feeling, Luna. It's about duty."
Luna. The word fell heavy in the room, as if the walls themselves didn't believe it.
Emma nodded once. "Tell him I'll be there in ten."
The mirror was a liar.
It showed her a stranger—bruised, regal, quiet rage in her amber eyes. Her long dark hair fell in waves down her back, unruly and wild. She wrapped herself in one of the silk robes from the walk-in closet—his closet—and took one last look at herself.
"I didn't come here to fall in love," she whispered to the glass. "I came here to survive."
At dining table (during morning breakfast)
The penthouse dining hall was more like a boardroom carved from obsidian and glass. The city skyline stretched endlessly behind Sebastian, who sat at the head of the long table, dressed in a suit darker than sin. He didn't look up as she entered.
Not even a flicker of acknowledgment.
Emma's heels echoed against the marble as she crossed the floor and sat opposite him. A steaming cup of coffee sat waiting. Not for comfort—just formality.
Emma sat at the long mahogany dining table, a porcelain teacup cradled between her fingers like a delicate weapon. The light streaming through the tall glass windows kissed her bare shoulders where the silk robe dipped low.
Sebastian turned a page in the file he was reading. "You're late."
"You're breathing," she replied, sipping the coffee. "Miracles happen every day."
A faint twitch of his jaw. Victory.
She scanned the room—no one else. No warm welcome. Just silence, broken by the occasional flick of his pen. He hadn't even bothered to glance at her bruises. Not that she expected concern.
"I assume we'll be discussing the pack today?" she asked after a long moment.
"No."
A pause. "You married me for a reason. I'd like to know what role you expect me to play."
Sebastian finally looked up. His eyes were colder than the steel cufflinks on his wrists.
"You'll play the role of my wife. Publicly. Nothing more."
Emma smiled sweetly. "So I'm a pawn with a pulse."
"You're smart," he murmured. "That's dangerous."
ENTRY OF NEW FACES
Before she could answer, the door opened, and the temperature dropped.
Three women stepped in like sin and ice had mated.
She could feel the gaze of every woman at the table. Sebastian's inner circle was present: Lysandra—the icy beauty with secrets in her smirk; Camilla—the sweet one, always watching; and then Celeste—the mistress with blood-red lips and claws coated in diamonds.
The first, tall and sleek in a midnight suit, moved with the controlled grace of someone used to being obeyed. Sharp cheekbones, shoulder-length black hair, and a pair of calculating grey eyes that landed on Emma with the precision of a blade. And Sebastian started introducing them.
"Lysandra Vale," Sebastian said, not looking up again. "My cousin. Beta of the East Wing."
"Camilla Vale, my second cousin, still studying."
The third woman wore red. Blood red. Her golden curls framed a face too beautiful to trust, and her lips curved in a smile that promised pain. "And Celeste Deveraux," Sebastian added flatly. "You've met before, haven't you, Emma?"
"No," Emma said, cool as winter. "But I've seen her kind before."
Celeste's smile widened like a snake baring its fangs.
They took their seats beside Sebastian, forming a triangle around Emma that felt anything but accidental.
"So you're the Luna," Lysandra said, tone velvet and disdain. "Doesn't look like much, does she, Celeste?"
Celeste leaned forward, chin resting delicately on her hand. "She's…different. Most women don't survive Sebastian's touch."
Emma didn't blink. "Most women don't bite back."
The silence that followed wasn't awkward. It was electric.
Sebastian glanced up then, just briefly—but it was enough. He was watching. Not her body. Her presence.
She smiled politely and sliced into her croissant with surgical precision.
Let them watch.
Let them underestimate.
Celeste leaned back in her seat, sipping orange juice like it was wine. "So," she said, the word sharp and smiling, "did you two have a good night?"
Emma didn't even flinch. "Restful," she murmured, brushing invisible lint off her robe. "After all, nothing puts you to sleep like ownership."
Camilla coughed, trying to hide her grin.
Celeste dabbed her lips delicately with a linen napkin, though her sharp gaze never left Emma. "It's adorable," she said airily, "how you're trying to act like you belong here."
Emma didn't look up from her coffee. "It's adorable," she replied, voice smooth as silk, "how threatened you sound."
Celeste narrowed her eyes. "Don't get comfortable, darling. Being Luna isn't about robes and rings. It's about knowing your place."
Emma finally looked up, slow and languid, like a lioness who'd already won. "Oh, I do know my place. At the Alpha's side. At his table." She let her gaze drop to Celeste's empty hand. "Where's yours again?"
The tension cracked like lightning.
Lysandra smirked behind her glass, and for once, Celeste lost a little of her charm. Her red lips curled back just slightly, the corners twitching like a snake baring its fangs.
"You may have the ring, darling," Celeste purred, "but we both know who he really wants in his bed."
Emma, slow and calm—pure elegance wrapped in warning.
"And yet here I am," she said softly, tilting her head, "wearing the ring, waking in his bed, and sipping coffee across his table." She smiled with gentle cruelty. "Tell me, Celeste, how does it feel to be the footnote to someone else's headline?"
Celeste's knuckles whitened around her glass. The air shifted. Even Sebastian looked up now, watching—not stopping them, not interfering. Just observing.
Emma stood then, unfolding herself with the poise of royalty, the silk robe wrapping her like armor. Emma rose—fluid, lethal. Her chair didn't scrape. She moved like she owned every floorboard beneath her.
"I'd love to stay and compare scars, but I don't do leftovers." She added sweetly, "and more importantly, I have a kingdom to prepare for. Being Luna isn't just about surviving the Alpha's appetite, after all." Her eyes flicked down. "Some of us were built for more than just warming his sheets."
She turned to Celeste one last time. "Maybe try being more than just a pause in his appetite next time."
The room went quiet.
And Sebastian, seated at the head of the table, watched without a word. His eyes locked on Emma, expression unreadable—but something shifted in his jaw.
Emma gave him a single, elegant nod and glided out, victorious.
Celeste's expression faltered for the briefest second—barely visible, but Emma caught it.
And that was enough.
As she turned and walked away, her stride unhurried, chin high, the room shifted. She didn't raise her voice. She didn't need to. Her exit was a declaration: You can't touch me.
Behind her, silence reigned.
And from his seat, Sebastian Vale's eyes followed every step.
Emma's heels echoed down the marble corridor, the silence following her like a shadow—but not for long.
(VOICE BEHIND HER)
"Enjoying your little performance, Mrs. Vale?"
Sebastian's voice rolled like a slow tide behind her—smooth, calculated, and laced with warning.
She paused, her back still to him. "You didn't stop it."
"I didn't need to," he said. "Watching you put her in her place was... entertaining." A slow smirk in his tone. "Didn't know my wife had such sharp fangs."
She turned then, eyes gleaming like moonlit steel. "You married a wolf, not a doll."
He stepped closer. Not touching. Just close enough to feel the energy twist between them.
"You keep playing games in my house, Emma, and someone's going to bleed."
She tilted her head. "You should know by now—I don't play to win." She smiled without warmth. "I play so there's nothing left for the other side to crawl back to."
Sebastian's jaw twitched. There it was—the flicker of something behind those cold, dominant eyes. Approval? Amusement? Interest?
He didn't say. He only stepped aside, hand gesturing toward the darker wing of the penthouse.
"Explore all you want. Just don't open doors you're not ready to walk through."
Emma didn't flinch. Her voice was soft, but every word struck like ice.
"I already did that the night I married you."
Then she turned and started walking straight into the unknown.
Emma barely made it a few steps before his voice called out again—casual, cruel.
"Oh, and Emma?"
She didn't turn this time. "Yes, Alpha?"
"There's a council meeting tonight. Formal. Mandatory."
A pause. "The elders have... questions about my choice of Luna."
She looked over her shoulder, the smallest smirk playing on her lips. "Let them question. I bite."
He chuckled darkly. "You'll need more than teeth. Wear something sharp."
"I always do," she murmured, and disappeared down the corridor like stormclouds on heels.
That was when she saw it—the black door.
And the growl behind it.