Aria
The tires crunched on the gravel of the Vale Lodge driveway—a sound that felt dangerously loud in the silent, tense bubble Lucian and I occupied. He drove the pack truck like a weapon, and his Alpha scent, sharp with residual dominance and fury from the Blackwood house, overwhelmed the air inside the cab.
When he stopped the engine, the silence was worse.
"You didn't have to do that," I said, finally finding my voice. It came out thin and shaky.
He turned off the dome light and looked at me, his eyes dark, reflecting the mansion's imposing structure. "Yes, I did. He put his hands on you. He was trying to use Lyra as leverage. That is unacceptable on every level."
"He's Lyra's father."
"He forfeited that right when he rejected you and tried to sell her soul for money. The paperwork is signed. He's gone. It's over." Lucian opened his door but paused, leaning back in. "You are not going back to that house alone, Aria."
"I'm not a child you need to shelter, Lucian." I pushed past the physical wave of his presence, hurrying out of the truck. "You need to focus on Lyra. She's your mate. She needs you to be the Alpha who protects her, not the reckless pup who… who makes mistakes."
He followed me up the grand steps to the side entrance, his strides eating up the distance. "Mistakes?" His voice dropped, suddenly low and lethal. "Is that what you call it? Because I remember that passionate night? Aria, I remember everything."
We stopped just inside the cold marble entryway. The house was silent, as if waiting for our arrival.
"It was heartbreak, Lucian," I whispered, my voice thick with tears I refused to shed. "It was the wine, rejection, and the raw, desperate need to feel like I hadn't failed after Damien cheated. You were the available option. You were kind. It was a temporary moment of sex. It was meaningless. It was a mistake I pray every day Lyra never learns about. I'm eight years older."
"Eight years." He scoffed, the sound harsh against the quiet. "You throw my age around like it's a weakness. I just handled a crisis involving your ex-mate, secured Lyra's future, and managed the security of this entire district in the past hour. I am the Alpha."
"I am thirty-three, Lucian! I raised a daughter, survived rejection, watched you bond with my child. You are twenty-five. You have a whole life ahead of you that is supposed to be clean, untainted by your Luna's mother. The fact that you are clinging to that night proves you are a pup, letting lust cloud your judgment when you need to be a leader!"
His jaw clenched. The air crackled with suppressed power. "Lust is what made me find you safe tonight. I felt your fear, I felt his rage, I crossed half the Pack lands in a second to get to you. Don't confuse what I feel for you with childish impulse. It is stronger than the air in my lungs."
I couldn't breathe. I couldn't fight the sheer conviction in his eyes.
"It has to be less," I choked out, pushing him away. "For Lyra. It has to be nothing. Do not talk to me like that again."
I spun on my heel, leaving him standing alone in the marble hall, and fled up the stairs toward my room, slamming the door shut against his overwhelming presence.
*******
Lucian
I stood there for a long time, the remnants of her desperate scent—salt, jasmine, and fear—clinging to the cool air. A pup. A mistake. Her words felt like a physical wound, cutting deeper than any threat to my new title. I was the Alpha now. I had no room for weakness, and Aria was a gaping, beautiful weakness I couldn't control.
The weight of my sudden, unwanted crown pressed down. I finally moved, heading not toward my new Alpha suite, but toward the relative solitude of the private wing I had occupied just before the Mating Ceremony.
I poured a glass of whiskey, the ice clinking so loud, an intrusive sound in the quiet mansion. I was supposed to be celebrating. Instead, I was fighting with the mother of my Luna, eight years my senior, over a night I refused to call a mistake.
And for the reason Lyra was my Luna in the first place…
Two Weeks Ago, at Alpha Rowan's Private Wing
It had been a subtle failing at first—a persistent cough, a shortness of breath. Alpha Rowan had spent the last year silently preparing me, but never admitting the severity.
Flashback: The Morning of the Ceremony
I stood by my father's bedside in his private wing. He looked decades older than his years, gray and fragile. My mother, Helena, the Luna, stood sentinel by the window, her expression grim.
"You know the truth, Lucian," Rowan whispered, his voice rattling. "The old poison from the northern treaty attack. It has accelerated. I won't see the dawn of the next day. The Pack needs continuity."
Helena stepped forward, her voice brisk, efficient, already in command. "The Elder is aware. The Mating Ceremony has been moved to this afternoon. The moment the bond is sealed, you will take the mantle. There can be no gap in leadership."
Rowan nodded weakly. "It must be done. Lyra is a good girl, Lucian. She will be a good Luna. You must protect her as you must protect the Pack."
I drained the content in the glass.
I intended to keep my vow to protect her, rushing the bond and taking the oath however turned what should've been triumph into tragedy.
Flashback: The Aftermath of the Mating
The moment my father's life force vanished, the Great Hall plunged into chaos. While the pack physician and elders moved the body, Lyra, overwhelmed, was quickly escorted to her chambers by a trusted female guard.
I, Lucian, Alpha-elect, was left with my mother, Helena. She grabbed my arm, her grip surprisingly strong.
"Go to the Alpha's private study. Now." Her command was sharp, devoid of any grief.
In the study, not five minutes after my father's passing, Helena sat behind the massive oak desk—his desk—staring at me with calculating eyes.
"Your father's death is sudden, Lucian. The timing is… opportune for some rivals. I have already contacted my brother's Pack Leader. He will offer support."
"Mother, he's barely cold. What are you talking about?" I demanded, shock battling raw grief.
"I am talking about power," she hissed, slamming her palm flat on the desk. "You are young, your Luna is a wolfless child, and the Pack must see strength. I am the former Luna. I have the experience. I will convene an emergency council with the Elders tomorrow morning to formalize a temporary role for me—an Alpha Regent—to assist you until Lyra manifests her wolf."
A blatant power grab. The thought flashed, hot and immediate. She wasn't offering support; she was inserting herself directly into the chain of command, using my age and Lyra's vulnerability as her justification.
"There will be no regent," I said, the words suddenly solid, commanded by the new, heavy force in my core. "I am the Alpha. I do not need a regent."
Helena's eyes glittered with a predator's triumph as she smiled. "They respect me," she said, and I felt the cold grip of inevitability as the Elders aligned with her darkness.
The threat of my mother, the former Luna, was a cancer on my rule before it even began. And Aria, with her desperate rejection, was a poison to my heart.
I am the Alpha. The phrase was less a declaration and more a desperate anchor. I had a Pack to save, a grieving Luna to guide, and a mother to neutralize. I had no time to be a pup.
The whiskey did nothing to mute the memory of Aria's lips on mine, or the searing sting of her calling our night a mistake. I didn't care if she was thirty-three, or if she was Lyra's mother. She was mine in a way Lyra, in her innocence, could never be.
I wasn't ready to let her go.