Jasmine's POV

The shackles bit into my wrists before I even understood what was happening.

"Jasmine Bridge." Father's voice cracked across the workshop like a whip. Two enforcers had my arms before I could set down the herb bundle I'd been sorting.

“You’re coming with us,” Father said. “Now.”

"What's going on?" I tried to twist free, but their grip only tightened. "Father, what did I do?"

He didn't answer. He hadn't been the same father since Mother died and he remarried. The stepchildren his new wife brought with her had become his favorites—especially after I turned sixteen and still failed to awaken my wolf.

From that day on, Damon and Cecilia became his family. And I became an embarrassment he kept fed just enough to work.

The enforcers dragged me through the pack house, past doors that opened a crack as we passed. Frightened faces appeared in the gaps, only to vanish again the moment I looked at them.

Nobody wanted to be seen looking at me.

By the time we reached the Great Hall, my knees were scraped raw from where I'd stumbled on the stone steps. The hall was packed.

Pack elders lined the walls. Warriors stood near every exit. At the center of them all was Alpha Marcus Thorne, his face dark with fury.

“Where is she?” he demanded. “Where is Cecilia?”

My stomach tightened.

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen her since dinner last night.”

"You're lying." My father—Beta Lucien—crossed the floor in three strides.

The back of his hand struck my cheek hard enough to snap my head sideways. Pain burst across my face, and no one in the hall flinched.

“You expect us to believe Cecilia vanished the night before her wedding,” Father said, “and her own sister knows nothing about it?”

“Stepsister,” I corrected before common sense could stop me. I slowly turned my face back toward him. “And yes. That’s exactly what I expect you to believe, because it’s the truth.”

A low laugh came from beside one of the pillars.

Damon.

My stepbrother lounged against the stone with his arms folded across his chest, dressed in the black uniform of a senior pack warrior. He looked perfectly at ease, as though I had been dragged into the hall for his personal entertainment.

“Still pretending you had nothing to do with it?” he asked.

“Still pretending cruelty makes you interesting?” I retorted.

His smile sharpened. Damon had been tormenting me since the day his mother brought him into our home. He hid my food when we were children, ruined my clothes before pack ceremonies, and made sure everyone heard whenever he called me wolfless.

Father always dismissed it as harmless teasing.

Damon and I both knew better.

“You’ve hated Cecilia for years,” he said. “You could barely look at her without choking on jealousy.”

“I was usually too busy cleaning up after her to look at her at all.”

Damon pushed away from the pillar and walked toward me.

Unlike me, he had awakened a powerful wolf. He never missed an opportunity to remind me of the difference between us. He stopped just beyond the reach of my chains and looked down at me, his expression bright with arrogant amusement.

“Careful, Jasmine. That mouth is the only thing about you anyone notices, and even that is getting tiresome.”

“Then stop talking to me.”

He leaned closer, lowering his voice just enough to make the insult feel personal.

“Admit it. You couldn’t stand watching Cecilia become the future Luna while you spent the rest of your life sorting herbs and scrubbing floors. A wolfless Omega like you would do anything to steal one night of her importance.”

“I don’t want Cecilia’s life.”

“No,” Damon said. “You just want everything she has.” His eyes moved over my soaked, worn dress with deliberate contempt. “Her status. Her beauty. Father’s love.”

That last one struck where he intended it to.

“Look at you,” Damon said coldly. “You did have a talent for causing trouble. Just like your mother. I suppose some things run in the blood.”

My hands curled into fists inside the shackles.

“Don’t talk about my mother.”

"Why not?" He smiled, slow and cold. "Everyone in this hall remembers what she was. I'd say you're doing a fine job carrying on the family tradition.”

Something ugly twisted in my chest, but I didn't get the chance to retort.

The doors at the far end slammed open hard enough to rattle the windows, and the entire hall fell silent in the space of a single heartbeat. Lucas Thorne walked in like the temperature dropped ten degrees with every step.

He was Alpha Marcus’s son, Moonvale’s heir—and the man Cecilia was supposed to marry tomorrow. Instead, he looked like he wanted to tear the building down stone by stone. His eyes found me immediately, locking on with a focus that made my stomach drop.

"You." His voice was quiet. That was somehow worse than shouting. "Where is my bride?"

"I already told everyone—I don't know."

"Funny. You don't look like you're trying very hard to remember."

He nodded once at the enforcer beside the wall, and before I understood what was happening, a bucket of ice water hit me full in the face. I gasped, choking, hair plastered across my eyes. The cold dragged a sound out of me.

"There." Lucas crouched slightly, tilting his head to study me like I was a puzzle he found mildly interesting. "Memory's clearer when you're cold. Try again. Where is she?"

"I don't—"

A second bucket caught me across the shoulder.

I dropped to one knee, choking as water streamed down my face. The stone tore through the thin fabric covering my skin.

“I told you,” I forced out through chattering teeth. “I don’t know.”

Lucas crouched in front of me.

He was close enough that I could feel the heat coming from his body despite the icy water dripping down my neck.

“You were the last person to see her.”

“I saw her at dinner. So did half the pack.”

“You lived under the same roof.”

“That doesn’t mean she told me anything.”

His fingers closed around my jaw.

“Either you tell me where she is right now, or I promise you, what happens next will make you wish for something as simple as death.”

Fear crawled through me, cold and instinctive.

I swallowed it.

“Maybe she couldn’t stand the thought of marrying a man who only knows how to threaten people.” My voice shook, but it carried through the silent hall. “Did you ever consider that, Alpha Heir?”

Lucas’s pupils contracted. Gold flooded through them in an instant, raw and animal.

The grip on my jaw tightened until I thought the bone would snap. "Say that again."

“Lucas.”

Alpha Marcus’s hand landed on his son’s shoulder.

“Don’t waste your strength on her,” he said. “Lock her up. We will have an answer ready before the wedding.”

An answer.

I understood exactly what that meant.

They weren’t interested in discovering the truth. They only needed someone weak enough to blame so Cecilia’s disappearance would stop humiliating the Alpha family.

And there was no one in that hall better suited to serve as their scapegoat than me.

A wolfless Omega.

No status. No allies.

Not even a father willing to defend me.

I clenched my fists inside my sleeves.

Before Mother died, she had promised me everything would change when I turned eighteen.

That day was almost here.

Until then, I only had to survive.

**

The dungeon was cold despite the hot weather outside. I sat on the damp floor with my knees pulled to my chest, staring into the darkness. Hunger gnawed at my stomach. And my wrists still ached from the shackles.

Hours had passed since Lucas ordered me thrown in here. No one had come. Not even my father.

Footsteps eventually echoed through the corridor. I lifted my head.

Several elders were approaching, their voices carrying clearly through the stone passage. Father was walking with them.

“The bride’s disappearance cannot simply be swept aside,” one elder said. “The entire territory knows the wedding was supposed to happen tomorrow. This makes the Alpha Heir look weak.”

“Alpha Marcus wants a solution before sunrise,” another replied.

“Executing the Omega may be enough to satisfy him.”

My breath caught.

There was only one Omega locked in the dungeon.

“What do you say, Beta Lucien?” the first elder asked. “She is your daughter, after all.”

My chest tightened.

Some small, stupid part of me waited for Father to object.

“If that is what the pack requires,” he said, “I have no objection.”

The words slipped between my ribs more cleanly than any blade.

I went rigid against the bars.

For years, I had told myself there had to be a reason Father treated me the way he did. Maybe I had disappointed him. Maybe seeing me reminded him too much of Mother. Maybe if I worked harder, spoke less, and caused no trouble, he would remember that I was his daughter.

Now I finally understood the truth. He simply did not care whether I lived or died.

When the footsteps finally faded, I got to my feet. I was not going to wait in that cell for my father to approve my execution.

I was getting out.

**

An hour later, I was crawling through an abandoned drainage tunnel beneath the pack grounds.

The loose bar behind the storage alcove had taken nearly forty minutes to pry free. Mud coated my hands and knees. Filthy water soaked through my dress, and the stone ceiling scraped my back whenever the tunnel narrowed.

I kept moving.

The old drain ran beneath the northern wall and emptied into the forest. The servants had stopped using it years ago, after tree roots cracked half the tunnel.

I had discovered it as a child.

I squeezed through the narrow opening and fell onto wet leaves, dragging in my first breath of fresh air.

Then my heart nearly stopped.

Someone was standing a few feet away.

Lucas.

Moonlight cut across his dark hair as he leaned against a tree, his arms folded over his chest. He looked completely unsurprised to see me crawl out of the mud.

As if he had been waiting for this exact moment.

His gaze dropped to the drainage opening behind me. “So how do you deny now?”

I forced myself to stand. “What are you talking about?”

“We found Cecilia’s scent in this tunnel.” His voice was almost conversational. “A strip of fabric from her nightdress was caught on one of the roots. The trail vanished the moment she reached the forest.”

My stomach sank.

Lucas stepped away from the tree.

“I had the guards leave the passage unsealed,” he continued. “I wanted to see who else knew about it.”

It had been a trap.

He had never accidentally left me with a way out. He had waited for me to condemn myself by using the same route Cecilia had taken.

“I found this tunnel years ago,” I said quickly. “I didn’t know Cecilia used it.”

“And you expect me to believe that both sisters chose the same hidden escape route by coincidence?”

“Yes, because that’s what happened.”

“Liar.”

I turned and ran, but I had no wolf—there was no way I could outrun a grown Alpha Heir.

Lucas closed the distance in seconds, his hand closing around my throat and slamming me back against the nearest tree. Pain exploded through my spine.

“Who gave you permission to turn your back on me?”

His fingers tightened, and my feet left the ground.

The air vanished from my lungs, and panic clawed through my chest. I grabbed his wrist, but I might as well have been fighting iron.

Lucas’s eyes burned gold.

“None of you respect me, do you?” he snarled. “First Cecilia humiliates me by running away. Now you try to follow her.”

Darkness pressed in at the edges of my vision.

Then he released me. I crumpled onto the forest floor, coughing violently as air tore back into my lungs.

Lucas stood over me. A slow, cruel smile spread across his face.

“Killing you here would be too merciful.”

Before I could crawl away, he seized my arm and dragged me upright.

He hauled me back through the forest, through the pack grounds, and into the council hall. My bare feet slipped on the stone as I struggled to keep up.

The elders were still gathered inside.

Lucas threw me down in front of them.

“The wedding will proceed as planned,” he announced.

Alpha Marcus frowned. “Lucas—”

“If Cecilia does not return, her sister will pay the debt in her place.”

Lucas yanked me against him like a broken doll. I felt his breath against my ear, and there was nothing gentle in it at all.

"Trust me, Jasmine." A chill ran down my spine. "Becoming my bride will be worse than living in hell."