Celeste sliced through the crowd the moment later, all gold and glide, smiling like a spotlight as she took up position beside Kieran.
“Alpha Kieran,” she said, brushing his sleeve. “Welcome to Silvercrest. We were just talking about our pack traditions. And our charitable work—I manage two funds.”
She offered warmth, but he was gravity. His amber eyes flicked to her, polite, then veered back to me as if I were magnetic north.
My wolf surged against my ribs, the mate bond drumming ‘want, want, want’ until every inhale felt like treachery.
I stood too still and tried to look like air while Celeste relentlessly talked.
“We’ve expanded our neonatal fund. Harper’s expecting, as you can see. The family is at our center.” She laughed, touching his forearm with practiced ease, a move she’d perfected since childhood.
People usually leaned in to her shine, but Kieran didn’t bite. His gaze kept being pulled to me while I sipped water I couldn’t taste. The room burned too bright. The bond throbbed, each beat a lash: mine.
I concentrated on breathing without making a sound.
Celeste’s smile tightened when she began turning to me. The burgundy wine leapt like a ribbon. Her glass tipped, and a dark wave cascaded over my dress, soaking fast.
“Oh no!” Gasps. Sympathy noises. Celeste pressed a hand to her chest, eyes glossy with dismay that didn’t reach down to where truth lives. “Harper! I’m so terribly—”
“Celeste.” Weston detonated. Not a shout—an execution. “What is wrong with you? She’s pregnant. Are you fucking blind? Towels. Now.” He snapped at a server before pivoting, shielding me with his body. “Are you alright, honey?”
“I’m fine,” I said, the stain carving a jagged line through silk. “It’s nothing.”
Celeste’s mouth trembled. “I’m truly—”
“Shut up,” Weston cut.
That made something small and sharp show its teeth on her face before she smoothed it away, retreating from me.
Weston turned to me, his hands suddenly gentle on my shoulders. "Are you alright? The baby?"
"I'm fine." I touched my belly where Ava kicked in response. "Just need to change."
"I'll come with you—"
"No." I placed a hand on his chest. "Stay. Alpha Kieran's time is valuable. I'll only be in a moment."
I escaped before he could protest, feeling Kieran's burning gaze follow my retreat like a physical touch. The hallway's air was cooler, the carpets swallowing sound, the family portraits suddenly riveting because looking at them meant not looking at amber eyes.
Shadows made a pocket near a side door and I stepped into it, trying to breathe the bond down. It didn’t work.
"Harper."
His voice stopped me cold. I didn't turn, couldn't turn, as his footsteps approached.
The mate bond sang louder with each step until he was there. His massive frame blocking any escape, his scent—pine and honeysucle—overwhelming my senses.
"Please don't…" I whispered.
"Don't what?" His control finally snapped, voice rough with barely contained need. "Don't acknowledge what we both feel? Don't mention that my wolf is going insane? That every cell in my body is screaming that you're mine?"
"I'm not yours." The lie tasted like acid while I stared at the knot of his tie because his eyes were a cliff edge.
His composure cracked. “My control is finite. Lie to me again and I will break it.”
The bond roared. Ava turned within me and my palm went instinctively to my belly.
"You may carry his child but you don't belong to him." Kieran moved closer, not touching but near enough that his heat wrapped around me. "I can feel your wolf calling to mine. We're true mates, Harper."
“It doesn't matter. Go back,” I said. “Your delegation—”
"Doesn't matter?" Pain bled through his voice. "I have waited years. Do you know what these years have been like? We were friends, Harper. Real friends. Those letters meant everything to me. You were everything to me."
My heart shattered and tears burned my eyes. The letters. Our secret correspondence that had made me feel less alone until Father found them.
"You stopped writing," Kieran continued, his voice breaking. "Six months of letters, of sharing everything, and then... nothing. No explanation. No goodbye. You just vanished from my life like I meant nothing."
"Kieran…"
"I wrote to you for months after. Begging you to tell me what I'd done wrong. If I'd offended you. If someone had threatened you." His hand reached toward my face but stopped inches away, trembling with restraint. "I never stopped looking for you. Never stopped hoping you'd explain why you disappeared."
Guilt found old bruises inside me and pressed. My father’s hand, the belt, the smoke of burning pages. I locked my jaw. “I had reasons.”
“I can smell your reasons.” Heat flared in his eyes. “They smell like fear as I find you here, carrying another Alpha's child while our mate bond screams between us.”
“My reason has a name: Ava.” I lifted my chin. “I belong to Weston. I carry his heir. That is the beginning and the end.”
His gaze didn’t soften. It cooled, a lake icing over. “So that’s your fairytale? Engaged to a man who lets his pack members whisper shit about you."
"What?"
"I've been here two hours, Harper. Two hours of hearing them gossip about how you're not good enough to be Luna. How Weston would be better suited to your sister. How you trapped him with the pregnancy.”
My mouth went copper. “People gossip. It means nothing.”
“It means something when your Alpha lets it stand.” His tone dropped a degree with each word. “When he doesn’t break their faces on the floor for speaking filth about his pregnant fiancée. I should end him for that alone.”
"Stop."
"He doesn't deserve you. He doesn't protect you. He doesn't—"
"Harper?" Weston's voice cut through the hallway like a blade. "What's going on here?"
His footsteps approached fast, suspicion darkening his features at finding us alone. I made my choice in a heartbeat, my performance flawless as I swayed.
"Weston," I gasped, before Kieran could answer, and let my knees soften, collapsing against his chest when he reached us. "I'm dizzy. The wine smell, the stress..."
His arms caught me instantly, going from suspicious to protective in seconds. "You should have called for me."
"Alpha Kieran was just making sure I was alright," I whispered, playing fragile perfectly. "But I think I need to lie down."
"Of course." Weston's concern seemed genuine as he supported my weight. He looked at Kieran, all business now. "I need to postpone our negotiations. My fiancée requires attention."
Kieran watched, the feral sealed away, the strategist awake and measuring. “Postpone if you must,” he said, mild now. “Take care of your…fiancée.”
Something flickered at his mouth—an almost-smile without warmth, like a blade turned flat.
Weston’s suspicion sharpened. “You’ll agree to a delay?”
"Naturally," Kieran agreed, but his predatory smile made my blood chill. "A pregnant woman's health takes priority. Besides, I find myself needing time to... reconsider my approach to this alliance."
Something in his tone made Weston stiffen. "Reconsider?"
"Think things through." Kieran's eyes found mine one last time, and what I saw there wasn't defeat.
It was a calculation. Planning. The look of an Alpha who'd just discovered exactly what he wanted and would burn the world to claim it.
He turned and walked away with controlled precision, leaving me trembling in Weston's arms while my wolf howled in agony at watching our mate leave.
"What really happened?" Weston demanded once Kieran disappeared.
"Nothing. I just felt overwhelmed." I let him guide me toward our wing. "The pregnancy, the wine incident..."
"Celeste will answer for her clumsiness," he promised darkly.
But I wasn't thinking about Celeste. I was thinking about the predatory satisfaction in Kieran's final look. He wasn't giving up.
He was just beginning.