The Alpha Who Made Him Can Destroy Him

At the Marking Rights Auction, Sloane, my fiancé's pack-sister, outbid everyone for the first right to mark him. "Silas, we grew up in the same pack together. Your first mark has to be mine." I let out a cold laugh and slid the bond-ring off my finger, letting it hit Silas's face. "The Bonding Ceremony is in a week. You represent both packs' honor. Either step forward and deny this or watch the Thorne pack collapse." Silas stood there, jaw tight, fist clenched. Sloane cut her eyes at me, sharp with hostility. "The bond isn't even sealed yet, and she's already setting rules for you. Imagine how she'll control you once it is." He nodded slowly, looking at me like I was a minor inconvenience. "This isn't the old days, a wolf doesn't need to be unmarked to mate. Besides, Sloane spent her silver on that bid. Can't let it go to waste." I watched that pair of reckless wolves disappear into a private room together, and made my call. "Since he treats the bond like a game, the Thorne pack no longer needs to exist." --- Silas returned to the VIP lounge with his shirt disheveled, finding me just ending a call, watching him without expression. The scent-marks along his throat were impossible to miss under the chandelier light. He dropped into his seat, barely glancing at the gift I'd bid for on his behalf, voice flat. "Elara, Sloane had nothing to do with this. She just didn't want someone else claiming what's mine." "Just?" I scoffed. "Have you forgotten what rank you are now?" Silas ground his teeth and smashed the gift I'd won for him against the table. "Stop using the bond to leash me. It's not even sealed yet. Sloane only didn't want someone else's scent on me—" He stopped mid-sentence. Sloane walked in. She was wearing the jacket I had given Silas — my gift, draped over her shoulders like a trophy. "Elara, don't misread this. I was only protecting Silas. Maybe if you'd been faster with the bid, things would've gone differently." As she spoke, she deliberately parted her collar, exposing the claiming scratches on her chest. "I'm simply honoring the auction rules. I won the bid — taking what I paid for is perfectly fair, isn't it?" "That's enough, Sloane. Head back." Silas's gaze swept over me with thinly veiled contempt. "This was always just an alliance bond. I was only... gaining experience, so you'd have an easier time later." Sloane's laughter rang out through the lounge, her eyes bright with scorn. She shrugged, utterly unbothered, and said nothing more. I studied Silas's face and felt a strange distance — like looking at someone I had never known. Three years ago, he had come to me with nothing, kneeling at my feet. "Elara, I'll do anything. Just help me." My family was pushing for a bond-match at the time, so he became my answer to their pressure. Then, somehow, we fell into something that felt real. I spent those years building him up so he'd never feel lesser beside me. I personally broke a prior match agreement for him. My family warned me he was no proper fit for an Alpha. I dismissed them. In three years, I raised him from a near-bankrupt Omega to the most talked-about name in the city's shifter circles. I owed him nothing. And this was how he repaid me? "Elara, I said the bond isn't sealed. My body, my choice — what business is it of yours?" Silas stood before me, posture arrogant, tone clipped. I gave a soft, indifferent sound and didn't even look up. "Every Alpha in the city will have eyes on the Bonding Ceremony next week." "If it falls apart, you're finished. You really want it to look like this?" "Look like what?" I let my gaze settle on the scent-marks on his throat. "The way it looked when you let Sloane claim what wasn't hers?" "She's not blood-related, so it's not—" "Enough. There's nothing left to say." I waved him off, voice cold. "My mate doesn't let another wolf mark them in a back room." The resentment rising in his eyes was cut short by a voice at the door — my best friend, Lyra. Lyra spotted the marks on Silas's throat and shot me a smirk. "Spent a small fortune bidding on your man tonight, and this is what happens?" "What does any of this have to do with her?" Sloane looked at me with contempt, then stepped to Silas's side and wrapped an arm possessively around his waist. "Silas and I grew up in the same pack together. Elara? Please." The smile vanished from Lyra's face. Silas waved at her coolly. "You, out. We're—" Before he finished, Sloane kissed him, then looked at Lyra with a honeyed smile. "She's Elara's friend, isn't she? No wonder she couldn't read the room. Couldn't even scent what was between us." Her voice climbed, triumphant. "You'd cut ties with someone like that. While I was in there claiming Silas, your precious best friend was standing outside this room, completely shut out. Pathetic." Crack. Lyra's palm connected with Sloane's cheek. Silas lunged forward, eyes bloodshot. "You hit her? Do you have a death wish?" I looked at both of them with cold disgust and turned to Lyra. "Leave it. Don't dirty your hands." "Elara, stop here." Silas grabbed my arm. "You think you can just leave after she strikes someone? Not how this works." Sloane pressed a hand to her face, seething. "By pack hierarchy, she should be calling me elder. Touch me again and I'll make sure your Bonding Ceremony never happens." "You'll regret this." She snatched her coat from the couch and slammed the door behind her.

The door hadn't even swung shut before Silas's hand cracked across my face. "Elara, what is wrong with you? Over something this small — you think I owe you that much?" "If anything happens to Sloane, you'll answer for it." I stared at the unbridled accusation in his eyes and felt my throat tighten. Three years of everything I had given — worth less to him than Sloane's one moment of temper. I watched him walk away and picked up my phone. "Cut every alliance contract with the Thorne pack. Effective immediately." I hadn't been home long when I found Silas and his father waiting in the front hall. "Elara," his father started, "I heard the alliances were cancelled—" I set the bond-seal on the table between us, face blank. "Not just the alliances. Since you're both here, just consider this bond dissolved as well." Silas's father went pale and nearly lost his footing. "This— the Ceremony is days away. Don't act out of anger—" I glanced at Silas and laughed quietly. "You already kept a she-wolf at your side like a future mate. Why did you ever need my pack's alliance?" His father stiffened and looked at Silas. "What is she talking about?" Silas said nothing. I smiled. "Nothing to say? Then let me." "Your son has been running a forbidden bond with his own pack-sister. Since they've been den-mates since pups, she'd make a fine mate. Still family, after all." Silas's expression remained flat, unbothered. "Elara, who are you to me now? Since when is any of this your concern?" Three years ago, he knelt before me over his mother's relic, a piece of her he couldn't bear to lose, and begged. The always-proud Silas, bowing for the first time. "Elara, just help me please. I'll stay by your side." His eyes were stubborn then. There was no warmth in them when he looked at me. Once I gave him what he needed, he kept his distance, voice stiff. "Elara. This is a transaction. Not a bond or feelings." I was the fool who believed that enough warmth could change that. In three years, Silas used my connections to rebuild his pack from the edge of ruin into one of the city's rising powers. I understand now — loyalty is like the markets. One-sided investment yields nothing. I gave everything. He kept nothing for me. "I failed as a father." "After everything the Thorne pack has done in your service — can't you find it in yourself to give him one more chance—" His father moved to kneel. "Dad. I'll handle it." Silas steered him out. When he returned, the look he gave me could have curdled blood. "Elara, it was nothing. Did you really have to use the alliances to threaten my father?" "Threaten?" I laughed. He had a gift for twisting the truth. "I've let too much slide. Have you forgotten what it means to betray me?" He stumbled back a step. His phone rang. "Sloane, where are you?" Whatever she said made him look at me with pure hatred. "I swear I'm not marrying her. Just calm down—" He hung up, pulled the bond-seal token from his coat, and threw it on the floor. "Elara — Sloane just drove to the cliffside. She's threatening to go over the edge because of this bond business. If you have any conscience left, stop pushing us."

I looked at the naked threat in his eyes and felt something close to amusement. This was the wolf I had protected and cared about for three years — and for a vicious, born-trouble pack-sister, he would say this. The last of my illusions cracked clean. He was exactly what he had always been. "So?" I looked at the bond-seal he'd thrown down. "As you wish. The bond is dissolved. — Escort them out." Silas trembled with rage. "You'll pay for this, Elara." Perhaps stung by the loss, he made his next move by morning. I stepped outside to find my car, my limited-run, one-of-a-kind coupe, reduced to a wreck of twisted metal at my gate. The key fob was gone from the hook inside. Sloane had taken it. My chest went cold. A car, no matter its worth, was replaceable. But hanging from the mirror had been my grandmother's moonstone amulet, the only relic she left me. Silas called before I could move. "A little gift, Elara. Like it? That's what happens when you provoke Sloane." I stared at the wreckage, voice low. "Where is the amulet?" His tone dripped with disdain. "Want it back? Come get it yourself." "Silas. Touch that amulet and I promise you that you will not survive what comes next." He scoffed. "Drop the act. You're just a pampered Alpha playing house. The Thorne pack runs this city now. Come at us." I had my driver take me to the Thorne estate, jaw set. My phone rang again. I nearly declined — then saw the name and drew a slow breath before answering. Killian's voice came through, carrying its usual stillness. "Elara. The bond ceremony — are you certain it's not a reaction?" I pressed two fingers to my temple. "Do I seem like the type to gamble a pack alliance on a reaction?" "No," he said, and there was a quiet smile in it. "But you seem like the type who let a man cloud your instincts." "That's why I came to a clear-headed ally." "Your pack wants the European territory. My channels are the fastest route. We both gain." Killian was quiet for a moment. "I don't want a cold alliance built on broken bonds." "From today, that's not what this is." I told the driver to move faster and added, almost as an afterthought, "See you at the Bonding Ceremony." I'd barely ended the call when a horn screamed from somewhere close. A truck — moving like something had cut its brakes — came directly at the rear of my car, headlights blinding. Impact. The frame buckled. Heat bloomed down the side of my face. The pain swallowed my vision. Through the shattered window, I saw Sloane stumble out of the truck's cab — and in her hand, something glowed with a soft, familiar light. My grandmother's moonstone amulet. "This looks expensive," she said. I tried to drag myself out. My ribs wouldn't allow it — every movement sent white fire through my body. "Put it down—" "Put it down?" She kicked my crumpled door. "You clung to Silas for three years. When are you going to let us go?" She raised her arm and brought the amulet down against the asphalt. The crack of it split through me. "Sloane!" Blood rose in my throat. "That belonged to my grandmother—" "Doesn't matter who it belonged to." She grabbed my blood-soaked collar and hauled me toward the open air. She jabbed at the marks on her own throat. "These are Silas's marks. He said no one else gets to touch him — ever." "Did you really think he loved you? You were a funding source. That's all." Her voice grew louder, sharper, high with excitement. "You know what you are? A stepping stone. The ladder Silas and I used to climb. Crook his finger and you'd hand over your life." She looked down at me and began to laugh — wild, unhinged. "Elara. You love him so much — why don't you die for him today?" Then she grabbed a fistful of my hair and drove my head into the ground.

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