BLURB/SYNOPSIS: "Dig. No matter the weather—rain slicing your back, sun blistering your skin, or blood soaking your hands—dig. Don’t stop. Not until your body gives out and you drop dead on a pile. Do you understand?" I heard those words every day for five years. A mantra. A sentence. Etched into my bones louder than my own name. And god, there were days I begged the earth to take me—just so I could finally stop. On the day her mother was to marry Alpha Damien, River lost the only family she had left. She never understood why her mother left their home or her past behind—but River stood by her, even as the pack eyed her like a stranger. When death came instead of vows, River was left stranded in a strange pack, mocked for being wolfless, and alone in her grief. Then came the cruelest blow—rejection from her fated mate, Gerald, the Beta's son, who discarded her like a curse. Broken and abandoned, River ran. Right into the hands of a rogue pack who saw her as nothing more than a slave. But pain has a way of awakening what’s buried deep. Over five long years, River bled, fought, and rose—from a scared pup to a fierce she-wolf. Her wolf finally answered… and she's not running anymore. Now River returns, not to be accepted. But to show them what they lost, fierce and reborn—only to find love in the most forbidden place: Alpha Damien, the man once meant to be her stepfather. Stoic, scarred, and haunted, he never expected to feel anything for the girl he once failed to protect. But fate doesn’t ask for permission. In a world that would tear them apart, they must decide—will they defy every rule to choose each other?