I HID MY CROWN FOR YOUR LOVE. DON’T BEG ME NOW: THE UNBREAKABLE OMEGA: THE BARREN LUNA

Zara's POV "Luna Zara, they're coming over the ridge. The Alpha is home!" I set down the flower arrangement I had been adjusting for the third time and turned toward the window. Torches lit the path from the Ironstone gates all the way up to the packhouse. The whole courtyard glowed warm and gold. My heart did something I could not name. Three years. Three years I had been waiting for a night like this. Not just because Kane was finally coming home from the border campaign. Not just because I had spent two weeks making sure every candle and every dish was exactly right. I was waiting because tonight, after three years of carrying a secret that had grown heavier every single day, I was going to tell my husband the truth. I was not the omega he married. I was the daughter of High Alpha Rowan Wells, the most powerful Alpha alive. The man every Alpha in the world answered to without question. The one who settled wars between packs with a single letter and whose name alone made full-grown Alphas straighten their backs and measure their words. I had hidden it from the moment I arrived at Ironstone. I walked through the gates as nothing. No title, no name, no standing. Just a quiet omega with grey eyes and no pack record. I wanted Kane to see me, not my father's name. I wanted to know if the fated bond was real or just an advantage he would have taken from anyone. And it felt real, once. In the beginning. A month ago, my father sent his orders across the territories. Every senior pack Alpha in the region was called to push back the rogue wolf threat building at the borders. Kane answered within the day, the way he always did when the High Alpha spoke. No hesitation. No complaint. I had watched him ride out and told myself: this is the test. My father does not do anything without reason. He sent Kane on a mission of this weight to watch him. To measure him. And if Kane leads well and brings his warriors home in one piece, my father will finally see what I have always known. That Kane is the right man for his daughter. After this campaign, I was going to tell the truth. I had it all planned. I smoothed my silver dress and walked to my place at the top of the packhouse steps. The pack lined the courtyard in their best clothes. The omegas had cooked all day. The warriors stood straight and proud. Even the children were here, holding small torches. I had organized all of this. Every piece of it. The gates opened. Kane walked in first, dark armor catching the torchlight. Tall and broad and hard-edged the way he always was, the kind of man who made rooms feel smaller just by entering them. My wolf stirred the moment she saw him. The pack roared with cheers. And then I saw her. A woman walked at Kane's side, close enough that their arms touched. She was blonde, sharp-faced, wearing a green dress cut to show the full, rounded curve of her belly. Beta Cole's daughter. Mira Cole. Kane's hand settled on her stomach. I stood very still. The cheering continued. The pack elders nodded with satisfaction. Warriors beat their fists against their chests. Not one person in that courtyard turned to look at me. "The Ironstone Pack has waited long enough for its heir," Kane's voice rang out across the crowd. "I am proud to announce that Mira Cole carries my pup. Ironstone's bloodline will continue." Another wave of noise crashed through the crowd. Something broke inside me. Not loudly. Quietly. Like a thread being cut in the dark. I watched the pack celebrate. I watched Kane guide Mira toward the packhouse steps. I watched his hand never leave her stomach. And I watched every person I had cooked for and organized for and stayed awake at night worrying about turn their faces toward her like sunflowers. The whispers started almost immediately. Three years and no pup. Mira should have been Luna from the start. She always looked too weak for an Alpha like him. I went back inside before the toasts were made. I walked through the decorated halls I had spent weeks preparing and I climbed the stairs to our chamber and I sat in the chair by the window and I waited. Nobody came looking for me. When Kane finally came through the door, I was ready. I had my anger where I could use it. I had my words prepared. I had spent the hour making sure I was not going to fall apart. "You should have stayed," he said, pulling off his armor piece by piece. "Leaving looked childish." "You brought her here," I said. "She had nowhere else to go." "She is carrying your child and you announced it to the entire pack before saying a word to your wife." My voice was controlled. Even. "At the celebration I spent two weeks preparing for you." "I knew you would make it complicated." I stood. "You think this is complicated? You betrayed me. While you were gone and the bond sickness was hitting me every night, you were with her. That is not complicated. That is a choice you made." Kane set down his armor. He did not look at me. "You have been Luna for three years. You have not given the pack an heir. The pack needed one. I made a decision." "You made a decision to humiliate me." "I made a decision to secure this pack's future." He turned then, and his face was the face of a stranger. "Not everything is about you, Zara." My wolf rose inside me. Hot and furious and ready. "And what happens to me?" I asked. He held my gaze. His voice was flat, decided, the voice he used when there was no more discussion. "You stay. You support Mira until the pup comes. You do your duty." He paused. "Or you give up the title and go back to omega standing." I stared at him. This was the man I had given up my name for. My father. My birthright. My place in the world. "Those are your two choices," he said. "Think about it." He walked out. I stood alone in the room that used to be ours and I understood something that should have been obvious long ago: he had already decided before he gave me the choices. He came home not to me but to announce a replacement. And the man I had built my life around did not look sorry. Not for one second. I sat back down and pressed my hands flat on my knees and breathed. I thought of my father. High Alpha Rowan Wells, sitting at the head of the great hall at Silverholm, three years of silence between us. I had walked out of his house without looking back, certain I was walking toward something worth the cost. I thought of Kane riding out for that border campaign while I stood at the gate watching him go. Proud of him. Telling myself: after this, everything changes. After this, I tell him who I am. My father will see. My father will accept it. I should have known better. The door opened. Mira walked in without knocking. She smiled at me the way you smile at someone you have already replaced in your mind, and her hand rested easy on her stomach, and her green eyes moved through the room like she was already measuring it for new furniture. "Oh," she said softly. "I was looking for Kane." She did not leave.