my fated alpha mate

Chapter 2: Sold To The Old Alpha

Mia's POV

"No." The word barely made it past my lips, thin and useless against the weight of what had already been decided.

"There has to be some mistake."

"There isn't," my father said, cold as ever.

"The contract has already been

finalized. One month from now, you will become Alpha Harold Westwood's wife."

"I won't marry him!" I shook my head, tears blurring the edges of the room. "I'm only twenty! He's old enough to be my grandfather!"

"So what?" Dad said, as though I'd raised an objection about the weather. "He's one of the richest Alphas in the country. You'll live comfortably."

"I don't care about his money!" For the first time in years, my voice rose loud enough to fill the room. "I have dreams. I want to go to college. I want a life of my own!"

My stepmom laughed — sharp, delighted, cruel. "College?" she echoed. "You actually believe you're worthy of college?"

I clenched my fists so tightly my nails bit into my palms. "I've been saving every dollar I earn."

"Oh, please." She rolled her eyes, waving a manicured hand as if swatting away something unpleasant. "Those ridiculous little jobs of yours? You'd work your entire life and never earn what Alpha Harold is paying for you."

She snatched the contract off the table and threw it down at my feet, the pages scattering across the marble.

"Sign it."

I looked down at them, then slowly stepped back. "No."

Her expression shifted, the warmth she reserved for Lyra nowhere in sight. "What did you say?"

"I said... no, mom."

The slap came before I even saw her hand move.

Smack.

My head snapped sideways, pain blooming hot and immediate across my cheek. I stumbled, catching myself against the arm of the sofa before I could fall, the metallic taste of blood spreading over my tongue where my teeth had caught the inside of my cheek. Tears rushed to my eyes, but I refused — I *refused* — to let them fall in front of her.

"Don't call me 'Mom,'" my stepmom hissed. "I'm not your mother, and I never will be."

She stepped closer, the click of her heels against the marble deliberate, unhurried, the sound of someone who knew she had already won. "Do you know why your father agreed to this marriage?"

I said nothing.

"Because Alpha Harold offered us one million dollars." She smiled, proud of the number the way other people are proud of their children. "One million dollars. That money will change many things in this family."

Before I could find words, Lyra rose gracefully from the sofa and crossed her arms, her cream-colored dress catching the light as she moved, every strand of her styled hair perfectly in place. She looked, as always, exactly like the daughter this family had chosen to love.

She reached out and gripped my chin, tilting my face up to hers. "Do you know what that million dollars is really for?"

I tried to pull away. Her fingers only tightened.

"It buys me an invitation to the Blackwood Family Banquet."

My heart stuttered. Every werewolf in the country had heard of the Blackwoods — the most powerful bloodline, the richest pack, the most feared Alphas in the country, spoken of in the kind of hushed, reverent tones usually reserved for royalty.

Lyra's eyes lit with excitement. "This year's banquet is different. Alpha Ethan Blackwood will finally choose a bride."

Even I had heard the rumors about him — the young Alpha who had inherited the Blackwood legacy at an age when most men were still finding their footing.

Powerful.

Cold.

Untouchable.

Women threw themselves at him at every event he attended, and none of them, as far as anyone knew, had ever managed to hold his attention for longer than a conversation.

"They say no woman has ever conceived his child," Lyra continued, savoring every word. "If he chooses me, I'll become Mrs.

Blackwood." She lifted her chin, already picturing it. "I'll give birth to his heir. Our family will become part of the Blackwood bloodline."

She laughed softly, then looked at me with something close to pity — the kind you'd offer a stray animal, not a sister.

"So yes. Your marriage is a small sacrifice compared to my future."

My chest tightened until it hurt to breathe. I wanted to scream, to ask why my life was worth so little measured against hers. But I already knew the answer. It had nothing to do with money, or contracts, or Alphas.

It was simply because I wasn't Lyra.

My stepmom folded her arms and looked at me the way you'd look at something you needed cleaned up before company arrived. "Go upstairs."

I frowned. "What?"

"Take a shower." Her tone left no room for negotiation. "Alpha Harold is coming tonight to meet his future wife."

Her eyes swept over me, disgust plain on her face. "And for once in your miserable life, try to look presentable."

The three of them walked away as though the conversation had been nothing more than a discussion about tomorrow's weather, leaving me standing alone in the wreckage of it — broken, humiliated, and entirely, completely alone.

I bent down slowly and gathered the marriage contract from the floor, smoothing the crumpled pages with hands that wouldn't stop shaking.

One million dollars.

That was what my life had been reduced to.

A price.

A signature.

A transaction between two men who had never once asked what I wanted.

I laughed, and the sound that came out of me was bitter and hollow, nothing like laughter at all. Maybe I had been foolish to believe that working hard enough, obeying enough, enduring enough would eventually earn me a place in this family — that if I only proved myself useful for long enough, my father would finally look at me and see a daughter instead of an inconvenience.

Instead, he had sold me.

I wiped my face with the back of my hand, refusing to let the tears fall any further. "No," I whispered to the empty room. "I can't stay here."

I ran to my balcony and dropped to my knees beside the cot, pulling the small metal box out from beneath it with hands that fumbled in their hurry. Inside were stacks of bills folded so many times the creases had gone soft — every tip, every paycheck, every dollar earned across months of double and triple shifts, saved one crumpled bill at a time while I told myself it would be enough someday.

It wasn't much. But it was enough to start over somewhere far from here.

I counted it with trembling fingers, and my chest tightened with something that felt almost like hope. *Just a little more. One more night's pay. That's all I need.*

If I could finish my shift at the bar tonight, I would finally have enough for a bus ticket — enough to disappear before Alpha Harold Westwood ever set foot in this house to claim what my father had sold him.

I changed quickly into my black uniform, tied my hair back with hands that still hadn't fully steadied, and slipped out through the back gate before anyone in that house noticed I was gone.

The evening air was cool against my face as I hurried toward the bus stop, my footsteps quick and certain despite the ache still throbbing in my cheek. For the first time in longer than I could remember, I wasn't walking toward that house.

I was walking toward freedom.

I had no idea that the oneday, my fate would collide head-on with the most powerful Alpha in the country — and that nothing in my life would ever be the same again.