90 Days to Run - Tricking the Alpha

"Alpha Onyx - If I told you we had a child, would you…" I had drafted the same text message seventeen times this week. I never hit send. When Nurse Della walked past the nurses' station, I quickly shut off the screen before she could see it. Seven years as the head healer of the Cedar Moon Pack had taught me exactly what to hide. My gaze drifted to the calendar, focusing on the red circle around a date ninety days away. That was the day the seven-year bond severance clause took effect. Ninety days until my contract marriage ended, my unclaimed mate bond severed, and I either told Onyx about the daughter who wanted a father at parent-teacher day or ran before he could take her from me. He wouldn't make it easy either way. Healing was the reason I had survived the last seven years. The Cedar Moon Pack had given me a clinic, patients who needed me, and enough trust to use my Spiritwalker gift without hiding in border camps. The marriage was strained, but I had thrived here in the one place that still made sense. Bodies told the truth. Bleeding stopped when I found the source. Fevers broke when I chose the right compound. Even fractured minds had pathways I could navigate with my gift, repairing what trauma had broken. Marriage was the one injury I never learned how to treat. Our daughter had blue eyes like his and my brown hair, only lighter because she spent too much time outside in Kano’s garden. Now that she was five, it was also clear she had her father’s stubbornness and a habit of asking questions when I was least prepared to answer them. She held up a crayon drawing while I was chatting with her on video last week. “Is my dad busy forever?” I almost told her the truth. That her father lived one pack away in a stone house with black gates, a formal dining room no one used, and a wife he visited only when the bond dragged him back to my bed. Before I could sink further into the memory, the clinic doors burst open. Alpha Onyx walked in, cradling someone in his arms. Our mate bond struck instantly. It always did. It tightened beneath my skin with cruel precision, recognizing him for everything he wasn't to me. Mona Cole whimpered against his chest. His brother’s fiancée. His first love. The woman half of the Cedar Moon Pack still treated as their true future Luna. “She has severe abdominal pain after strenuous activity. Treat her.” Not please. Not hello. Just a command. Always a command. I forced myself to move, reminding myself that I was a healer first, long before I was the wife he commanded like an unwanted omega. “What happened?”I asked. Mona clutched her lower abdomen, whimpering into his shoulder. Onyx answered for her. “We were in Leo’s therapy room. She collapsed.” I paused. “Strenuous activity in the therapy room?” “Do your job, Doctor Dray. I won’t tolerate any more of your attitude.” The snap of his voice cut through the clinic. He wanted to embarrass me. He wanted to bruise my pride badly enough that I would snap, giving him an excuse to punish me. I wouldn't give him the satisfaction. I forced air into my lungs and pressed the scanner crystal to her lower abdomen. A soft, inner glow flared to life beneath her skin, pulsing in a rhythm that wasn't her own. She was pregnant. Roughly six weeks, judging by the intensity of the light. But Leo had been paralyzed five months ago, rendering him physically incapable of fathering a child. I was the one who had confirmed and signed off on his diagnosis. Mona opened her eyes, and the instant she saw my face, she knew I had figured it out. Tears immediately spilled down her cheeks as she turned to Onyx. “Don’t let her touch me.” I swallowed a sigh. “Mona, I need to finish the examination.” “She hates me.” Mona pushed weakly at my wrist. “She has always hated me.” I withdrew. “You came into my emergency room.” “She is jealous. She knows about the baby, and now she wants to hurt it.” “I didn't say anything about a baby,” I replied, my voice cold, “It seems you didn't need my diagnosis after all.” Onyx’s head snapped up. “Wait. She is pregnant?” As he spoke, a sudden surge pulsed through our mate bond. It almost felt sickeningly like excitement. I swallowed the rising bile as his giddy anticipation washed over me. “Yes. The scan shows early pregnancy. However, the gestational timeline means she was impregnated long after Leo was paralyzed.” Mona went pale. Onyx let his wolf flash in his eyes. “This is not the time, Ember.” I felt my own wolf starting to claw at my thoughts. “You expect me to treat her safely, without all the needed data?” “You will treat her safely because I told you to.” I gritted my teeth until the answer in my head sounded clinical. “Fine. Without timeline confirmation, I need blood work if you want me to treat her.” “No!” Mona struggled to sit up. “She wants to harm me!” “I want to keep the fetus alive.” I stripped off my gloves. “If that offends you, then you should have..." Before the words could fully leave my mouth, Mona’s hand whipped across my face. The force of the slap jerked my head aside. A sharp heat bloomed across my cheek and temple as the skin began to swell. The surrounding nurses surged forward, but froze the moment Onyx raised his hand and growled. Mona collapsed back against him, sobbing as if she were the one who had been struck. Onyx wrapped his coat around her, shielding her trembling, wailing form from the room. His eyes flashed erratically between amber and dark brown. “That’s it. You are done here.” “This is my clinic.” I stared at him, waiting for the mate bond to make him flinch on my behalf. It didn't. He looked at the swelling on my cheek and dismissed it as if it were a smudge of dirt on his floor. “Get out.” He shifted Mona higher against his chest. “Leave the pack territory before midnight, or I will have you dragged off this land in front of every wolf who still mistakes you for someone of importance.” I forced my hands to stop shaking. “You would throw your only healer out?” “My healer would know her place.” Mona peeked over his arm. The tears were gone. Her eyes were dancing with delight. In one moment, I understood everything I’d ignored up until then. I understood seven years of waiting until he came home near dawn. I understood the rushed, private wedding with only four witnesses. I understood the missing Luna mark. I understood seven years of signing my research over to Cedar Moon ownership because his grandmother Mara had given me a home. Onyx’s growl echoed through the building as he walked out the front door. “Get off the land before midnight. Don’t make me show you how serious I am.” My phone shook in my hand when I unlocked it. The draft was still open. "Onyx - If I told you we had a child, would you…" I stared at the words, reading them over and over until Kano’s name flashed across the screen. He had sent a photo of Lily sitting on his kitchen floor. She was sorting her wooden toy animals into two piles: those with mean fathers, and those with nice ones. She always placed the wolves right in the middle, claiming they hadn't decided which they were yet. But Onyx had just decided. For all of us. I saved the photo and deleted the draft. I clicked on my best friend’s name and attached the picture with a simple message. "Harlow - It’s time to start the plan."