Moonbound Secrets

Chapter 1

The Galas Ghost

When his gaze caught mine across the ballroom my heart stopped beating. Thirty years. In one glance three years of running, hiding and being dead to the world were all undone. The flute of champagne slipped from my fingers. The orchestras music drowned out the sound of the glass hitting the marble floor. People turned to look. I didn't see them. I only saw him.

Damien Kael Voss.

He stood near the staircase a powerful figure in a tailored black tuxedo. The light from the chandelier caught the angles of his face his dark hair swept back. Even though he was talking to a senator his golden gaze was fixed on me. I felt like my lungs were being squeezed by a fist. No. It is impossible. He is in New York. The schedule said…

My mind went blank trained for survival. My wolf, a creature I kept caged and silent inside whimpered and tried to get free. Mate.

No. Not anymore. I had broken that bond. He thought I was dead. I’d made sure of it.

“Ms. Lenoir? Are you okay?”

The French diplomat I was translating for Mr. Armand heard my voice from away. I’d been in the middle of explaining a trade clause. Now the words meant nothing to me.

“I… a moment please " I managed, my voice barely above a whisper. "The bubbly. Clumsy.”

I didn’t look at the mess. My eyes were still locked on his. In their depths a slow terrifying realization dawned. It was more than curiosity about the woman who had spilled her drink. It was the dawning earth-shattering knowledge of the impossible.

He saw me. Not Lena Lenoir, the translator with boring glasses and a pinned-up bun. He saw Selene Ashford. The woman he’d buried.

His head tilted, a fraction. A predator catching a scent on the wind.

Run.

The single command screamed through every nerve. I turned, my heels skidding on the floor. I didn’t apologize to Mr. Armand. I didn’t look back. I pushed through a cluster of laughing socialites their perfume thick and overpowering.

“Hey!" one protested.

I ignored her. The ballroom was a maze of silk and jewels. My goal: the servants’ entrance behind the floral display. I knew how this house was laid out. In another life I’d attended parties here. The knowledge was a comfort now.

A low vibration hummed through the air a pulse that made my teeth ache. My wolf curled up. Alpha instruction

He wasn’t chasing. He was commanding the space itself.

I dared a glance over my shoulder. He was no longer by the stairs. He was moving. Not with haste. With an inevitable terrifying purpose. He cut through the crowd like a shark through water. People parted for him without seeming to realize why drawn by the force of his presence.

My breath came in sharp gasps. The elegant updo felt like a trap the pins digging into my scalp. I ripped the glasses from my face shoving them into my clutch. Maybe without them in the light…

A hopeless thought it was. He had noticed my eyes. He had seen my heart.

I reached the towering arrangement of orchids and slipped behind it. The hidden door was there a dark wood panel. I pressed the latch. It didn’t budge.

Locked.

Panic, sharp and metallic flooded my mouth. My sweat-slick fingers fumbled with the latch. The sound of the gala was muffled here. The rustle of my emerald- dress and my own frantic heartbeat were both audible to me.. Then footsteps. Measured. Heavy. Getting close.

I flattened myself against the wall behind the leaves of a potted plant, my chest heaving. The shadow that fell across the marble floor was long and unmistakable.

He stopped a feet away. Now I could smell him. Frost, sandalwood and something special and potent. "Damien". It was a scent that had once been my home. Now it was the smell of my ruin.

He didn’t call out. He didn’t demand I show myself. Even worse was the silence.

Then his voice. It didn’t shout. It didn’t need to. It was low, deep. It seemed to bypass my ears entirely slamming directly into the shattered scarred-over place inside me where our mate bond had once blazed.

“Don’t you dare move.”

The command was absolute. My human mind could not defy it because it was woven with Alpha power. My wolf instinct begged to be obeyed. My legs trembled, threatening to buckle.

I couldn’t see him. I felt him. His attention was a weight pinning me in place.

Every second stretched into an eternity. The music swelled again. A woman’s delighted laugh echoed. The man I'd betrayeds presence and the scent of damp earth from the plants had reduced my world to this gloomy corner.

He took a step forward. The shadow on the floor shifted.

Think, Selene! The mental scream cut through the panic. The bond was broken,. Some echo remained. I could feel his confusion, his fury, a storm held back by a thread of disbelief. He wasn’t sure. Not completely. I was a ghost, a trick of the light.

That doubt was my weapon.

With a strength I didn’t know I had I shoved against the bond in my mind. I threw up every wall I’d built over three years walls of fear of motherhood of an identity. I pictured Leo’s sleeping face. My armor was his safety.

I pushed away from the wall.

The moment I moved his control snapped. "Selene.”

He said my name. My real name. It wasn’t a question. It was a verdict.

I ran.

Not into the ballroom but down the narrow dark service corridor I found when I turned the next corner. It was lined with stacked chairs and discarded tablecloths. My heels were an issue. I kicked them off the floor biting into my stockinged feet. I didn’t stop to pick them up.

Behind me I heard the soft snick of the service door opening. He was on his way.

A T-junction marked the end of the corridor.. Right? My old memory of the blueprints was fuzzy. Right led to the kitchens a hive of activity. Left… left led to storage. Maybe a delivery exit.

I turned left. The hallway grew darker the sounds of the gala fading to a murmur. The air smelled of wood and cleaning supplies. A single dim bulb flickered overhead.

My pulse thundered in my ears. I was a rabbit in a warren and the wolf was at the gate.

A door stood ajar up ahead. A fridge. As I made my way I pulled the door almost shut behind me leaving only a small opening. Cans and linens were stacked high on shelves in the space. The sliver of light from the hallway was the light in the dim space.

I pressed my back against a shelf trying to silence my breathing. I heard his footsteps once more. Slower now. Hunting.

They stopped outside the pantry door.

I stopped breathing.

Silently the door swung open. He filled the doorway blocking the light. He was more formidable up close his shoulders impossibly broad, his presence sucking all the air from the small room. In the semi-darkness his golden eyes searched for me in the corner before glistening.

His gaze was not triumphant. Only a tempest.

He stepped inside. Closed the door.

The click of the latch was the sound I’d ever heard.

We were alone in the dark for the time, in three years.

He didn't say anything away. He just looked at me his gaze traveling over my face my hair, my bare feet. Taking in the living breathing proof of a lie that had defined his life.

When he finally moved it was swift. One hand shot out not to hit me but to pin me. His palm slammed into the shelf by my head his arm caging me in. His other hand came up his fingers hovering beside my throat. They trembled.

He leaned in close his body heat around me. I could smell him. It was like smelling something familiar. It was overwhelming. Made me feel both super scared and really hurt. "You died " he said, his voice was rough. Not smooth like I was used to. It was raw and painful. "I held the urn. I scattered the ashes. I felt our bond… snap."

I could feel his fingers like they were burning me even though they weren't touching my skin. I remembered that night. The car crash, the expensive ID switch, the hard part of leaving our bond behind while making it look like I died. And it made me feel sick.

I said quietly "I had to." My voice was barely audible. He looked at me suspiciously. His eyes got narrower. Something cold and sharp was mixing with the pain. He was suspicious. Then he sniffed the air really sniffing it past my perfume and fear.

His nose was almost touching my skin where my neck and shoulder meet as he leaned in closer. A low confused sound started in his chest. His head shook a lot. His eyes were wide with shock more than anger. "Whose scent is on you?" His voice was soft but dangerous. I was frozen. Leo. He could smell Leo. The baby shampoo, the cookie crumbs, the scent of my little boy that was all over me.

"It’s faint…. It’s there " he said, more, to himself. He thought for a moment then his breath caught. He realized something. It hit him hard. He swayed a bit.

His voice got really quiet and scared.

"It’s… mine.”

Those two words hung in the dark making it hard to breathe.

He wasn’t asking about a boyfriend. He was asking about a kid. A kid that had his scent.

All the color was gone from his face. Damien Voss, the Alpha looked… broken. He was still angry. Now he was also hopeful and it was a terrible and fragile hope. He stared at me waiting for an answer I couldn’t give.

The world outside. The music, the laughter, the politics. Didn’t matter anymore. It was him this question and the three-year-old secret sleeping safely in his bed ten miles away.

His hand finally moved from the shelf. His fingers, still trembling, came to rest lightly under my chin, forcing my eyes to meet the storm in his.

“Take me to him,” he said. It wasn’t a request. It was the most absolute command I had ever heard. “Now.”