Alpha: Married to My Sister's Fiancé

Selene′sPOV The front door of Moonveil Atelier slammed so hard the glass trembled. I lifted my head. Ivy strode in like she wanted to bite through someone's throat, dark coat still open, green eyes lit sharp enough to cut. "That bastard did it again." I set down the Blood Moon ceremonial robe sketch spread across my desk. Silver thread clung cold to my fingertip. "Damon?" "Who else?" She threw her bag onto the velvet chair and started pacing. "The West District development rights. I've been tracking that land for months, Selene. Months. I had the council nearly cornered, and then Damon swoops in, steals the whole thing, and uses it to make me look reckless in front of the board." Her laugh came out ugly. "He even enjoyed it." I leaned back slowly, watching her tear across the room like a spark looking for oil. "You threw off his negotiation line last time." She stopped. "So?" "So this kind of bite-back isn't rare in our world." I kept my voice even. "Not when territory, money, and pride all sit on the same table." I said it calmly, but something still sank inside me. Because she was angry, and Damon was cruel when he wanted to win, and every fight in our circle always seemed to end with someone taking more than they should. Ivy folded her arms. "I made him lose one crucial piece of land. One. He's been waiting to return the favor, and now he has. Fine. I can play that game too." "Ivy." She pointed at me. "Come with me." I blinked. "What?" "Not to the next council meeting. I'm not dragging you into Ashcroft Land politics." Her mouth twisted. "But help me hit back. Strategically. Socially. Whatever hurts most." I stared at her. She stared right back. Then I shook my head. "No." Her brows jumped. "No?" "I'm not involving myself in that fight." I pushed the sketch aside and wiped my fingers on a cloth, though the chill of the silver still clung to my skin. "And I'm not dragging Moonveil Atelier into it either." Her expression hardened. "You think I'd let blowback touch your studio?" "I think none of this stays contained once men like Damon decide to turn ugly." I stood and moved around the desk, softer now. "This is between you and him. I'm not stepping into the middle just because both of you prefer war to boredom." Ivy let out a disbelieving breath. "You always do this." "Do what?" "Step back. Pretend distance protects you." Before I could answer, my phone lit up on the table. One name. Lucien. My spine locked so fast it hurt. Ivy saw it. Of course she did. Her gaze dropped to the screen, then lifted to my face with the kind of sharp pity I hated. The phone kept vibrating. My throat tightened. I still picked it up. "Hello?" His voice came through low and flat, too controlled to be careless. "Are you at the atelier?" "Yes." "I need you to come with me." My fingers curled around the phone. "For what?" "To choose Vivian's Blood Moon betrothal gift." For one second, I said nothing. The room felt colder. The silver thread on my skin might as well have been a blade now, dragging slow under my ribs. His tone did not change. "You know what she likes better than I do." Of course I did. Of course he asked me. Of course I still answered. "All right," I said, and the words tasted like blood held too long in the mouth. "When?" "I'm outside in twenty." The line went dead. I lowered the phone carefully, like if I moved too fast, something inside me would split open in front of Ivy. She was already glaring. "No." I forced my face blank. "It's just a gift." "It is never just a gift when it's him." "Ivy---" "No." She came closer, voice dropping. "Every single time Lucien gets near you, you fall apart and then spend days pretending you didn't." Heat rose into my face. "That's dramatic." "It's true." "We're friends." Her expression turned savage. "That is the lie you've been feeding yourself since St. Aurelia." My jaw tightened. She didn't stop. "I watched you back then, Selene. Four years of it. Four years of you looking at him and then looking away. Four years of swallowing every single thing before anyone could see it." I turned from her and gathered the robe sketches into a neater stack than they needed to be. "It doesn't matter." "It matters if you're about to go shopping for your sister's engagement present with the man you've wanted for half your life." My hands stilled. The silence hung. Then I spoke without turning around. "Even if I said it out loud, what would it change?" Ivy said nothing. I faced her at last. My voice stayed quiet. That made it worse. "Lucien has spent all these years beside Vivian. Not me. He has never given me a place to stand." The words scraped on the way out. My fingers were cold now. Cold enough to ache. Ivy's face softened for half a second, but I kept going before she could say anything kind. "The marriage contract has already dragged on too long," I said. "Everyone is watching it. Everyone is waiting for the Blood Moon announcement. If anyone sees even a hint of how I feel, it won't just humiliate me." My laugh was small and thin. "It will destroy whatever is left between your family and mine. It will make people talk about Vivian. About me. About Hart bloodlines clawing at the same man." I looked down at my own hands. "And you," I added. "It would touch you too. You're my friend before you're his sister, and I won't make you stand in the middle of that." Ivy's lips parted, then pressed together hard. "Hart family gossip is ugly enough already," I said. "I'm not giving them more." "So you'll just step aside." Her voice turned rough. "Like always." "I'll do what keeps the least amount of damage alive." She stared at me for a long moment, breathing through her nose like she was trying not to scream. Then she said, sudden and hard, "The Ashcrofts didn't look at Vivian first." I frowned. "What?" "The first name they asked for was yours." The room went still. I did not move. Ivy watched my face carefully now, like she knew exactly where to press the knife. "When the families first started talking marriage, it was you. Not Vivian." I blinked once. A memory rose before I could stop it. My father standing near the terrace doors. My mother's smile too bright. An Ashcroft elder asking, almost casually, Which daughter is Selene? I had thought nothing of it then. Or maybe I had thought too much and buried it fast. Ivy stepped closer. "You know I'm right." I did. I remembered the question. I remembered the way a few eyes had turned toward me first. And then I remembered the night everything shifted. Vivian's coming-of-age gala. Candlelight. Music. Gold on crystal. Lucien walking in late, all dark shoulders and quiet menace, drawing half the room into silence without trying. I had looked at him once and already known better than to do it twice. Then Vivian crossed the floor. And his gaze found her. That was it. That was all it took. No announcement. No grand decision. Just one look, and the current changed. Every conversation after that bent around her. Every expectation moved. Every future that had hovered near my name slid cleanly into my sister's hands. I swallowed, but my throat still burned. "I know," I said at last. Ivy's eyes flashed. "Then why are you acting like none of it was taken from you?" Because saying it out loud would make it real. Because I had survived this long by naming my losses anything except theft. Because if I called it what it was, I would have to admit how much I wanted it. I picked up my coat from the chair and smoothed the sleeve with numb fingers. "It doesn't matter who they asked for first." "It does to me." "It shouldn't." "It should to you." I met her gaze. For a second, neither of us spoke. Then I gave her the only truth I could still carry without breaking in half. "Maybe they did ask for me first," I said. "But after that night, it was never mine again." My voice almost failed on the last word. Outside, a car door shut somewhere beyond the street glass. Lucien. Right on time. Ivy heard it too. Her face darkened with instant fury, but mine went still. I thought of the old question asked in a polished room. I thought of Lucien's eyes lifting to Vivian and never returning. I thought of every small, quiet thing I had learned to surrender before anyone could force it from my hands. Some losses were loud. Mine never were. They were elegant. Social. Reasonable. Which only made them crueler. I slipped my phone into my coat pocket and headed for the door. Because that was what I did. I kept moving. Even when everything that should have been mine was already wearing someone else's name.