The Pup He Never Wanted Chapter 01
The afternoon I was confirmed as the Graymark family’s imposter daughter, the real one, Chloe, stormed into the house and stabbed me in the stomach with a silver-plated dagger.
Silver poisoning feels like shards of ice churning through your bone marrow.
My wolf howled inside me, desperate to shift, but the silver weapon chained her down. I could feel her clawing at the depths of my soul, completely paralyzed.
The pack doctor later told me that the blade likely destroyed my ability to have children.
Permanently.
Caden lost control on the spot. He ran barefoot into the woods and shattered an entire marble wall with his bare fists. The sound echoed in my bones—the desperate roar of an Alpha, an ancient, agonizing cry.
My adoptive parents, Marcus and Vivian, held my hands tightly, their voices trembling. “We won’t accept that lunatic. She is not our daughter.”
To “soothe” me, Caden held the most rushed mating ceremony in the history of the Blackwood Pack just three days later.
Now I know it was all an act.
But back then, I believed it.
Under the full moon, he bit the back of my neck, completing the temporary mark. I felt his wolf surge through the bite and into my blood—the first thread of a mating bond. In our world, this is the touching of souls.
His pheromones were thick with the scent of a vow: oak and fresh snow.
“Whether you can have pups or not,” he whispered in my ear, “you are mine. Forever.”
I was stupid enough to believe that lie.
My adoptive parents immediately signed an expulsion order, banishing Chloe to the rogue lands on the border.
“She won’t survive a single winter in a place like that,” Vivian said, stroking my hair, her voice terrifyingly calm. “It’s what she deserves.”
I believed her.
For six whole years.
Until today, when I saw Chloe—the woman who was supposed to be suffering in the rogue lands—in the VIP lounge of an OB-GYN clinic, very pregnant and curled up in my husband’s arms.
Her fingers traced Caden’s cheek, her voice sickly sweet.
“If I hadn’t been so impulsive six years ago… I’d be the one by your side right now, not that imposter who stole my place.”
Moon. The way she said my name was like spitting venom. It was the nickname Caden had given me. Hearing it from her mouth made my bones ache.
Caden—the man who once swore to make the rogues pay for what happened to me—leaned down and kissed her forehead.
His hand rested on her swollen belly. From this distance, I could clearly see the tenderness in his eyes. A tenderness he never, ever showed me.
His pheromones had changed. It wasn’t the restrained, protective scent he gave me. This was a possessive, doting aroma I knew all too well—I had waited for him to truly feel this for me during every full moon for the past six years.
It never came.
“Marrying her was just to quiet the gossip,” he told Chloe, his voice filled with a guilt I’d never heard before. “It was all to make sure you could come back with a clean slate. It was all worth it.”
I stood frozen in the shadows of the hallway. The old wound in my stomach burned as if that silver dagger had pierced me all over again.
My salvation had been nothing more than an elaborate, cruel deception.
My phone vibrated in my hand.
My adoptive mother, Vivian, was calling. I took a deep breath and answered.
“Moon, the butler said you left the territory alone?” Her voice was as taut as a drawn bowstring. “Do you know how dangerous that is? Your condition—”
“I’m in the clinic restroom,” I interrupted, my voice so calm it surprised even me. “Vivian. It’s just a routine check-up.”
I heard my adoptive father, Marcus, in the background. “Don’t move. We’ll be there in two minutes.”
I hung up and stared at my pale face in the mirror.
My manicured nails dug into my palm. Their urgency to get here at this exact moment—were they worried about my safety, or terrified I would discover the truth?
When Vivian rushed into the restroom, her nostrils flared, trying to catch every scent in the air. In the werewolf world, scent is evidence. She was checking if Caden’s pheromones were on me, if anything was out of the ordinary.
Only after she was satisfied did her shoulders relax.
“You haven’t had the exam yet, have you?” she asked.
“I felt sick the moment I got here,” I said, looking down. “Got delayed.”
“Good,” she blurted out, then quickly tried to cover her mistake. “I mean… it’s a good thing we made it in time. How could we let you face those cold instruments all by yourself?”
My adoptive father, Marcus, stood at the door, his body still powerful in the way of a middle-aged Alpha. We weren’t related by blood, but I once believed he was the man who loved me most in this world.
Only today did I understand that twenty years of raising me meant nothing compared to the bond of a pureblood lineage.
If that’s how it is.
Then I needed to give them a gift they truly deserved.