I’d grown up here in Hawthorn, sent from Plum Blossom at ten years old because my identity made me a target there and even in the neighboring territories who secretly heard about the news of my awakening. Ryan and Warren had been my world from the first day.
They’d walked me to school, torn up love notes from other wolves, glared at anyone who even thought about asking me to dance.
Even as adults, one on track to be Alpha, the other set to serve the Wolf King himself — they still stayed. Bought the houses next to mine, knocked down the walls so we could all live like one packhouse.
They’d cried when my parents wanted me to go home. “Wherever Allison is,” they’d said, “we’ll be there.”
I stayed because of them.
But that was before Trisha.
Trisha, the shy little Omega whose father had disgraced his bloodline and left her a pariah.
I pitied her once. Took her under my wing.
And she took everything.
Ryan started throwing parties for her, even though he hated crowds. Warren quit hunting at her slightest frown, even though he lived for it.
They stopped competing for me. And started competing for her.
I’d once thought I might choose one of them to stand at my side when I became Luna.