After My Alpha Branded His Mistress the True Luna

I needed the botanical reference text.

It was a small thing. A leather-bound volume on rare mountain flora that I'd lent Ryland six months ago when he'd asked about expanding our sourcing network. He'd never returned it. I'd never asked for it back. But tonight I needed it—there was a compound I was working on that required precise identification of a subspecies, and my memory wasn't enough.

So I went to his study.

It was late. Past eleven. The pack house was quiet. Most of the household had gone to bed. I walked down the west corridor in soft-soled shoes that made no sound on the stone floor. The study door was ajar. Light spilled out into the hallway.

I pushed it open.

Ryland wasn't there. But his laptop was—open on the desk, screen glowing in the dim room.

I crossed to the bookshelf. The botanical text was on the second shelf, spine out, exactly where I'd expected it to be. I pulled it free and tucked it under my arm.

Then I saw the email.

The laptop screen faced the door. I wasn't trying to look. But the subject line was right there, bold and unmissable:

**Hart IP Transfer — Phase 2 Legal Framework — CONFIDENTIAL**

I went very still.

My wolf stirred. Not a growl. Just... attention. Sharp and focused.

I shouldn't read it. I knew that. This was Ryland's private correspondence. Pack business. Alpha business. I should walk out.

I set the book down on the desk.

I leaned forward and read.

The email chain was long. The most recent message was from someone named Gerald Frost, whose signature identified him as corporate counsel for something called "Northridge Botanical Ventures LLC." The message was addressed to Brooke and CC'd to Ryland.

*Brooke — Attached is the revised extraction agreement per our call. Phase 2 shifts all proprietary formulas under NBV's sole ownership, with IP origination attributed to 'Ironveil Pack Healer Collective' rather than individual lineage. This neutralizes the legacy liability and insulates against future claims. Offshore registration complete. Rogue-network liquidity partners confirmed. Proceed with internal authorization at your discretion.*

I scrolled up.

The earlier messages were worse.

Brooke had written: *We need to move quickly. The formulas are documented, but if she realizes what we're doing before the paperwork is finalized, she could block the transfer. She still has the original journal. We need a legal framework that makes her consent irrelevant.*

Gerald Frost had replied: *Understood. The structure I'm proposing treats the IP as pack property rather than personal property. Since she contributed the work as a pack member under Alpha authority, we can argue implied assignment. The offshore entity adds a jurisdictional buffer. Even if she contests, litigation would take years and cost more than she has.*

Ryland had written only one message in the entire chain. It was short.

*Do it. She won't fight.*

I read that line three times.

She won't fight.

My hands were resting on the edge of the desk. I looked down at them. They were steady. Pale against the dark wood. No tremor. No clench.

I scrolled further. There were attachments—draft agreements, corporate filings, a list of formulas organized by commercial value. At the bottom of one document, in a section labeled "Risk Assessment," there was a single line:

*Evangeline Hart: legacy liability. Minimal operational involvement post-transition. Monitoring recommended but intervention unlikely to be necessary.*

Legacy liability.

I straightened.

I didn't need to photograph anything. I had the original journal. They had copies—good copies, detailed copies, but copies nonetheless. And I knew every formula in that journal by heart. I knew which ones required the rare wolfsbane-neutralizing extract. I knew the temperature tolerances. I knew what would happen if someone tried to substitute a cheaper compound.

I knew exactly what they were doing.

And I knew exactly what it would cost them.

Behind me, the study door opened.

"What the hell are you doing?"

Ryland's voice was low and sharp. I didn't turn around immediately. I closed the email window first. Then I straightened and looked at him.

He stood in the doorway, still dressed in the clothes he'd worn to dinner. His eyes went to the laptop, then to me, then back to the laptop.

"I came for the book," I said quietly. I gestured to the botanical text on the desk. "You borrowed it."

His expression darkened. He crossed the room in three strides. "You were reading my emails."

"The screen was open."

"That's pack business." His voice rose slightly. "Private correspondence. You had no right—"

"I wasn't looking for it," I said. My voice was still calm. Still even. "It was just there."

"Bullshit." He reached past me and slammed the laptop shut. "You were snooping."

I didn't move. I stood there, one hand still resting on the desk, and looked at him.

"What did you read?" he demanded.

I didn't answer.

His jaw tightened. "Evangeline. What did you read?"

"Enough," I said quietly.

Something shifted in his expression. Not guilt. Not regret. Something colder. Sharper.

"This is pack security," he said. His voice dropped lower, that Alpha tone threading through it now. "You don't get to question pack strategy. You don't get to interfere with—"

"I wasn't interfering," I said. "I was retrieving a book."

"You were reading confidential emails!" His hand slammed down on the desk beside the laptop. The sound cracked through the room. "Do you have any idea what you've just—"

He stopped mid-sentence. His eyes locked on mine. And I saw the exact moment he made his decision.

He didn't ask if I was hurt. He didn't ask what I planned to do with what I'd read. He didn't ask anything.

He shoved me.

Both hands, flat against my shoulders, hard and sudden.

I stumbled backward. My lower back struck the stone counter behind me—sharp, brutal impact that knocked the air out of my lungs. My head snapped back. The edge of the counter caught me just above my left temple.

Pain exploded white and hot across my skull.

I heard something shatter.

I slid down the counter and caught myself on the edge of the desk, one hand braced, the other pressed to my temple. When I pulled my fingers away, they were red.

Blood ran down the side of my face, warm and fast.

Ryland snatched the laptop off the desk. He held it against his chest like it was something precious. Something worth protecting.

"You don't go through my things," he said. His voice was tight. Controlled. "You don't overstep your boundaries. And you sure as hell don't compromise pack security because you're feeling—" He stopped. His lip curled. "Whatever it is you're feeling."

I stared at him.

Blood dripped from my jaw onto the floor.

"Do you understand me?" he said.

I didn't answer.

"There will be consequences," he continued. His eyes were hard. Flat. "Appropriate to your rank."

He emphasized the last word. Deliberate. Contemptuous.

Then he turned and walked out, the laptop still clutched against his chest.

The door slammed behind him.

I stood there, one hand pressed to my bleeding temple, the other braced on the desk.

On the floor, in a spreading pool of liquid that smelled like rosemary and something sweeter, lay the shattered remains of a small glass vial.

I recognized it immediately.

It was a rare essential oil my mother had compounded before she died. The vial had been sitting on the counter for years—Ryland had kept it as a decorative piece, he'd said. Something elegant. Something old.

The scent rose from the broken glass, delicate and irreplaceable.

I looked at it for a long moment.

Then I straightened.

I picked up the botanical text. I walked out of the study, my footsteps steady and even, and headed toward the Healer wing.

Blood dripped onto the stone floor as I walked. I didn't wipe it away. I just kept moving.

The Healer wing was empty. Everyone had gone to bed. I flipped on the light in the main compounding room and went to the supply cabinet. I pulled out a suture kit, antiseptic, gauze, and a small hand mirror.

I set everything on the counter in a neat row.

Then I sat down on the stool, angled the mirror, and examined the wound.

It was a clean split, about two inches long, just above my left temple. Deep enough to need stitches. The bleeding was steady but not arterial. Manageable.

I threaded the needle.

From the next room—Ryland's private office, the one connected to the Healer wing by a shared wall—I heard his voice. Low and tense. He was on the phone.

"...containment," he was saying. "She saw the emails. I don't know how much. Enough to be a problem."

A pause.

"No. I handled it. She's not going to—"

Another pause. Longer this time.

"Brooke, I said I handled it."

I pressed the needle into my skin and pulled the first stitch through.

The pain was sharp and clean. I focused on it. On the thread. On the precise angle required to close the wound properly.

Ryland's voice continued in the next room, muffled but audible.

"She's not going to do anything. She never does."

I tied off the first stitch.

I pulled the second one through.

No one came to check on me.

No one knocked on the door.

I stitched the wound closed with the same steady, unhurried precision my mother had taught me when I was twelve years old. Six stitches total. Even spacing. Minimal scarring.

When I was done, I cleaned the needle and replaced it in its case. I wiped the blood from my face and neck. I applied antiseptic and a clean bandage.

Then I sat there on the stool, hands folded in my lap, and stared at the wall.

In the next room, Ryland's voice had gone quiet.

The mark on my neck didn't burn anymore.

It didn't ache.

It was just... there. Silent. Finished.

I stood up. I put the supplies away. I turned off the light.

And I walked back to my room, the botanical text tucked under my arm, my footsteps echoing softly in the empty hallway.