My fated Alpha kissed another female at our betrothal ceremony

"Get away from her!" Kyle’s shout sliced through the rain. He took three charging steps down the stone terrace, his dark eyes ablaze.

Rhett didn't shift an inch. He kept his broad back squarely between his brother and me.

"Elowen," Rhett muttered without turning his head. "Are you going back to his table?"

"Never," I rasped, my throat raw. "I would rather bleed in the dirt."

"Then you come with me." Rhett hooked an arm beneath my elbows, levering me to my feet before my trembling legs could betray me. "Lean on me. Keep your eyes forward."

"Elowen, stop right where you are!" Kyle bellowed, his voice climbing into a ragged snarl. "You are my mate! You don't walk away from me with another man!"

"You chose Lila," I yelled back, refusing to hide behind Rhett's coat. The rain plastered my hair to my forehead, stinging my eyes. "You chose her on the sacred stone! You gave away every right to speak my name!"

Kyle choked on his own breath, stunned that I dared shout back in the presence of the pack guards. "I am your Alpha! You obey me!"

Rhett turned his head just enough for his profile to catch the torchlight. "She is in my custody now, little brother. Try to cross this line, and we settle our inheritance before sunrise."

The threat hung in the freezing air, lethal and final. Kyle froze on the lower step, his boots skidding in the mud, fury and hesitation warring across his twisted face.

Rhett didn't give him another second. He gripped my waist, half-carrying me through the northern archway away from the main hall.

We crossed the perimeter into the shadow of the northern cliffside within minutes. Behind high iron gates topped with silver spikes sat Rhett’s private compound. Heavily armed warriors stood guard at the stone pillboxes, their gazes dropping instantly in respect as Rhett passed through. Nobody asked questions. Nobody whispered. This was the fortress of the pack’s first Alpha, a territory Kyle had never dared to touch.

Rhett brought me inside the central lodge, steering me straight toward a low leather sofa beside a massive hearth.

"Sit," he told me.

I dropped onto the cushions, my whole body shaking violently. "Your guards... they're going to talk."

"My men fight wars," Rhett said, tossing his damp leather coat onto an iron rack. "They don't run gossip to the council."

He disappeared into an adjoining room and returned holding an earthen bowl filled with dark, crushed leaves and a kettle of steaming water.

"Drink this," he commanded, pouring the boiling liquid over the mash. A sharp, bitter aroma of winterberry and silver-root bloomed through the heat.

I pulled back from the rim. "What is it?"

"Ancestral root," Rhett answered flatly. "It dulls bond shock. If you don't take it, the conflicting frequencies in your blood will seize your lungs by midnight."

"You carry remedies for broken bonds?"

"I carry remedies for wounds that kill wolves from the inside out," he said, holding the cup out until my fingers curled around the warm clay. "Drink all of it. Don't sip. Swallow."

I brought the cup to my mouth and downed the bitter draught. The liquid burned like molten glass sliding down my esophagus, but within seconds, a numbing frost seeped through my veins, clamping down on the agony clawing at my ribcage.

I exhaled a ragged breath, leaning my head against the leather. "It's quieter."

"It's temporary," Rhett said. He pulled up an oak chair across from me, sitting with his elbows on his knees, watching me with unblinking golden-ringed eyes. "The roots only numb the nerves. They don't erase what's happening."

"Why did this happen?" I stared down at my bruised knuckles. "Kyle tore our mate bond to shreds for Lila. But why you? The Goddess doesn't hand out second chances while the first thread still bleeds."

"Kyle broke the sacred covenant the moment he claimed another female on consecrated ground," Rhett said, his deep voice scraping the quiet room. "The Goddess doesn't leave an Alpha's true mate discarded. My blood recognized you ten years ago, Elowen. Kyle simply stood in the light until he threw you away."

"It doesn't feel like a gift," I whispered. "It feels like I'm being ripped in half."

"I know." Rhett didn't offer empty comforts. He didn't reach out to pat my shoulder with fake softness. He simply remained there, an immovable wall of bone and muscle, anchoring the room. "Sleep. I have sentries on the gate."

I couldn't sleep.

For the next two hours, my body became an open battleground.

To my left, Kyle’s mate bond rotted like an infected suture, pulsing cold waves of spite, rejection, and bitter pride directly into my spine. Every time Kyle’s thoughts drifted back to his precious Lila, the bond burned like frostbite.

To my right, Rhett’s bond blazed like an unquenched furnace. It demanded room. It surged through my marrow, wild and demanding, matching the steady cadence of the Alpha sitting five paces away.

The two forces twisted against my wolf until I curled into a ball on the sofa, biting my knuckle to keep from crying out.

"Fight it," Rhett’s voice cut through the haze, low and steady. He didn't touch me—he kept a respectful distance—but his aura wrapped around the room like a heavy cloak, smothering the panic that threatened to choke me. "Don't let his thread drag you down. Lean into mine."

"I can't... clear him out," I gasped, sweat dripping from my jaw onto the cushion. "He won't let go."

"He will," Rhett growled, a dangerous rumble rattling in his chest. "When I rip it out of him."

Suddenly, a violent jolt snapped down the mate link.

My spine locked straight. My eyes flew open, the pupils dilating into wide black pools.

"Elowen?" Rhett rose instantly, his stance shifting into combat readiness. "What is it?"

"Kyle," I rasped, clutching the collar of my dress. "He’s... he’s lost his mind."

Through the lingering psychic channel, Kyle’s emotions slammed into me like a battering ram.

The arrogant indifference he wore on the dais was gone. In its place was a suffocating, rabid frenzy.

He had tracked my scent.

More than that, he had tasted the residual power clinging to my skin. Over our bond, he felt the heavy, undeniable resonance of another Alpha wrapped around his betrothed. His territorial pride—the sick, entitled belief that I was his possession to neglect or discard at will—had shattered completely.

*She belongs to me,* his thoughts screamed across the link, bloody and frantic. *How dare she crawl to another bed? She is mine!*

He wasn't thinking about Lila anymore. He wasn't thinking about pack law or elders. The realization that I had walked into the arms of a stronger wolf had broken whatever sanity he had left.

"He’s tracking my bloodline," I whispered, panic spiking through my veins. "Rhett... he’s running. He’s coming straight here."

"I know," Rhett said calmly.

The distant shriek of bending iron echoed from the outer perimeter.

A sentry shouted a warning outside. Heavy bootsteps pounded against the gravel pathway, moving at breakneck speed.

Kyle knew Rhett outmatched him in strength, rank, and battle experience. Every wolf in the five territories knew Rhett was an apex executioner. But blind, possessive jealousy had erased Kyle's fear. He was running on pure adrenaline and wounded ego.

A massive fist slammed against the heavy oak front doors of the compound, rattling the iron hinges.

"Elowen!" Kyle’s voice roared from the threshold, shrill with rabid fury. "Get out here right now! Open this fucking door before I tear it off the frame!"

Rhett didn't blink. He reached down to his belt, checking the silver hunting blade sheathed at his hip, his golden eyes narrowing into slits of pure, lethal focus.

"Stay behind me," Rhett said, stepping toward the entrance. "Let us see if my little brother finally grew teeth."