My Mate Tore Up Our Baby’s Ultrasound Before Rejecting Me

The pack house felt different after the call.

Not quieter. Not emptier. Just different. Like the air had changed weight. Wolves who used to brush past me in the hallways now pressed themselves against the walls when I walked by. The Deltas who'd cornered me at the Banquet avoided the great hall entirely when I was there. Even Garrett, Cruz's ever-loyal Beta, kept his distance, watching me from across rooms with something that looked like fear.

Cruz, on the other hand, wouldn't leave me alone.

He found me in the Luna quarters two days after I made the call. I was folding laundry — my own laundry, because no one in this pack house did anything for me anymore — when the door slammed open. No knock. No warning.

"You're going to cancel it," Cruz said. His voice carried that Alpha edge, the one that used to make my knees buckle. "Call him back. Tell him you made a mistake."

I set down the shirt I was holding and looked at him. He was still handsome. Sharp jaw, broad shoulders, eyes the color of winter storms. Five years ago, I'd thought he was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. Now I just saw the crack in his collarbone where the rogue's claw had missed his throat by an inch. The scar I'd earned saving his life.

"No," I said.

His eyes narrowed. "That wasn't a request."

"I know."

He stepped closer. The Alpha aura rolled off him in waves, thick and oppressive, trying to force my wolf into submission. Cinder snarled but stayed low. She wasn't bowing. Not anymore.

"You have nowhere to go without this pack," Cruz said. His voice dropped, quieter now, almost reasonable. "No family. No allies. You think Marcellus is going to protect you? He's Lycan royalty. You're nothing to him."

I picked up another shirt. Started folding.

"If you go through with this," Cruz continued, "I'll demote you. Omega status. You'll scrub floors and serve meals until you beg me to take you back."

I set the folded shirt on the pile and met his eyes. "Okay."

He blinked. Like he'd expected me to break. To cry. To argue.

I just stood there, waiting for him to leave.

He did. Eventually. The door didn't slam this time. It closed soft and final, like a coffin lid.

Cinder whispered in my head. *Good.*

---

The nausea started three days later.

At first, I thought it was stress. I'd barely eaten since the Banquet. Hadn't slept more than a few hours a night. My body was running on spite and determination, and neither of those were particularly nourishing.

But when I bent over the kitchen sink one morning, dizzy and sweating, my wolf went completely still.

*No,* Cinder breathed.

I gripped the counter. Waited for the room to stop spinning.

*Check,* she said. *Now.*

I didn't want to. I didn't want to know. But my feet carried me through the pack house anyway, down the narrow hallway to the healer's clinic. The door was unlocked. It always was.

Evelyn Hayes looked up from her desk when I walked in. She was old, older than any wolf I'd ever met, with silver hair pulled back in a braid and hands that never shook. She'd been the Shadowridge healer for forty years. She'd delivered half the pack, including Cruz.

"Luna," she said, standing. Her voice was warm. She was one of the few wolves who still used my title like it meant something. "What brings you in?"

I sat down in the chair across from her desk. My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat against my thighs.

"I need a test," I said.

She didn't ask what kind. She just nodded, reached into a drawer, and pulled out a small vial and a silver needle.

The test took three minutes. I watched the clock on the wall, counting every second, while Evelyn worked in silence. When she finally looked up, her face was soft.

"You're carrying, dear," she said quietly. "About four weeks along."

The world tilted.

Cinder surged forward in my mind, alert and awake for the first time in months. *Pup. Our pup.*

I pressed my hand against my stomach. Flat. Empty. Except it wasn't.

"An Alpha heir," Evelyn added. She was smiling now, cautious but genuine. "Strong aura already. You'll feel it soon."

I nodded. I couldn't speak. My throat had closed up, tight and burning.

For one fragile, stupid moment, I let myself imagine it. A pup. Mine. Something worth protecting. Something that might finally matter to Cruz, might finally make him see me as more than the broken Luna he was ashamed of.

Cinder growled. *Don't.*

But I couldn't help it. Hope was a weed. It grew even in scorched earth.

---

I found the swapped supplements two days later.

I'd gone to the healer's office to pick up prenatal vitamins. Evelyn handed me a bottle with careful instructions, telling me to take them every morning with food. I carried them back to my quarters and set them on the bathroom counter next to the other bottles Cruz had given me months ago.

Something didn't match.

I picked up the old bottle. Read the label. Then read it again.

Contraceptive blend. Healer-approved.

My hands went cold.

I opened the pack healer's records on my phone — I still had access, technically, as Luna — and searched for my name. The order was there. Submitted five weeks ago. Authorized by Alpha Cruz Griffin. Notes in the margin: *Patient may attempt fraudulent pregnancy claim. Preventative measure approved.*

I set the phone down. My pulse was steady. My breathing was even.

Cinder didn't snarl. She didn't rage.

She just went quiet. The kind of quiet that came before wolves ripped out throats.

I took the real prenatal vitamins and walked to the Omega quarters. No one stopped me. No one ever watched the Omegas. I found an empty room, unlocked a drawer with a hairpin, and hid the bottle inside.

Then I went back to my quarters, climbed into bed, and stared at the ceiling until dawn.

I didn't cry. I didn't scream.

I just lay there, one hand pressed against my stomach, protecting the only thing Cruz had ever given me that mattered.

And I understood, with perfect, crystalline clarity, exactly what kind of wolf my mate was.