Rejected by My Alpha, Poisoned for His Mistress

I hadn't used the old code in years. A sequence of numbers that looked like a phone typo but meant something specific if you knew what to look for. Iris and I developed it during joint pack training when we were fifteen — back when secrecy meant sneaking out after curfew, not plotting against your own mate.

I sent the message from a burner phone I'd bought at a gas station two towns over. Three digits. A pause. Four more. Then I waited.

Her reply came in under an hour. A time. Coordinates for the boundary stream between Ironvale and Silverfang territory. A stretch I knew was unpatrolled because I'd designed the rotation schedule myself five years ago.

I drove there before dawn. The cabin had no security — why would it? I was the exiled Luna, not a prisoner. The forest was still dark when I parked and walked the last quarter mile on foot. My wolf stirred faintly inside me, stronger than she'd been in weeks now that the wolfsbane doses had stopped. Not healed. But present.

Iris was already there when I arrived. She stood on the Silverfang side of the stream, hands in her jacket pockets, her breath fogging in the cold air. When she saw me, something in her expression cracked.

"Nora."

I crossed the stream. The water was shallow and freezing. I didn't care.

"Tell me," she said.

So I did. Everything. The kitchen conversation I'd overheard. Jemma's scent on Victor's sheets. Oliver slipping wolfsbane into my morning tea while they laughed about it. The Council hearing they were planning. The six years. The dead pup. The raid Victor paid for.

Iris didn't interrupt. Her face cycled through shock, then something colder. Operational. When I finished, she was quiet for a long moment.

"How much time before the Council hearing?" she asked.

"Weeks," I said. "Not months."

She nodded once. "Come to Silverfang tomorrow morning. I know a healer who'll run a panel without alerting Ironvale. We need proof. Real proof. The kind the Lycan Council can't ignore."

"Iris—"

"No." Her voice was flat. Final. "You're not doing this alone. Not anymore."

I wanted to argue. To tell her this wasn't her fight. But the truth was I needed her. I needed someone who wasn't poisoning me or plotting my destruction or pretending I didn't exist.

So I just said, "Okay."

---

Elena Marsh's clinic was tucked into a quiet corner of Silverfang territory, a small building that looked more like a cottage than a medical facility. Iris walked me in through the back entrance. No sign-in sheet. No records.

Elena was older, maybe mid-fifties, with silver streaking through her dark hair and the kind of steady hands that came from decades of practice. She didn't ask questions. Just gestured for me to sit.

"Iris says you need a tox panel," she said. "Unregistered."

"Yes."

She tied the tourniquet around my arm and prepped the needle. "This stays between us. Understood?"

"Understood."

The blood draw was quick. She filled four vials and labeled them with a code instead of my name. Then she ran the panel herself, right there in the clinic, while Iris and I waited in the small exam room.

It took ninety minutes. I counted every one.

When Elena came back, she was holding a printout. Her expression was grim.

"Concentrated wolfsbane extract," she said. "Cumulative dosing over an extended period. Months at minimum. Possibly years." She set the printout on the exam table in front of me. "The levels are significant. Whoever did this knew exactly what they were doing. Micro-doses calibrated to suppress your wolf without triggering acute symptoms. If you'd kept ingesting it—" She paused. "Your wolf would have gone dormant permanently within another month. Maybe less."

I stared at the numbers on the page. My hands were steady. My voice was steady. "Is the damage reversible?"

"If the dosing stops, yes. Your wolf is strong. She'll recover. But it'll take time."

"How much time?"

"Weeks. Maybe a month before she's fully back."

I nodded slowly. Folded the printout and slipped it into my jacket pocket. "Can you certify this? Make it official?"

"I can provide documentation that will hold up with the Lycan Council," Elena said. "But once I do, there's no taking it back. You understand that?"

"I understand."

She held my gaze for a moment, then nodded. "I'll have it ready by tomorrow."

Iris walked me out to the parking lot. We were halfway to my car when she said, "There's something else."

I stopped. Turned. "What?"

"My tech team found something. Silverfang shares an alliance server with Ironvale for joint communications. Encrypted, but we have access." She pulled out her phone and handed it to me. "There's a cloud backup linked to Jemma's personal devices. A private journal. Hundreds of entries. Six years' worth."

I looked at the screen. Saw the file directory. Dates stretching back to the year the affair started.

"She documented everything," Iris said quietly. "Every encounter. Every dose. Every piece of the plan. It's all there."

I scrolled through the entry titles. My hands didn't shake. My breath didn't catch. I just read.

*Finally made him see her for what she is.*

*Oliver called me 'cool Aunt Jemma' again today.*

*The rogue raid worked. She's grieving. He's mine now.*

I handed the phone back to Iris. My voice came out calm. Cold. "Download everything. Every file. Every entry. I want it all."

She nodded. "Already done."

I looked at her. My best friend. The only wolf in my life who hadn't tried to destroy me.

"Thank you," I said.

She met my eyes. "We're going to bury them, Nora."

I believed her.