The Alpha's Collared Pet: Rejected and Reborn

For ten years, I lived for Dante Moretti. I waited for my eighteenth birthday, knowing that the Alpha of the Dark Nebula was my fated mate.

But when the day finally came, he didn't claim me.

He brought Isabella home instead. A warrior. A political asset.

"Welcome home, my future Luna," he announced to the pack, shattering my heart in front of everyone.

I was just the orphan girl who couldn't Shift. A liability.

To ensure I knew my place, Isabella offered me a "gift." A collar made of pure silver.

To a human, it is jewelry. To a wolf, it is acid.

When she locked it around my neck, the metal sizzled. The smell of my own burning flesh filled the room.

I fell to my knees, screaming, looking at Dante with tears in my eyes. I begged him to stop her.

But he just looked at me, his face a mask of cold logic.

"Wear it," he commanded, ignoring the smoke rising from my skin. "Consider it discipline. If you take it off, you leave the Pack."

He thought he was protecting me. He thought making me look weak would save me from his enemies.

He didn't realize he was killing the girl who loved him.

That night, I didn't just take off the collar.

I closed my eyes, found the golden thread of our Mate Bond in my mind, and snapped it in half.

Dante collapsed in the hallway, clutching his chest in agony as he felt our connection die.

"What did you do?" he whispered into the void.

"I set you free, Alpha," I said.

Then I ran into the storm.

He thought I was a defenseless human. He didn't know I was the lost daughter of the Royal White Wolf bloodline.

And when I returned, I wouldn't be kneeling.

Chapter 1

Seraphina POV:

The noise in my head was deafening.

It wasn't a sound you could block out. It was the Pack Link-the psychic hive-mind of the Dark Nebula. Usually, it was white noise: patrol logs, hunger pangs, petty drama.

Today, it was a riot.

Our Alpha has chosen!

Isabella is the one!

Finally, a warrior Luna!

I stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror in the Moretti estate. My knuckles were white against the marble counter. Inside my ribcage, my wolf was thrashing, clawing at my lungs like she was trying to dig her way out of a grave.

She knew.

She knew Dante Moretti was ours.

I closed my eyes. The memory was ten years old but still drew blood. I was eight, caked in the ash of my family's home. Dante had pulled me from the rubble. He was eighteen, newly Alpha. When he lifted me, the smell hit me.

Pine and fresh blood.

The Mate Bond. Biology's cruelest joke.

For ten years, I lived in his shadow, waiting for my eighteenth birthday. Waiting for my wolf to surface so I could stand beside him.

But I was a dud. A late bloomer. To the pack, I wasn't just human; I was a genetic dead end.

The heavy oak door downstairs slammed open.

The floorboards vibrated with his voice. That deep baritone that used to read me bedtime stories was now the voice of a warlord.

"Prepare the guest suite," Dante commanded. The Alpha Tone laced his words, a frequency that bypassed the ears and ordered the marrow. Even from here, my knees went soft.

"Dante, relax," a female voice purred. Isabella.

I walked to the balcony.

Dante stood in the foyer. Six-four, lethal grace, black hair slicked back. He wore power like a tailored suit. The air around him felt heavy, pressurized.

Isabella hung on his arm. Tall, curvaceous, smelling of expensive musk and unearned victory. She was a high-ranking female from a strategic ally pack. She was a political asset. A warrior.

She was everything I wasn't.

Dante looked up.

His eyes, the color of a rough sea, locked onto mine.

For a microsecond, his pupils blew wide. He smelled me. Vanilla and rain. I saw his knuckles whiten as he gripped the banister. His wolf wanted to claim me.

But Dante was a man of logic. And logic dictated that a weak mate meant a weak pack.

He looked away. He looked at Isabella and smiled-a sharp, calculated expression.

"Welcome home, my future Luna," he said, projecting his voice so the servants-and I-wouldn't miss a syllable.

My chest didn't break; it just went hollow.

I turned back to the bathroom.

I looked at my reflection. Waist-length black hair. Dante used to brush it. He said it was his favorite thing.

Just dead cells, I thought.

I opened the drawer and grabbed the sewing scissors.

My hands shook, but I didn't hesitate. I grabbed a fistful of silk.

Snip.

The sound was violent in the quiet room.

Snip.

Black locks hit the porcelain like dead snakes.

Snip. Snip. Snip.

I hacked at it until I looked deranged. Until I looked like a survivor of something terrible. I was cutting away his favorite part of me.

My wolf whimpered, curling into a ball in the back of my mind.

I wasn't mourning. I was defecting.

I pulled a stolen pack of cigarettes from my robe. I'd never smoked; Dante hated the smell.

I lit one, coughing as the smoke hit my virgin lungs, then forced another drag. I blew the smoke out the window, watching the estate light up for the engagement party.

I looked up at the moon.

"You gave me a mate who thinks I'm a liability," I whispered. "Keep him."

I didn't say the formal rejection words yet. That would kill me in my current state. But the bond was already bleeding out.

I had to run.

But first, I had to survive the night.

The next morning, the house reeked of them.

Dante's pine mixed with Isabella's floral musk-a territorial marking on every surface.

I was an intruder in my own life.

I went to my room-the one next to his office-and started purging.

I ripped the nightlight out of the wall. A plastic star he bought me when I was ten. Trash.

Clothes he bought. Trash.

I found an old diary under my mattress. First page, Dante's jagged handwriting: Pack Property. Do not touch.

Once, I thought it was protection. Now I saw it for what it was: a barcode.

"Cleaning house?"

Isabella leaned against my doorframe, wearing a silk robe that cost more than my education. She let it slip just enough to show the fresh bite mark on her neck.

"This is my room," I rasped, voice rough from the smoke.

"Not anymore," Isabella smiled. "Dante promised me a walk-in closet. This room connects to the master. It's perfect."

She walked in, sneering at my chopped hair.

"Oh, honey. A breakdown? How cliché. You look like a rat that got caught in a fan."

She reached into her pocket. "But don't worry. I have a peace offering. Since we're going to be... family."

She pulled out a collar.

Intricate filigree. Beautiful. And unmistakable.

Silver.

To a human, it's jewelry. To a wolf, it's mace. It burns on contact, disrupts the nervous system, prevents shifting.

"I can't wear that," I said, backing up.

"Dante thinks you should," she said, eyes gleaming. "He says you've been acting out. Cutting your hair. Smelling like smoke. You need a reminder of your rank."

"He wouldn't."

"Dante!" she called.

He appeared. Alpha speed. One second the doorway was empty, the next he filled it.

His gaze swept over my hair. His jaw went tight, a muscle feathering in his cheek. He looked pained, but he buried it instantly under a mask of ice.

"Problem?"

"Fina doesn't like my gift," Isabella pouted. "I thought a little pet collar would be cute."

Dante looked at the silver. He knew. He was an Alpha; he knew exactly what silver did to a dormant wolf.

But he looked at me-at the defiance in my eyes, at the hair that screamed rebellion-and his ego took the wheel. He needed me submissive. If I was weak, I was safe. If I was a pet, the Council wouldn't demand my head.

"Put it on her," Dante said. Flat.

"Dante, it's silver," I said. "It will burn."

"You are human enough," he said, looking away. "It won't kill you. Consider it... discipline."

Isabella lunged. I tried to dodge, but she was a ranked warrior. She pinned me against the wall.

The metal hit my neck and hissed.

It wasn't heat; it was chemical corrosion. Acid eating into the pores.

Sizzle.

The smell of cooking meat filled the room.

"Ahhh!" I screamed, clawing at her hands.

Click.

The lock snapped shut.

Isabella stepped back, grinning.

I fell to my knees, gasping. The pain was a high-frequency drill boring into my spine.

"Stop being dramatic," Dante snapped, though he paled when he saw the smoke rising from my skin. "It's sterling, not pure. It's a rash."

He was lying to himself. He had to believe I was weak so he could justify treating me like this.

I looked up at him through tunneling vision.

"It hurts," I wheezed. "Dante..."

He took a half-step forward, hand twitching.

Isabella put a hand on his chest. "She's manipulating you, baby. Look at her. Drama queen."

Dante stopped. He hardened.

"Wear it," he commanded. "If you take it off, you leave the Pack."

He turned and walked away.

He wasn't my savior. He was just a man too cowardly to love a liability.