Chapter 1

The night my Alpha announced he'd found his fated mate, every she-wolf in the Silver Fang pack lost her mind. Meanwhile, I was in the kitchen sneaking texts to my anonymous online pen pal — a vampire I'd been flirting with for three months.

"You sent me a voice note of you growling last night. My turn. What do you want to hear?"

Before he could reply, the pack house erupted. Wolves poured into the grand hall, howling and shoving for a glimpse of the Alpha's supposed destiny.

My best friend Clara grabbed my arm so hard her claws came out.

"Nora! Get in there! Alpha Dominic just told the whole council he's been secretly communicating with his mate for months. She's somewhere in THIS pack, and he's going to find her tonight!"

"He apparently has her saved in his phone as 'My Eternal.' The Luna candidates are losing it."

"And the best part — Selene walked up to him and demanded to see the messages. He read one out loud. In front of everyone. Something about wanting to hear her voice in the dark."

The hall was chaos. Wolves were speculating, scheming, panicking.

I looked down at the message from my vampire pen pal that read: "In the dark, your voice is the only thing that keeps me from losing myself."

And I thought — huh, what a coincidence.

Let me back up.

By my third year in the Silver Fang pack, I had mastered the art of being invisible. Not in the cool, mysterious way. In the "nobody notices the Omega who cleans the kitchen" way. I had no rank, no wolf bloodline worth mentioning, and no desire to climb the pack hierarchy. My parents had been nobodies — rogues taken in out of pity — and when they died, the pack kept me around because someone had to scrub the pots.

I didn't mind. Getting fed for work done is surviving. But getting fed while slacking off? That's winning.

I'd learned to hide romance novels inside recipe binders. I'd stream TV shows on the kitchen tablet, pretending to watch cooking tutorials. And three months ago, I'd stumbled into an anonymous supernatural chat room and met him.

He called himself "D." I called myself "Little Wolf." We never exchanged names, packs, or covens. That was the rule. Vampires and werewolves don't mix — everyone knows that. If my pack found out I was flirting with a bloodsucker, I'd be exiled. Or worse.

But D was — God, he was intoxicating. We agreed on everything. Same taste in old horror films. Same hatred of pretentious pack politics. Same dark humor. And his voice notes? Low, commanding, the kind of voice that made my wolf whimper in ways I'd never admit.

He sent me audio clips of himself reading poetry in the dark. Photos of his hands — just his hands — wrapped around a whiskey glass, veins visible, fingers long enough to make me dizzy. He never showed his face. Neither did I.

It was safe. It was thrilling. It was the one secret that was entirely mine.

And now Clara was dragging me into the grand hall where Alpha Dominic stood on the raised platform, his jaw set like granite, his dark eyes scanning the crowd like a predator counting prey.

"He's really going to do this," Clara whispered. "He's going to sniff her out."

Dominic's voice cut through the noise like a blade.

"My mate is in this room. I've known for weeks. Tonight, I'm done waiting."

Every woman in the hall held her breath.

I felt my phone buzz in my apron pocket.

A new message from D: "Something's happening on my end tonight. If I go quiet, don't think I've forgotten you. You're the only real thing in my life."

My heart clenched.

And then Alpha Dominic stepped off the platform, moving through the crowd, nostrils flaring — and his eyes locked directly on mine.