Chapter 1

I was scrolling through my phone after work when I found the post.

"Would you go after someone you like even if they already have a girlfriend?"

One comment said: "Of course."

"Five years ago I moved next door to a high-ranking Pack member. Smart, good-looking, already with someone."

"I made friends with both of them first. Then I told him his girlfriend had hurt me, played the wounded card until he felt sorry for me. The cracks started right away."

"They fought more and more. One night when he came to me to vent, I kissed him. He couldn't stop himself."

"And that night, his girlfriend was home crying because she'd been rejected from every academy she'd applied to."

"Looking back, I made the right call. He's now the Alpha Heir of his Pack. We're about to be Marked. If I hadn't made the first move, none of this would be my life."

Then the commenter added: "His ex has it rough now. No academy, no future. She's probably rotting somewhere."

I went completely still.

I recognized the profile picture. It was a photo of Vivienne Calloway and Callum Whitmore. Their first photo together. I had taken it, on Callum's birthday.

I stood on the side of the road staring at that comment for a long time.

Most people in the replies were tearing her apart, calling her a scheming homewrecker.

But a small group took her side.

"That's a real power move. Locking down an Alpha Heir early, crossing into a higher rank — she just wanted a better life."

"Even without her, those two might not have lasted. I don't see what she did wrong."

The wind picked up. I lost my footing. The takeout bag in my hand hit the ground and landed in a puddle.

I picked up the ruined sandwich and threw it in the trash.

I was the ex she was talking about. I was the one she said was rotting somewhere.

After everything fell apart, I didn't get into any academy. Then my mother got hurt. For a while I thought about ending it. But the last few years, life slowly got back on track.

It had been five years since Callum and I separated. Three years since I'd finally let him go.

The pain and humiliation had healed over the same way the scars on my wrists had. I barely felt them anymore.

Back home, I sorted through the sketches piled on my desk.

Just like Vivienne had said — I never made it to an academy. I never got my chance to level up.

While I was stacking the drawings, my hand hit something tucked in the back of the cabinet. An envelope. Old, dusty. My name was written on it in strong, deliberate strokes: For Hazel.

Inside was a letter from Callum. He'd written that he would give me everything he had. In the end, I lost everything because of him.

My mind drifted back.

Callum and I grew up side by side. Same Pack grounds, practically the same house.

Back then his family still looked like a family. His father was doing well, rising in rank. Then his father's business started failing, and he came home less and less. Callum would show up at our door and say it felt more like home than his own place.

When Callum was six, his father took a second mate. His mother found out and destroyed everything in the house that same night. After that, she stopped loving Callum too.

When the separation was finalized, both parents passed him back and forth like he was in the way. Neither one wanted him.

My parents took him in. They treated him like their own son.

From that point on, Callum and I were always together.

He was exceptional. Top marks, sharp mind, the kind of presence that made everyone look twice.

I was ordinary. Average grades, nothing remarkable — except that I could draw. That was the one thing I had.

But I never thought I was less than him. Not then.

He used to say my family gave him everything he understood about belonging. He used to say I was the only light in a dark stretch of his life.

In our first year at the Pack Academy, one evening after class, we were walking home the usual way when Callum's father appeared at the end of an alley. He smelled of alcohol. His movements were erratic. His father's business had collapsed. His second mate had left him. Now he wanted Callum back.

Callum didn't want to go.

His father lunged to grab him.

I stepped between them. My legs were shaking, but I didn't move. I got Callum's father to back off.

That night, Callum held me and said I was the only one he'd ever love.

As the years passed, Callum became someone everyone noticed. Ranked first in the academy. Girls chased after him. He had everything.

I was still the same — an art-track student with middling marks and no particular status.

I was afraid he'd leave. But he would just laugh and flick my nose and say: "Idiot. How could I leave you? What your family did for me — I could never repay that in a lifetime."

I thought it would stay that way.

Then Vivienne arrived.