Chapter 3

Serena pulled herself into Ethan's arms, face red, her hair stuck to her wet cheeks.

"Nora, I know I've wronged you. But how can you call Ethan's pup a bastard?"

"Nora, don't worry, I won't take your place as his Luna. I only want to do this for Ethan. He's too good a man to have no heir. I'm begging you. Let me carry his pup as my thanks for everything he's done for me."

As she said it, she straightened up and started to bow to me.

Ethan pulled her back and wrapped his arms around her, his face full of protectiveness.

"Serena, this isn't on you. It's my fault."

He looked at me coldly. "Nora, how can you be so heartless? Do you know what Serena's doing this for?"

I slapped Ethan across the face. My lips were shaking.

"Ethan, you bastard."

"She got into bed with my mate, and I'm supposed to thank her? She's a conniving bitch. She's manipulative and rotten."

I was half a second away from saying it — that he was the one who couldn't have pups, that it was impossible for this child to be his — when Ethan's hand connected with my face first.

"Nora, I won't let you speak about Serena like that. She's the mother of my child."

I stared at him. He had already chosen Serena in his heart.

Maybe my expression was too broken, too pathetic, because his face softened slightly. His hand came up and touched my cheek gently.

"Nora, all I want is a pup. As long as you don't cause trouble, the child can call you mother too."

"Serena is loyal and decent. She won't take your place or try to take anything from you. Can you just be gracious about this and accept her?"

Serena dropped to her knees in front of me.

"Nora, please. I really do love Ethan. Just let me carry his pup. I promise — once the pup is born, I'll leave. You'll never see me again."

Ethan panicked. He grabbed Serena and pulled her up, furious.

"Serena, I won't let you leave. You promised you'd stay with me and build the legal office into something international. Did you forget?"

"If you leave, I'll shut the whole thing down. I'll follow you to the ends of the earth."

Then he turned and looked at me with cold eyes.

"Nora, I know I owe you a great deal. But Serena is innocent in this. If you force her out, then we end our bond. Let's break it."

"I gave you status, a name, a good life. If you leave me, do you really think you can keep any of that on your own?"

It was only in that moment that I understood how much pain my father had been in, the day I had knelt and begged him to protect someone who owed him nothing.

That day I ran out of the inn with tears on my face and let them stand there comforting each other.

I couldn't swallow it. I went straight to the Pack legal office and tore it apart. I threw all of Serena's things out the front door and plastered a sign outside that said whores and their dogs are not welcome. Then I made calls to every client, telling them exactly what kind of She-Wolf Serena Voss was.

One call from Ethan, and I was in Pack custody.

With his standing and his reach, he could cite Pack law from personal insult to emotional damage without breaking a sweat. And what I'd done was a full-scale public attack on Serena.

He crushed me like he was stepping on an insect.

At the hearing, I was a wreck, furious, red-eyed, looking like someone who'd lost their mind. Ethan listed every violation against me, one by one, with calm precision.

Then easily got a ruling against me.

In the end it was Ethan himself who asked the council for leniency. They reduced it to three months in Pack detention. What came with it was the full destruction of my reputation — Riverton's well-regarded Pack attorney publicly caught in a harassment and defamation case, now behind bars.

That day, Ethan handed me the bond-severance agreement and said flatly, "Sign it. I can't let my pup be born without a name."

"You have my word — as long as you genuinely apologize and learn to coexist with Serena peacefully, I won't treat you badly."

I threw the agreement in his face and told him that unless I was dead, Serena would never be anything but a scandal he couldn't show the light.

Ethan looked at me without expression and placed a document on the table in front of me.

"If you want your father's spirit to know no rest because of you, then don't sign."