Chapter 2 The Rejected Luna

Selene

The divorce papers lay spread before me, a crisp white contract with a number that could buy entire cities: five million dollars. Five million to make me disappear.

I traced my fingers along the edge of the document, watching as a thin layer of frost followed my touch. Pale morning light filtered through the curtains, casting shadows that seemed to mirror the fragmentation of my life.

Once, I'd been Selene Frost, promising young executive and heir to the Crystal Bay Pack. Every man desired me. My moonlit silver-blue eyes were hailed as one-of-a-kind. Back in university, so many brilliant young men pursued me, worshipping me as their dream goddess.

And now? I’ve been reduced to a rejected Luna. How ironic!

Memories flickered through my mind—Vortend's cold eyes, his ruthless words. "I would have refused you. Even now, I would refuse you for Adriana." The betrayal cut deeper than any physical wound, a pain that seemed to crystallize in my very bones.

My hand instinctively moved to my stomach. The doctor's words from yesterday echoed: "Congratulations, you're pregnant!"

Now, those words felt like a cruel joke from some malevolent universe intent on breaking me.

I walked to the full-length mirror, studying my reflection. The woman staring back was pale—too pale—with ice-blue eyes that seemed to hold entire winters within them.

The lunar mark in my right eye—a tiny crescent visible only up close—seemed to pulse with a quiet, dangerous energy.

Stay calm, I reminded myself. Stress is not good for the babies.

The phone rang, shattering the silence.

"Selene," Vivian's voice was professional but tinged with concern. "I need you to come to Aurora Medical Center. Now."

Aurora Medical Center

The sterile white hallways felt like an extension of my internal landscape—cold, precise, unforgiving.

Vivian Clark waited in her office, her green eyes studying me with a mixture of medical scrutiny and genuine friendship. As my friend and the pack's most respected physician, she was one of the few people I could trust completely.

The ultrasound machine hummed to life, its screen flickering with two distinct shapes. Two heartbeats. Two lives. My breath caught in my throat.

Vivian's fingers moved expertly across the screen, her brow furrowing. "Your energy signatures are... complicated."

"Complicated how?" I asked, a thread of frost spreading across the examination table where my hands rested.

She sighed, pushing her golden hair behind her ear. "Your werewolf lineage—particularly your ice and lunar abilities—they're in flux. The stress of being rejected by your mate is creating dangerous energy fluctuations."

Rejected. The word felt like a physical wound, a tear in the delicate fabric of my existence.

"Will I lose them?" The question emerged as a whisper, my silver-blue eyes locked on the ultrasound.

"Not if we're careful," Vivian said firmly. "But you must avoid emotional stress. Absolutely no confrontations. The twins are fragile."

Twins.

The word hung in the air, heavy with possibility and danger. A legacy I never expected, a future Vortend had so casually discarded.

"No one can know," I said, my voice gaining strength. "Not yet. Especially not Adriana."

Vivian nodded. Her fingers adjusted some settings on the machine. "Werewolf pregnancies, particularly for ice-line wolves like you, are delicate. Your ability to conceive again—if something goes wrong—might be impossible."

The weight of those words settled over me like a funeral shroud. My entire future, my lineage, balanced on a knife's edge.

The city of Black Pine wore its winter coat—gray skies, bare trees. My body radiated a heat that defied the winter chill, a protective mechanism for the two lives growing within me.

Memories of Vortend surfaced—rare moments of tenderness that now felt like elaborate deceptions.

"May our children take after you," he whispered, fingers threading through my silver-blue strands.

"Me?"

"Yes, my frost sprite," he breathed against my lips, kissing the petal-soft blush of them. "As beautiful as you are—preferably with the same hair. I’d even wish for three."

"When we have a boy, I'll name him Ethan."

The irony was a bitter knife twisting in my gut.

I turned a corner and froze. There, in the park where we used to walk, sat Vortend with Adriana. Her legs, impossibly long and barely covered, draped provocatively over the bench. Her laugh—was that a hint of compulsion in her voice?

My heightened hearing caught every word.

"Oh, Vort, I was worried you might have actually fallen for my sister," Adriana purred.

"Don't be ridiculous," Vortend's voice was ice. "This was always going to happen. I should have done this years ago."

"And now we can finally be together. Like before she interfered."

"Three and a half years, Vortend," she said, her fingers tracing lazy patterns on his suit sleeve. "Three and a half years without an heir. Don't you think it's time we discussed... alternatives?"

Vortend's response was measured, clinically. "The pack expects the continuation of the bloodline."

I could imagine his posture—rigid, controlled, the perfect image of an Alpha. Even now, seated on a park bench, he would radiate an unmistakable sense of power.

"She never gave you what you needed," Adriana pressed, her voice dropping to a seductive whisper. "A pure Alpha heir. Strong. Uncompromised."

A soft laugh—more calculation than genuine amusement. "Selene was... decorative. Useful for political alliances. Nothing more."

The words were a calculated knife, intended to wound. And they did. Each syllable felt like frost spreading through my veins.

"I can give you what she couldn't," Adriana continued. Her hand moved higher on his thigh, a blatant display of possession. "A child. Loyalty. Everything the Luna failed to provide."

Vortend's response was chillingly clinical. "The severance ritual is scheduled for tomorrow. Once it's complete, we can discuss... future arrangements."

Adriana leaned closer, her voice a practiced purr. "Imagine it. Our child. With your strategic mind, my social graces. We'd be unstoppable."

My hand instinctively pressed against my stomach. The two lives within me seemed to pulse—a silent, defiant heartbeat.

The intimate way Vortend's hand now rested on Adriana's knee told a story more painful than words.

Tears formed—but they froze instantly, falling as delicate ice crystals that shattered against the frozen ground.

Each crystal reflected a fractured memory, a broken promise.

Suddenly, my phone vibrated. It was Vortend's number.

"We'll finalize the severance ritual tomorrow."

"I'll be there," I responded, my voice steady despite the storm inside me.

As I hung up, around me, the temperature plummeted. Trees frosted. The ground crystallized.

Ruin me, I thought. Just ruin me.