Darius’s estate was nothing like the crumbling beta house I grew up in.

It wasn’t a home—it was a kingdom.

A quiet, luxurious, suffocating kingdom of stone and silence.

Cold grey walls wrapped around endless corridors, velvet drapes muffled the sound of wind, and the floors were polished until they reflected your steps like mirrors—always reminding you that you could never sneak away.

Wolves bowed when he walked past,not from loyalty but from fear.

The air changed when he entered a room. People stood straighter, heads lowered, mouths shut.

Power didn’t cling to him—it oozed from his skin like scent, like warning.

I should have felt safe but no, I didn’t.

The moment he brought me here, the doors closed behind me like a coffin lid.

“This is your room,” he said, opening a tall door with a smooth swing. His voice was calm and unreadable.

He ordered the maid following beside to clean me up and bring me down for dinner.

I paused half way into the room. He must be joking,this isn't a room, but an enormous chamber—too big for someone like me.

A bed big enough for three sat in the center, draped in dusky blue silk. Everything was rich, elegant, untouched.

There were windows—tall and beautiful—but they didn’t open.

The closet smelled of cedar and luxury. Dresses, coats, things I’d never dare imagine owning. I ran my hand along the fabric of one gown—it was softer than anything I'd worn in my life. Nothing in this room felt like mine. Not the clothes, not the space, not even the skin the maid had dressed and pampered.

“I don’t belong here,” I whispered.

He stepped closer. I could feel his presence before I even turned to him.

“You’re my mate,” he said, his voice low but firm. “That’s all the belongings you need.”

I wanted to scream that a mate is supposed to be a choice. A gift, not a chain.

But my voice had learned how to hide.

For one moment, his eyes softened. The ice in them cracked just a little, and behind it, something flickered—concern? Regret? I wasn’t sure.

Then it was gone. The Alpha returned, swallowing the man.

“You’ll stay here. No wandering. No leaving. You’re safe now.”

Safe? He used that word like it meant something.

Like it should mean something coming from him.

But I wasn’t safe,I was watched,guarded and contained. A Luna without a title. A prisoner with better walls. I literally lived in fear.

The days passed slowly, like cold molasses dripping from a broken clock.

He brought me things,gifts, my favorite fruits, classic novels I once mentioned. He remembered things I didn’t expect.

A soft blanket I hadn’t asked for, slippers that actually fit,a journal with a pen made of real wolfbone and silver inlay.

He never forced himself on me. He never touched me without reason but he didn’t let me go either.

His touches were… careful. But they still clung to me long after he left. His fingers barely grazed mine when handing me tea. Little things, too small to scream over. But they carried weight. They carried intent.

And every time he looked at me, it felt like I was drowning in water so deep that one could stop fighting and simply… sank.

“You keep running from me in your eyes,” he said once, after I flinched when he touched my wrist. “I can feel it.”

I didn’t answer because he was right.

My soul kept running even if my body couldn’t.I thought I could outwait him.

Two weeks later, I tried to escape.

I waited until midnight, when the guards rotated. I'd watched their patterns, memorized their rhythm like a song.

I crept through the eastern wing, barefoot, heart pounding, and slipped into a tunnel I’d overheard two omegas whispering about in the laundry hall.

The cold stone scraped my palms. Dust clung to my throat but the scent of pine and freedom waited just beyond the trees.

I almost made it, almost but he found me before I could shift. Before I could taste even a second of freedom.

He didn’t yell, didn’t hit me. Didn’t even speak for a while. We were both silent. He just looked at me like I’d stabbed him.

“I would’ve kept you safe,” he finally said, voice hollow. “You didn’t have to run.”

And then, without another word he picked me dropping me on his right shoulder swiftly.

“I hate you,” I whispered as soon as we got to his chamber, “let me go!”

“You’re lying,” Darius breathed against my ear, voice low, rough. “You only say that when you want me.”

His scent wrapped around me— pine,cedarwood and danger, wild and maddening. His body was hot against mine, rigid with restraint. But his eyes… his eyes devoured me.

“Stay away from me,” I lied again.

He backed me into the wall, slowly, deliberately, caging me in with his arms. “Say it again,” he dared.

“I hate—” My breath hitched as he grabbed my jaw gently, tilting my head up. “I hate… how you make me feel.”

Darius’s thumb brushed over my lower lip, slow and possessive. “That’s more like it.”

And then he kissed me.

There was no tenderness in it. Only heat and desperation. A storm that had waited too long to break. My knees buckled, but he caught me, lifted and pressed me against the stone wall like I weighed nothing.

His mouth moved down my neck, sucking, biting, branding me.

“You drive me insane,” he growled. “I dream about you. I wake up hard for you. I burn for you.”

My hands tangled in his hair, dragging his mouth back to mine. This is what I mean when I say my body betrays me when he's around me.

“I want to hate you,” I gasped.

He kissed me harder, lips punishing mine, his hands made their way beneath my dress sliding up.“Then hate me like this.”

My body arched against him as he slid the fabric up, baring my thighs, my hips. His fingers found the soaked meat between my legs, and he hissed through his teeth.

“Damn you, Octavia…”

“Then take me,” I whispered. “If you dare.” These words found its way to my lips, another betrayal from my body.

With a feral snarl, he lifted me from the wall and carried me to the bed, laying me down like something precious, even as his hands trembled with hunger. He undressed me slowly, eyes never leaving mine, watching every breath, every shiver.

“You’re mine,” he said, voice like thunder. “Say it.”

“No.” I refused.

He smirked, then stripped his shirt off—chest bare, tattooed, scarred, powerful.

When he lowered himself onto me, the world stopped spinning. His skin was on fire. His weight, grounding. His lips, a promise and a punishment.

He slid through my walls slowly, deeply, wrapped in my warmth, eyes locked on mine like he needed to see the moment I broke.

And yes, I broke, I didn't want to but I did.

I gasped, a mixture of pleasure and pain which was later replaced with pleasure after a few more strokes.

I rose with him, met every thrust with the same fire.

Matched his growl with my moan.

The room echoed with the sound of our bodies colliding, the sound of our skin slapping, the heat of breathless pleas, the rhythm of something too primal to be named.

“Say it,” he groaned against my shoulder.

“Never,” I gasped, nails raking down his back.

He thrust deeper, harder, until I cried out, until my body clenched around him like a vice.

He gritted his teeth. “Say it.”

And then, I did because it felt true.

“You’re mine,” I breathed, arching under him. “And I’m yours.”

We came undone together—wild and breathless, lost in the bond, tangled in sweat and sheets and sin.

And for that one night… There was no war,no betrayal, only us.

The moon burning above us like it knew how this would end.

The next morning, I went to check the tunnel and it was sealed.

The third escape ended worse.

A collar, sleek, silver-wired. Hidden beneath lace. It buzzed when I stepped past the boundary charm.

Not pain. Just enough discomfort to freeze my limbs. He was learning and ready for my every move, so was I.

I learned how to smile when he watched.

How to answer softly when he asked about my sleep. How to say “thank you” even when my fingers trembled.

I learned how to lie.I told him I was adjusting.I told him I just needed time.I told him what he wanted to hear—until I missed my heat.

And then…I knew, I was pregnant.

The realization hit me like a fist to the gut. I vomited. I cried. Screamed into the pillow when no one could hear.

Not even the Moon Goddess could save me now.

My wolf whimpered, curled tight in my chest like a wounded pup.She knew. She mourned before I could even speak it aloud.

I held the truth in my belly like a bomb.

Darius shouldn't know about the baby,not now.