Elinor POV:

The city lights blurred into streaks of gold and white through the taxi window. They offered no warmth, just a cold, glittering backdrop to the hollow space that had opened up in my chest.

My phone, which I'd put on silent, vibrated violently against the leather seat. The screen lit up with a name I dreaded.

Warren Campbell. My father.

I took a deep, shuddering breath and swiped to answer.

"Elinor! What in the hell did you do at the airport?" His voice was a low growl, fury barely contained.

A humorless laugh escaped my lips. "What did I do? You should be asking your precious daughter and your future son-in-law what they were doing."

"Don't you dare take that tone with me! You've embarrassed the Charles family. You've embarrassed us!" He wasn't concerned about me. He was concerned about appearances. Of course.

My heart, already bruised, sank like a stone. I should have known.

In the background, I heard my mother's voice, sharp and piercing. "All for your pathetic jealousy! You had to make a scene! You terrified poor Kayla!"

The phone was jostled, and then Kayla's voice, thick with fake tears, filled my ear. "Sister, I know you're mad at us, but how could you do that to Ewing? The security guards almost pressed charges..."

The sheer audacity of her performance was so staggering, I almost laughed again.

Then Ewing's voice cut in, laced with impatience and a thin veneer of placation. "Elinor, let's just talk about this at home. It's all a misunderstanding."

"A misunderstanding?" I cut him off, my voice dangerously quiet. "Do you need me to describe what you were doing in that car, Ewing?"

Silence on the other end. A thick, damning silence.

Then my father's roar exploded through the speaker again.

"Elinor Campbell, I am ordering you to come home right now! Stop causing trouble out there!"

It wasn't just a father's command. It was the command of my Pack's Alpha. I felt the pressure of it, a psychic weight pressing down on me, but it was drowned out by a wave of pure revulsion.

He wasn't finished. He delivered the final, killing blow. "Ewing and Kayla are in love. Since you can't seem to accept that, for the good of this family's reputation, your engagement to Ewing is over."

The words hit me like a physical slap. My cheek burned with a phantom sting.

"Over?" I repeated, my voice a hoarse whisper.

"The Charles family needs a union," Warren continued, his tone cold and final as a death sentence. "Since you're not suitable, Kayla will take your place."

And there it was. The truth, laid bare. My engagement wasn't just cancelled. It was being transferred. Like a piece of property. Like a stock option.

My entire life, my future, my fiancé-everything could be stripped away from me and handed to my sister without a second thought.

I thought of all the years, all the times Kayla had been excused, and I had been punished. All the times her mediocrity was celebrated while my achievements were ignored.

She was their real daughter. I was just... the other one. The placeholder.

In that moment, years of buried resentment, of quiet suffering and swallowed injustices, erupted inside me.

"Fine," I said. Just one word, spoken into the phone with a terrifying calm.

I ended the call and powered the phone off completely.

The taxi driver shot me a worried glance in the rearview mirror. I ignored him, staring out the window. The reflection that looked back was a stranger-a woman with dead eyes and a face carved from ice.

I had no home to go to. No family to turn to.

I had been utterly and completely cast out.

For a second, the sheer desolation of it threatened to swallow me whole. I was an orphan all over again.

But then, something else rose from the ashes of my despair. Something hard and unyielding.

I would not let them break me.

Elinor POV:

"Just drop me here, please."

The taxi pulled over in front of a brightly lit, 24-hour diner. I needed a place to think, a neutral corner to regroup before the world completely fell apart.

I slid into a booth at the back, the cracked vinyl cool against my skin. The waitress came over, her expression tired but kind.

"Black coffee," I ordered.

The bitterness of the coffee when it arrived was a welcome shock to my system, grounding me in the present. But my mind, a traitor, dragged me back into the past.

Three years ago. A rainy night.

I was an intern at Northwood, our family's company. A jealous colleague had sabotaged my inventory report, leaving me stranded in a cold, cavernous warehouse to recount thousands of units by myself. The rain was hammering against the metal roof. I was running a high fever, the numbers on the page blurring together.

I was about to pass out when the warehouse door burst open.

It was Ewing Charles.

He swept me up, carried me out of the cold, and drove me to the hospital. He stayed with me, his presence a warm, comforting weight in the sterile room.

That was the night I fell in love with him. He was my hero, my savior.

Or so I thought.

A year ago, at a family barbecue, I overheard a drunk Kayla bragging to her friends. She was the one who had called Ewing that night, telling him in a panicked voice that she was trapped at the warehouse.

Ewing had rushed over to save her.

In the dark, feverish haze, he never saw my face clearly. He just felt a desperate girl clinging to his jacket. He assumed that girl was Kayla. The sweet, fragile Omega he'd always had a soft spot for.

He saved me by mistake. He fell in love with the idea of saving Kayla.

I was just a stand-in.

The truth had been a poison I'd chosen to ignore, a lie I'd told myself to keep the fairy tale alive. Now, the fairy tale was a pile of ash.

The coffee's bitterness seeped from my tongue into my soul. I had never been truly chosen. Not by my family, not by the man I thought I loved. I was always the second choice, the convenient option, the one who could be sacrificed.

I couldn't let that happen again. I knew what Warren would do next. He'd find another alliance, another family to marry me off to, using me as a pawn to secure another business deal.

I had to save myself.

And as I sat there, staring into the black depths of my coffee cup, a wild, insane idea began to form.

I thought of the man in the airport lounge. The one with eyes like a winter storm.

Alaric Charles.

Ewing's uncle. The true power behind the Charles family. A man so formidable, even my father spoke his name with a measure of fear.

The rumors about him were legendary. He was ruthless, reclusive, and supposedly repulsed by the scent of all women. A powerful Alpha with no interest in a mate.

What if... what if I could offer him a deal he couldn't refuse?

If I married Alaric Charles, I would become Ewing and Kayla's aunt by marriage. The thought of them having to greet me with deference, with respect, sent a thrill of vicious satisfaction through me. It would be the ultimate revenge.

And with the power of the Charles name behind me, Warren wouldn't dare touch my position at Northwood. I could finally secure my footing, take back what was rightfully mine.

It was a gamble. A terrifying, high-stakes gamble.

But I had nothing left to lose.

I turned my phone back on, ignoring the flood of missed calls and angry texts. I scrolled straight to one name.

Hannah Sullivan. My best friend.

I pressed the call button. She picked up on the first ring.

"Elinor! Oh my god, are you okay? I heard..."

I cut her off, my voice steady and clear, forged in the fire of my newfound resolve. "Hannah, I need your help."

"Anything. What is it?"

"I need you to tell me everything you know about Alaric Charles. Every single detail."

There was a stunned silence on the other end of the line. "Alaric? Why?"

I looked out the diner window at the dark, sleeping city. A flame of determination flickered to life in my reflection's eyes.

"Because I'm going to marry him."