Sophia sent the apology at 7:16 in the morning.
I knew the exact time because I had been awake all night, sitting on the edge of the bed with one hand over my stomach and the other holding the ultrasound photo Dr. Harper had given me.
The message appeared on my phone while the estate was still quiet.
I’m sorry. I know you won’t believe me, but I am. Can we talk? Just us.
I stared at the screen until the words blurred.
Then another message came.
I found Mom’s moonstone bracelet. The one you thought was gone. I’ll bring it if you meet me.
My fingers tightened around the phone.
That bracelet had belonged to our mother.
She had worn it every full moon until the day she died. After her funeral, it disappeared from her jewelry box, and Sophia swore she had no idea where it went. I had cried for weeks because losing the bracelet felt like losing the last warm piece of my mother.
And now, after all these years, Sophia suddenly had it.
Of course she did.
I called Daniel first.
He answered before the second ring.
“No.”
I blinked.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You’re calling me at seven in the morning after your sister found out you’re pregnant. Whatever she asked you to do, the answer is no.”
“She says she has Mom’s bracelet.”
Daniel went silent for a second, and when he spoke again, his voice was softer but not less firm.
“Olivia, that is bait.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t bite.”
I looked down at the ultrasound photo.
The tiny shape on the image looked more like hope than a child, but it was enough to make every decision feel heavier.
“I don’t want to go,” I said. “But if she really has it—”
“She has had it this whole time, and now she’s using it because she knows exactly where to cut.”
That was probably true.
It hurt because it was true.
“She asked to meet in the forest.”
Daniel cursed.
“Absolutely not.”
“Near the old north trail.”
“Olivia.”
“She said she doesn’t want cameras or Pack guards.”
“That should terrify you, not persuade you.”
“I’m not going alone.”
“You’re not going at all.”
“I can bring a recorder.”
“You can bring the entire FBI and it would still be a terrible idea.”
Despite everything, a small laugh escaped me.
“You know werewolves don’t call the FBI for family drama.”
“They should consider it.”
I rubbed my forehead.
“Daniel, I need to know what she knows.”
“You already know enough. She knows you’re pregnant. That means she’s dangerous.”
“She’s always been dangerous.”
“No,” he said sharply. “She’s always been selfish. There is a difference. A selfish woman steals attention. A dangerous woman tries to erase evidence.”
My hand moved instinctively to my stomach.
Evidence.
That was what my baby had become in Sophia’s world.
Proof that her pregnancy was a lie.
Proof that Ethan had betrayed the real heir.
Proof that everything she gained could vanish the moment I opened my mouth.
“I’ll stay close to the main trail,” I said.
Daniel made a sound of disbelief.
“That is not a compromise.”
“I need the bracelet.”
“No, you need to stay alive.”
“I need both.”
He was quiet for a long moment.
Then he said, “Share your location with me. Keep your phone recording. If she asks you to move deeper into the forest, you leave. If she touches you, you scream. If Ethan calls, you answer on speaker so I can hear him.”
“Ethan won’t call.”
“You don’t know that.”
I looked toward the closed door of the east wing bedroom, beyond which the entire estate had moved on as if I were already a ghost.
“No,” I said quietly. “I do.”
By noon, the sky had turned the color of wet steel.
I left through the greenhouse path wearing a loose gray coat and boots that would not slip easily on the old trails. I kept my phone in my pocket with the recorder running, and every few minutes Daniel texted me.
Still visible?
Yes.
Still on trail?
Yes.
Still think this is stupid?
Yes.
His last message almost made me smile.
Almost.
Sophia waited near the entrance to the north forest path, dressed in cream cashmere and leather boots that looked too clean for the woods. She held a small velvet pouch in one hand.
When she saw me, her face softened.
“You came.”
“I came for the bracelet.”
Her mouth tightened.
“Not for me?”
“Do you want me to lie?”
She looked away, and for one strange second she almost looked like the girl who used to climb into my bed during thunderstorms because she hated sleeping alone.
Then she said, “You always were better at making people feel guilty.”
I stopped several feet away from her.
“And you always were better at pretending guilt was something other people made you feel.”
Her eyes flashed.
“I’m trying to apologize.”
“Then apologize.”
Sophia looked down at the velvet pouch.
“I shouldn’t have let the livestream happen that way.”
I laughed once.
“Let it happen?”
“I told Ethan it would hurt you.”
“And then you stood beside him in my Luna dress.”
Her jaw tightened.
“I didn’t choose the dress.”
“No, you just chose the man wearing the mating mark that matches mine.”
The Fate Bond throbbed as soon as I said it. My breath caught, and I hated that Sophia noticed.
Her gaze dropped to my chest.
“It still hurts?”
I lifted my chin.
“That’s none of your business.”
“It must be awful.”
The words were quiet.
Almost gentle.
But her eyes were hungry.
I understood then that Sophia did not simply want Ethan, my title, or my room.
She wanted to know the exact shape of the pain she caused.
“You enjoy it,” I said.
She blinked.
“What?”
“You enjoy knowing it hurts.”
“That’s cruel.”
“No, Sophia. Cruel is announcing a fake pregnancy in front of the entire Pack while your sister is carrying the real heir.”
The air changed immediately.
Sophia’s sweet expression vanished so fast it almost impressed me.
For several seconds, neither of us moved.
Then she said, “So you admit it.”
My blood turned cold.
I had been careful.
Too careful.
But anger had done what fear could not.
It opened my mouth.
I stepped back.
Sophia smiled slowly.
“That’s why you went to the clinic.”
I reached into my pocket and touched my phone, praying the recorder was still running.
“Sophia.”
“No, don’t use that voice.” She laughed, and there was nothing soft in it now. “The big-sister voice. The patient voice. The voice you use when you want everyone to remember you’re the good one.”
“I never said I was good.”
“You never had to. Mom thought it. Dad thought it. The Pack thought it. Ethan thought it too, until I showed him he could want something else.”
I stared at her.
“You’re sick.”
“No. I’m honest.”
She turned and started walking deeper down the trail.
I did not move.
Sophia glanced back.
“Do you want the bracelet or not?”
“Show it to me.”
“It’s safer near the overlook.”
“No.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“You’re afraid of me.”
“Yes.”
That seemed to surprise her.
For once, I did not pretend courage for her benefit.
“I’m pregnant, Sophia. I’m alone in the woods with a woman who has spent the last week stealing my life. So yes, I’m afraid of you.”
Her face twisted.
“You always make yourself the victim.”
“You pushed yourself into a wall yesterday and blamed me.”
“You called my baby fake.”
“Because it is.”
Her nostrils flared.
Then she smiled again.
“Fine. Come get the bracelet.”
She opened the velvet pouch just enough for me to see silver and pale blue stone inside.
My chest tightened.
Mom’s bracelet.
It was real.
Against every rational instinct I had, I took a step forward.
Then another.
We walked toward the overlook in silence, the trees closing around us until the estate disappeared behind a veil of mist and branches. The north cliff rose ahead, its edge protected by an old wooden rail that had been half destroyed years ago during a winter storm.
I stopped several feet from it.
“Give me the bracelet.”
Sophia stood near the broken rail and turned the pouch in her hand.
“Do you remember when Mom gave this to me for safekeeping?”
“She didn’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do. Mom knew you lost everything you borrowed.”
Sophia’s smile collapsed.
There it was.
The wound beneath everything.
Not Ethan.
Not Luna power.
Not Pack politics.
Our childhood.
“You think you’re so special because she trusted you,” Sophia said. “She gave you the recipes. The family records. Her old letters. Everyone gave Olivia the meaningful things and gave Sophia pretty things because pretty was all I was good for.”
I stared at her.
“I was sixteen when she died. I didn’t choose what she left behind.”
“No, you just enjoyed it.”
“I grieved her.”
“So did I.”
“Then why steal the bracelet?”
Her fingers tightened around the pouch.
“Because for once I wanted something first.”
The wind moved through the trees, cold and sharp.
I looked at my sister and finally understood that her hatred had not begun with Ethan. He was just the latest object she used to prove the world owed her what it had given me.
“You could have told me you felt that way.”
Sophia laughed.
“What would you have done? Hugged me? Told me I mattered too? You always think kindness fixes things because kindness has always worked for you.”
“It didn’t work with Ethan.”
Her eyes gleamed.
“No. I did.”
The Fate Bond burned at his name.
I gripped my coat.
Sophia stepped closer.
“Do you know what he said when I told him I was pregnant?”
I did not answer.
“He cried.”
My throat tightened.
“Stop.”
“He held me and said the Pack finally had a future.”
“Stop.”
“He said maybe the Moon Goddess gave him the right woman too late.”
Pain ripped through me so fiercely I stumbled.
Sophia’s eyes dropped to my stomach.
“And there it is.”
I forced myself upright.
“You don’t have to do this.”
“Oh, Olivia.” Her voice became almost tender. “I really do.”
I backed away.
“Daniel knows where I am.”
“Does he know exactly where?”
I reached for my phone.
Sophia moved faster.
She slapped it from my hand, and it skidded across wet leaves toward the broken rail.
I turned to grab it.
She shoved me.
Hard.
I caught myself against the railing, wood splintering under my hands.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“Sophia, don’t.”
For one second, her face trembled.
Maybe there was still a human being somewhere inside her.
Then her gaze dropped to my stomach, and whatever softness remained disappeared.
“If that baby is born, I lose everything.”
“You already lost yourself.”
Her expression twisted with rage.
Then she pushed me again.
The railing snapped.
The ground vanished.
I twisted instinctively, wrapping both arms around my stomach as the cliffside tore past me in a blur of rock, branches, and frozen earth. Pain exploded through my shoulder, my ribs, my hip. My head struck something hard enough to fill my vision with light.
I kept my arms locked over my stomach.
Not me.
Please not the baby.
When I finally hit the bottom of the ravine, the air left my lungs in one brutal rush.
For several seconds, I could not move.
Rain misted across my face.
Somewhere above, Sophia shouted my name.
Not in fear.
In performance.
“Olivia!”
I tried to answer, but no sound came out.
My phone lay somewhere above me.
My body screamed with pain.
My stomach cramped.
I pressed a shaking hand beneath my coat.
“No,” I whispered. “Please, no.”
Far above, Sophia’s voice became smaller.
Then I heard her speaking to someone.
Maybe she had called Ethan.
Maybe she had called the guards.
Her voice carried faintly down the ravine.
“She attacked me. She went crazy. She said she would kill the baby, and then she ran. I don’t know where she went.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course.
Of course that was the story.
A minute later, through the rain and the roaring in my ears, Ethan’s voice came from somewhere above.
“What do you mean she ran?”
Sophia sobbed.
“She said if she couldn’t be Luna, no one could. Ethan, I’m scared.”
His voice turned sharp, commanding, Alpha.
“Search the forest. Find Olivia before she crosses the border.”
Find Olivia.
Not save Olivia.
Not where is my wife.
Find her.
Like I was the criminal.
Like I was the danger.
I tried to call his name.
All that came out was a broken breath.
The Fate Bond pulsed weakly in my chest, but it did not pull him toward me.
Maybe because he had stopped listening to it.
Maybe because he had stopped listening to me long ago.
Footsteps thundered above as the Pack began searching in the wrong direction.
Sophia’s crying faded.
Ethan’s orders faded.
The forest swallowed their voices.
I lay at the bottom of the ravine with blood warming my side and my arms still wrapped around the only truth I had left.
“I’m here,” I whispered.
No one heard me.
“I’m here.”
The rain fell harder.
My vision blurred.
And somewhere deep inside me, my wolf began to howl.
