His Heir Lived, His Luna's Baby Died

At nineteen, I entered Blackwood Pack as the outsider everyone said would never become a real mother to an Alpha's son.

Knox married me anyway and told four-year-old Theo that family was something we chose.

I sold my mother's moonstone hairpin during Theo's first brutal shift fever, and years later he signed his adoption papers with Mom beside my name.

Then Knox's first love, Bianca, came back pregnant with a DNA report naming my husband as the father.

Knox swore she would never replace me, but her ultrasound replaced our family photo and Theo started calling her baby his little brother.

I was eleven weeks pregnant too, with my own ultrasound hidden inside my purse.

At the Founders' Feast, Bianca learned about my baby, stepped backward near the stairs, and screamed just as Knox turned the corner.

He shoved me aside to reach her, my back hit stone, and warm blood ran down my leg while no one looked at me.

"She pushed me. She tried to kill your baby."

"Evelyn, don't touch her."

"Mom, you already have me. Why would you hurt my little brother?"

"Get Bianca to the hospital. I'll deal with my wife later."

***

"Making room," my nine-year-old stepson announced.

Theo slapped a yellow sticky note onto the refrigerator and wrote BABY BROTHER in crooked black letters. Then he shoved our framed family photo to the far corner of the counter and taped a glossy ultrasound scan where the picture had been.

"He needs to know this is his home before he gets here," Theo said proudly. "Can we give him the empty room upstairs? Bianca says babies can feel when people don't want them."

My hand stayed on the leather handbag beside my chair. Inside the front pocket was another ultrasound photo, sealed in a dark blue envelope.

Mine.

Eleven weeks. A steady heartbeat. A secret I had planned to share after tomorrow night's Founders' Feast, once the pack stopped whispering about Bianca's sudden return and the private paternity report she had placed in Knox's hands.

"We don't rearrange the house until your father and I agree," I said.

Theo frowned. "But Dad already said Bianca can stay."

That was not the same thing, and he knew it.

Five years ago, I had married Knox Blackwood at nineteen and inherited a four-year-old boy who watched me like an intruder. When Theo nearly died from his first shift fever, I sold the last thing my mother left me, a moonstone hairpin, to pay a traveling healer for the herbs our clinic could not get in time. I slept beside his bed for three nights. When the fever broke, Theo opened his eyes and called me Mom.

I had never asked him to repay me for loving him.

Now another woman had taught him to measure love by how quickly I surrendered my place.

"Bianca doesn't decide what happens in this house," I said.

Theo's mouth tightened. "She is carrying Dad's baby."

"She is carrying a baby she says is your father's. The Blackwood clinic still has to verify the report."

"Dad believes her."

The quiet confidence in his voice hurt more than the accusation.

Before I could answer, wheels rattled across the stone drive outside. Theo shot toward the window.

"She's here!"

A black SUV stopped at the front steps. Two pack guards unloaded suitcases while Bianca Vale climbed out slowly, one hand pressed to the small curve beneath her cream sweater. Knox followed from the driver's side.

I stood before they entered.

Knox came through the foyer first. He looked exhausted, not guilty. That somehow made it worse. He had spent the last week acting as if accepting Bianca's claim was a burden of leadership rather than a betrayal inside our marriage.

"The guest cottage is ready," I said. "I had fresh linens sent over this morning."

Bianca appeared behind him. "The doctor said I shouldn't be isolated."

Her voice was soft enough to sound reasonable. Her gaze went straight to the ultrasound on my refrigerator.

"Theo wanted everyone to see it," she added.

"The cottage is two minutes from the healing center," I said. "It is not isolation."

Knox removed his gloves. "She's staying in the east guest room until the Feast."

"We agreed on the cottage."

"We agreed before she started cramping last night."

My fingers closed around the edge of the table. "Then take her to our clinic. Have a healer examine her and repeat the bloodline test while she's there."

Bianca's expression flickered.

Only for a second.

Then she lowered her eyes. "I already gave you the report, Evelyn. I know this is humiliating. I am not trying to take anything from you."

Theo rushed to her side. "You aren't. The baby belongs here."

He reached for her hand before he looked at me.

Knox's jaw tightened. "Not in front of Theo."

"Then stop making decisions in front of Theo," I replied. "You moved an unverified claimant into our home. You let him call her child his brother. You are turning a medical question into a loyalty test."

Theo recoiled as if I had insulted him personally.

"It's not a test," he snapped. "Why can't you just be happy?"

A dull ache started low in my abdomen. I pressed my palm against the table instead of my stomach.

Stress, I told myself. Nothing more.

Bianca noticed anyway.

Her gaze dipped to my hand, then to my handbag. Something sharp passed through her eyes before her fragile smile returned.

"Maybe I should go," she murmured.

"No," Knox said immediately.

He looked at me. "Tomorrow, I will give the clinic a sample. Until then, Bianca stays in the main house where the guards and healers can reach her quickly."

"The east guest room," I said. "Not the empty room upstairs."

Knox frowned. "Why does that matter?"

Because the empty room had once been the nursery we chose together.

Three years ago, when we still believed another child would come easily, I painted the walls pale green. After month after month of negative tests, I closed the door and stopped going inside. Knox never asked me to clear it out.

Theo had not entered it in years.

Until Bianca told him to.

"Because it is not available," I said.

Theo grabbed Bianca's suitcase handle. "Dad said we could decide after the test."

He dragged the bag toward the stairs.

"Theo. Stop."

He froze halfway up.

Knox looked from my face to the staircase. For one breath, I expected him to back me.

Instead, he said, "Let him prepare the room. We can change it back if the report is wrong."

Something inside me went very still.

Theo bounded upstairs, relieved. Bianca followed more slowly. As she passed me, she brushed two fingers over the dark blue envelope peeking from my bag.

"Pretty color," she whispered.

I pulled the envelope deeper inside.

Knox did not hear her. He was already answering a call from his beta.

From the second floor came the scrape of furniture, then Theo's excited voice.

"Dad! I found the old crib catalog!"

I looked at Knox.

He kept talking into his phone.

So I opened my pack medical app, scheduled an independent ultrasound for the next morning, and added a second request beneath it.

Urgent bloodline verification: Bianca Vale's unborn child.

I hit submit.

Upstairs, a door I had kept closed for three years swung open with a hard wooden bang.