My Alpha Used Me as His Breeder

The autumn equinox festival blazed around me like a living thing, all golden firelight and howling celebration. I pressed one hand to my swollen belly—six months now—and used the other to steady myself against the surge of wolves moving through the ceremonial grounds. The baby kicked, as if responding to the wild energy crackling through the pack bonds.

But tonight was different. Tonight, I could hear.

After five years of suffocating silence, the world had exploded back to life. Laughter rang sharp and clear. Conversations layered over each other in a symphony I'd forgotten existed. And underneath it all, threading through my consciousness like silver wire, came the whispers of the pack mind—that sacred connection I'd lost the night I went deaf.

I was whole again.

My heart hammered as I searched the crowd for Ryker. I needed to find him, needed to see his face when I spoke his name aloud for the first time in half a decade. My daughter Maisie would be with him—my beautiful, patient girl who'd learned sign language just to talk to her broken mother.

There. Near the ceremonial fire, Ryker stood in profile, his dark hair catching the flames. Even after all these years, the sight of him stole my breath. My Alpha. My mate. The man who'd never once made me feel less than whole, even when I couldn't hear his voice or feel the pack's presence.

I pushed through the celebrating wolves, one hand protectively cradling my belly. This baby would grow up hearing his father's voice, feeling the pack bonds from birth. Everything I'd missed, he would have.

Ryker turned as I approached, and his face lit up with that smile that had captured my heart seven years ago. His hands moved in fluid sign language: *You look beautiful tonight.*

Warmth flooded through me. Five years of darkness, and he still looked at me like I hung the moon. His fingers continued: *How are you feeling? Is the baby—*

"I can hear you," I whispered.

But he was already turning away, distracted by something in the crowd. His hands had stilled mid-sentence, and I realized he hadn't heard my words over the festival noise. I opened my mouth to call louder when another voice sliced through my consciousness like a blade.

*Daddy, when is that deaf woman going away? I want my real mommy to come back!*

The mental voice was petulant, sharp with a child's cruel honesty. I spun, searching for the source, and my eyes landed on Maisie—my five-year-old daughter—standing beside Ryker with her arms crossed and a scowl twisting her delicate features.

My daughter. Speaking through the pack bond. About me.

Ryker's mental voice responded, warm and indulgent in a way that made my stomach lurch: *Patience, princess. Her womb still has its uses. Once your brother is born, we can dispose of the cripple.*

The world tilted. Sound became muffled, distant. The celebrating wolves around me blurred into shapes of fire and shadow as Ryker's words echoed through the pack bond with casual cruelty.

*I used forbidden blood magic, Maisie. Selene's bloodline seed was implanted in her womb. She's nothing but a vessel—a convenient incubator for our real family.*

Selene. The name hit me like a physical blow. Ryker's first mate, who'd died in a rogue attack six years ago. The woman whose memory I'd spent five years trying to honor, trying to fill the void she'd left behind.

My hands flew to my belly, pressing against the life growing inside me. Not my baby. Never my baby. Just another lie in a web of deception that stretched back five years.

Maisie wasn't my daughter. She was Selene's child, tolerating the deaf woman who'd dared to try replacing her real mother.

The baby inside me wasn't conceived from love. It was the product of forbidden magic, planted in my womb like I was nothing more than fertile soil.

Everything—every gentle touch, every patient sign, every moment I'd believed myself cherished despite my disability—had been an elaborate performance.

*Soon, Selene,* Ryker's mental voice continued, and I could feel his longing ripple through the pack bond like a physical caress. *This fool's purpose is almost complete. Once the child is born, I'll be free to join you properly.*

Join her. In death.

My legs nearly gave out. The noise of the festival became a roar in my ears as the full scope of my situation crashed over me. I wasn't just disposable—I was scheduled for disposal. A temporary inconvenience to be discarded once my biological function was complete.

Ryker turned back to me, his face shifting into that perfect mask of concern I now recognized as performance. He moved toward me with fluid grace, arms opening for an embrace that had once meant safety and love.

Now it felt like a trap closing around me.

"Harper," he murmured aloud, his voice honey-smooth as his arms encircled me. "You look pale. Are you feeling alright?"

I forced myself not to recoil as his mental voice continued its private conversation: *Almost there, my love. This pathetic creature's usefulness is nearly at an end. Soon I'll perform the ritual to join you in the spirit realm, and our children will finally have their real parents together.*

His hand rubbed gentle circles on my back while his mind plotted my death.

"I..." My voice cracked. I cleared my throat and tried again, signing as I spoke to maintain the charade. "I don't feel well. I think I need to lie down."

"Of course," he said, pressing a kiss to my temple that felt like poison against my skin. "Rest is important for the baby."

*For my son,* his mental voice corrected with possessive satisfaction. *Selene's true heir.*

I pulled away from his embrace, fighting the urge to vomit. "I'll just... go back to our room."

"I'll check on you later," he promised, already turning back toward the fire where Maisie waited with barely concealed impatience.

I walked away on unsteady legs, each step carrying me further from the celebration and deeper into a new understanding of my reality. The pack bonds hummed around me, full of joy and connection I'd longed for—but now they felt like chains, binding me to wolves who saw me as nothing more than a useful vessel.

By the time I reached our bedroom, my hands were shaking. I closed the door and leaned against it, sliding down until I sat on the floor with my back pressed to the wood.

The Harper who had loved Ryker Mills for five years—who had believed in his gentleness, his patience, his devotion—that woman had died tonight in the space between one heartbeat and the next.

I pressed both palms flat against my belly, feeling the child move restlessly inside me. Selene's child. Ryker's true heir. The final piece in a puzzle that would end with my convenient disappearance.

My jaw clenched as something cold and sharp crystallized in my chest. Not grief—I was done with grief. Not fear, though that would come later.

Revenge.

I had four months before this pregnancy reached term. Four months to plan, to prepare, to ensure that when Ryker tried to dispose of his broken, deaf vessel, he would discover exactly how much he'd underestimated me.

The woman who had loved him was dead. What rose in her place would be something far more dangerous.

Something with nothing left to lose.