Rain came down in sheets hard enough to bruise skin.
Lu Rin was eighteen, soaked to the bone, four months swollen with a child no one wanted, and still walking.
The bodyguard had delivered the message hours ago: Don't come home. Go to the safe house.
He had deleted it without replying. He needed to see the man who wrote it. Needed to watch Gu Xun say the words to his face.
The Gu estate loomed like a tomb. Inside, the air was thick enough to choke on. Chairman Gu stood in the foyer, a mountain of muscle and old money, his ozone-and-leather pheromones rolling out unblocked, a deliberate slap. Any lesser wolf would have dropped to their knees. Lu Rin stayed upright by sheer spite.
Gu Xun stood in front of his father, shoulders locked, 195 centimetres of perfect Alpha cowardice. He hadn't turned when the door opened. He still hadn't turned.
"You still haven't cleaned up your mess," the Chairman rumbled. "An Omega Luna? The pack will laugh us out of the council. Break the bond. Take the Lin girl. Or I strip you of the name you're pissing away."
Lu Rin's stomach cramped, a warning stab. He pressed a palm low against the swell hidden beneath the wet coat and waited.
Gu Xun's voice came out thin and rusty. "Father. He's carrying my heir."
"A half-blood from a perfume peddler who thinks scent is a weapon?" The Chairman laughed once, ugly. "The Lotus Moon Pack does not kneel to florists."
Lu Rin stepped forward. Water dripped from his hair, from his lashes, from the ends of trembling fingers.
"Xun," he said, soft enough to cut. "Look at me."
Gu Xun's head twitched. He did not turn. That single refusal was louder than any scream.
The Chairman kept talking, threats stacking like bricks. Lu Rin no longer heard them. He heard the silence where his mate's protection should have been.
He walked until he stood an arm's length from Gu Xun's rigid back. Close enough to smell the suppressants eating the pine-smoke scent he once loved.
"Say it," Lu Rin whispered. "Say you choose them over us."
Gu Xun's fists shook. "I can't lose the pack."
I don't choose them.
Not I'm sorry.
I just can't.
Something inside Lu Rin snapped clean in half. The break was soundless, colder than the rain outside.
He reached up and pressed two fingers to the fading claim mark on Gu Xun's nape. The skin was hot, feverish with blockers.
"An Omega Luna makes the pack look weak," Lu Rin repeated, tasting every word like broken glass. "Good. Then watch me break it on my own."
He let his own pheromones flood the room, blue lotus sharpened to arctic yuzu, lethal and pure. For three full seconds, the Chairman actually swayed. Long enough.
Lu Rin turned and walked out.
The storm swallowed him whole.
Three blocks later his knees buckled. He hit the pavement hard, palms scraping, blood mixing with rainwater between his thighs. The pain was sudden and absolute, a red-hot blade twisting deep.
He knew what it meant before the first cramp doubled him over.
He crawled to the curb, flagged a taxi with shaking fingers, and bled the whole ride to the clinic. The Beta doctor confirmed it quietly: miscarriage, fetus non-viable, haemorrhaging controlled.
She pulled the gown down afterwards and traced the thin silver line that now crossed his lower belly like a signature.
"This won't fade," she said gently. "S-class Omegas scar like this when the loss is… absolute."
Lu Rin stared at the mark until it stopped meaning anything. Then he dressed, paid in cash, and vanished.
One private flight later, under a name Gu Xun would never trace, Lu Rin disappeared from the country with nothing but the clothes on his back and the taste of iron in his mouth.
He swore two things that night.
First: Gu Xun would choke on the empire he chose over his own blood.
Second: the next child he carried would never know what it felt like to be disposable.
Five years later
The private jet's stairs unfolded onto humid tarmac that smelled of home and oncoming war.
Lu Rin stepped down first, black coat flaring, the silver lotus clasp at his throat catching the airport lights like a warning. Behind him, two tiny four-year-old Alphas descended with identical scowls and identical murder in their dark eyes.
In the arrivals hall waited 999 blood-red roses and a man on his knees holding them.
Lu Rin smiled, slow and sharp enough to cut flesh.
"Beiyan, Beiyu," he murmured, smoothing their black hair. "Mommy's old dog learned how to beg. Let's see how low he goes before we let him breathe."
The twins grinned, small fangs glinting.
The storm had ended years ago.
Now the reckoning began.