Chapter 1
The silk of the sheets felt like ice against my bare legs. I sat on the edge of the massive, king-sized bed, my fingers twisting the lace of my white negligee until my knuckles turned white.
I was a Santosh. I was supposed to be protected. But tonight, I was nothing.
The door creaked open. I didn't have to look up to know who it was. The air in the room shifted instantly. It became thick with the scent of pine, rain, and something like ozone before a storm. The scent of a dominant Alpha.
Hughes didn't say a word. He walked straight to the bar in the corner. I watched his reflection in the mirror as he poured himself a glass of amber liquid.
"Drink?" he asked.
"No, thank you," I whispered.
He finally turned. His eyes were a piercing, frozen blue, devoid of any human warmth. He looked at me the way a wolf looks at a rabbit it isn't quite hungry enough to kill yet.
"Suit yourself," he said, taking a slow sip. He leaned against the bar, crossing his powerful arms over a chest that looked like it was carved from granite. "Get off the bed, Kiel."
I blinked, my heart skipping a beat. "What?"
"You heard me. You don't sleep there. That bed is for my mate. And you are definitely not my mate."
The sting of his words was like a physical blow. We had been married four hours ago. The pack had watched as we exchanged marks, though his had been a cold, shallow bite that barely drew blood. It was a claim of ownership, not a bond of the soul.
"Then where am I supposed to go?"
Hughes gestured vaguely toward the corner of the room, near the window, where a small, stiff velvet chaise lounge sat. "There. Or the floor. I don't really care as long as you stay out of my space."
I felt the heat of humiliation crawl up my neck. "Hughes, we had an agreement. My family gave you everything. They gave you the territory, the docks, and... they gave you me."
He was across the room before I could even blink. He didn't touch me, but he loomed over me, his shadow swallowing me whole. The sheer power radiating off him was suffocating.
"Your family gave me what they stole from mine," he hissed, his face inches from mine. "And as for you? You were the interest on the settlement. Don't mistake yourself for something precious, Kiel. You're a reminder of why I hate the Santosh name. You're here to be a servant to this pack, not a Luna."
"I did nothing to you," I said, my voice gaining a spark of defiance despite my fear.
"You exist," he snapped. "That's enough."
He reached out, his large hand grabbing my hair and tilting my head back. I gasped, my eyes watering from the pressure. He leaned in, his nose brushing against the sensitive skin of my neck, right over the pathetic, half-healed mark he'd given me earlier.
For a second, I thought I felt a flicker of something else. A spark of heat. But then he pulled away with a look of pure disgust, as if the very scent of me made him sick.
"You smell like a Santosh," he muttered, wiping his hand on his trousers as if he'd touched something filthy. "Weak. Entitled. Smelling like artificial roses and cowardice."
"I'm not a coward," I whispered, though my shaking hands told a different story.
"We'll see about that. The pack starts training at five in the morning. You'll be in the kitchens by four. You'll scrub the floors, you'll prep the meat, and you'll stay out of the way of the real wolves."
"I'm an Omega, Hughes. I'm not built for that kind of labor."
He let out a short, dry laugh that didn't reach his eyes. "Then you'd better learn to adapt, shouldn't you? Or maybe you'd prefer I send you back to your brothers? I hear they're having a very difficult time finding a place to sleep now that I've seized their assets."
My brothers were all I had left, and they were useless. If Hughes turned them out onto the streets, they wouldn't last a week in this territory.
"I'll be in the kitchen," I said, looking down at my lap.
"Good. Now, take that ridiculous dress off and put on something that suits you more.
You look absurd."
He turned his back on me, walking toward his walk-in closet. He started unbuttoning his shirt, revealing the brutal scars that crisscrossed his tan skin. I knew those scars. My uncle had given them to him years ago during the Great Purge. Every time Hughes looked at me, he saw the man who had tried to skin him alive.
I stood up, my legs feeling like lead, and moved toward the chaise. I pulled a small wool blanket from the ottoman and wrapped it around myself, shivering. The room was freezing, but I didn't dare ask him to turn up the heat.
I watched him as he moved around the room. He was beautiful in a terrifying way. He was the perfect Alpha, every muscle tuned for violence, every instinct sharp. And I was tied to him for the rest of my life.
He turned off the main lights, leaving only the dim glow of the moonlight filtering through the curtains. He climbed into the massive bed, stretching out with a sigh of contentment that felt like a mockery of my misery.
"Hughes?" I whispered into the darkness.
"What now?"
"Why did you choose me? If you hate me this much, why not just take the money and the land? Why force the marriage?"
There was a long silence. I thought he might have fallen asleep, but then I heard his voice, lower and darker than before.
"Because, Kiel, killing your family would be too quick. I want to watch the Santosh pride die slowly. And the best way to do that is to keep their prize jewel in a cage where I can watch her fade away."
I bit my lip to keep from sobbing. I curled into a ball on the hard chaise, the velvet scratching my skin. I didn't think I could feel any lower, any more broken.
But then, the door to the bedroom flew open.
A woman stood there, her hair disheveled and her eyes red from crying. It was Vivian, the woman everyone knew had been Hughes's lover before the political marriage was forced.
"Hughes!" she cried, ignoring me entirely. "You can't do this. You can't stay in here with her."
Hughes didn't even sit up. "Vivian, go back to your quarters. I'm tired."
"No! You told me she was nothing. You told me she wouldn't even be in your room!" She turned her gaze to me, her eyes flashing with a predatory yellow light. "You little slut. You think just because you have a ring that you're his? He'll never touch you. He'll never mark you properly."
"Vivian, enough," Hughes said, his voice dropping into that dangerous Alpha register that demanded absolute obedience.
"No, it's not enough!" she screamed. She lunged toward me, her fingernails lengthening into claws.
I scrambled back, but the chaise was small and I had nowhere to go. I braced for the impact, closing my eyes.
But the impact never came.
I opened my eyes to see Hughes standing between us. He had moved with a speed that shouldn't be possible for a human. He had Vivian's wrist in a literal vice grip.
"I said, enough," he growled.
"Hughes, you're hurting me!" Vivian whimpered.
"Go. To. Your. Room. If you touch her, you're touching my property. And I don't like people touching my things without permission. Do I make myself clear?"
Vivian looked at him in shock, then glared at me with enough hatred to burn the house down. She wrenched her arm away and bolted from the room.
Hughes stood there for a moment, his back to me. His shoulders were heaving.
"Don't thank me," he said, without turning around. "I didn't do it for you."
"I know," I whispered.
He turned then, and the look on his face was different. It wasn't just hatred anymore. There was a strange, hungry intensity in his eyes as they raked over my body. He stepped toward the chaise, and for a second, I thought he was going to pull me to the bed. My heart hammered against my ribs, a confusing mix of terror and a dark, unwanted spark.
He reached down, his fingers brushing my cheek. His touch was burning hot.
"I have a surprise for you, Kiel," he whispered.
I swallowed hard. "A surprise?"
He leaned down, his lips inches from mine. "I lied about your brothers. I didn't just seize their assets."
My heart stopped. "What did you do?"
Hughes smiled, and it was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen. "I had them brought here. They're in the dungeons, Kiel. And every time you disobey me, every time you fail to be the perfect, silent little slave I want you to be... I'm going to send one of my guards down there to remind them of why their sister should have been a better bride."
He backed away, enjoying the look of absolute horror on my face.
"Sleep well, wife," he said, climbing back into his bed and closing his eyes.
"We have a very long day tomorrow."