Chapter 3

The smell of copper was thick in the air, a metallic taste that coated my tongue and clogged my throat. I lay in the sticky ruin of my own life, my hand still clutching my flat, empty stomach. I was too weak to cry. The tears had dried up hours ago, leaving only a hollow, aching void where my heart used to be.

The heavy door to the basement slammed open, the sound vibrating through the damp floorboards.

"Luca," I croaked, hope fluttering in my chest like a dying bird. He had come. He had felt the bond snap. He was here to save us.

But as my eyes adjusted to the sudden light, I saw her. Kara clung to his arm, her face buried in his shoulder, her shoulders shaking with theatrical sobs.

"Oh, Luca! Look!" she wailed, pointing a manicured finger at the blood-soaked mattress. "She really did it! She killed the heir just to spite you!"

My breath hitched. "No..." I whispered, trying to push myself up, but my arms trembled and gave way. "Luca, she poisoned me. She gave me wolfsbane..."

Luca stepped forward. His boots stopped inches from my face. I looked up, searching for the man who had promised to protect me with his dying breath. Instead, I found a stranger. His eyes were glazed over, swimming in the dark, unnatural influence of the bond Kara had fabricated. He looked at the evidence of his dead child not with grief, but with cold, detached fury.

"You are a monster," he spat. The words were quiet, but they hit harder than a physical blow. "You were so jealous of my True Mate that you would destroy your own flesh and blood?"

"I didn't!" I screamed, the effort tearing at my raw throat. "It was her! Please, Luca, I need a healer. I'm bleeding out..."

"Healers are for pack members," Luca said, turning his back on me. "Child killers deserve to rot."

He grabbed Kara's hand and stormed out. The heavy lock clicked into place, sealing me in with the smell of death.

That night, the door opened again. I didn't move. I couldn't. The fever had set in, making the room spin in nauseating circles.

"Comfortable?" Kara's voice drifted from the shadows. She didn't enter. She just tossed a heavy burlap sack onto the stone floor. It wriggled.

"Since you like poison so much," she giggled, "I thought you might want some company. Don't worry, they aren't lethal. They just... hurt."

She untied the string with a flick of her wrist and kicked the bag over before slamming the door shut.

In the darkness, I heard it. The dry, rasping sound of scales sliding over stone. Hissing.

Panic, primal and electric, surged through my exhausted body. I dragged myself into the farthest corner, pulling my knees to my chest. Something cold and muscular slithered over my ankle. I bit my lip to keep from screaming, knowing she was listening, knowing she wanted to hear me break.

Then the first bite came. A sharp, needle-like pain in my calf. Then another on my thigh.

For three nights, I lived in hell. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't rest. Every time I drifted off, the hiss of a viper would jerk me awake. My body was a map of puncture wounds, swelling with venom that burned like fire but refused to kill me.

On the second night, I heard footsteps outside the door. Heavy. Familiar.

"Luca?" I whimpered, the name slipping out before I could stop it. "Help me."

The footsteps paused. I held my breath, listening to the silence on the other side of the wood. For a second, I thought he might open the door. I thought the Alpha I knew might still be in there.

Then I heard Kara's voice, sickly sweet. "Come away, my love. Don't listen to the witch's lies. She's just trying to trick you again."

The footsteps walked away.

On the fourth morning, the door was thrown open. The light blinded me. Before I could shield my eyes, rough hands grabbed my hair and dragged me off the mattress.

"Get up," Luca growled.

He hauled me up the stairs, my legs dragging uselessly behind me. He didn't care that I was burning with fever. He didn't care about the snake bites covering my legs or the blood that still stained my clothes.

He threw me out the back door into the freezing rain. The cold water hit my feverish skin like a shock, making my teeth chatter violently.

"Rogues," Luca announced to the gathered wolves. He gestured to a pile of bodies near the tree line—scruffy, malnourished wolves that looked like they had been paid to die. "They tried to breach our borders. Kara says they were coming for you. Spies."

He shoved a rusted shovel into my hands. My fingers were so numb I could barely grip the wood.

"Since you are so fond of death, Anastasia, you can bury them."

I stared at him, shivering so hard the shovel rattled in my grip. "Luca... I can't. I'm sick..."

His eyes flashed with Alpha dominance. He opened his mouth, and the Command rolled over me, heavy and suffocating.

*"Dig."*

My body betrayed me. The Alpha Tone hooked into my spine like a fishing line, bypassing my will, bypassing my pain. My muscles seized, forcing me to turn toward the mud. I sobbed as my arms lifted the heavy shovel, driven by a power that wasn't my own.

The rain turned the earth to sludge. Every scoop was agony. My abdominal muscles, torn from the miscarriage, screamed in protest. I slipped in the mud, falling to my knees, but the Command forced me back up.

I dug until my hands blistered and bled, mixing my blood with the mud. I dug while the pack watched in silence, their eyes filled with pity they were too afraid to voice. I dug while Kara watched from the porch, dry and warm under Luca's arm, sipping wine.

And as I threw the last shovel of dirt over the dead rogues, I realized something. I wasn't just burying these strangers. I was burying the woman I used to be. I was burying the love I had for Luca Kennedy.

The hole was deep, dark, and cold. Just like my heart.