The Alpha's Wolfless Luna Filed for Divorce novel · Chapter 1 of 32
Chapter 1: The Ring on the Table
At the Harvest Moon gathering Winifred names Camille Luna-elect, Torin stays silent, and Orla lays her ring and divorce papers on his table. Torin signs unread and begs her to keep the ring off.
At the door of the Great Hall, Winifred Kensington had brushed a thread off my shoulder and told me the green suited me.
It was the night of the Harvest Moon, in the Kensington tower.
Later she tapped her champagne glass with a silver fork, and three hundred wolves stopped talking.
I stood at my husband's elbow in the green dress his mother had picked for me.
My husband was looking at the floor.
An hour earlier, Camille Roswell had zipped me into that dress in the cloakroom.
The zipper had stuck and my hands were shaking, and she had fixed it fast and kindly.
"Don't worry about whatever Winifred says tonight," she told me. "Torin says it's only for the council. It means nothing."
He had texted me the same words before we left our floor: Ignore whatever she says. It's for the council.
I had not told Camille about that text.
I noticed it, and then she smoothed my sleeve and smiled at me, and I stopped noticing.
Now she stood by the far pillar in white, hands folded, looking at no one.
"Four years ago I welcomed Orla Lowell into this family," Winifred said. "I was told she would shift in time."
She let the pause run.
"She has not. Four years, and not one change, not one howl at the moon."
A few people laughed. Near the doors, someone raised a phone.
"A Luna who cannot shift cannot give this pack an heir. So the council has chosen a Luna who can. Camille, come stand with my son."
Camille crossed the floor, and the crowd opened for her.
Nobody opened for me.
I waited for Torin to speak.
"No" would have done. So would "Mother," or my name.
In four years he had never once raised his voice to her.
He didn't now.
I had carried the divorce papers in my clutch for six weeks.
I had promised myself I would use them the day he took her side.
I hadn't pictured three hundred people, or a phone.
So I walked out to the Alpha's table in the middle of the hall and put the folded papers down on it.
"Orla," Torin said. It was the first thing he had said all night. "Don't."
"Wolf law says a Luna can release herself before the pack," I said. My voice came out steadier than I felt. "The Alpha has to witness it. That's you."
I pulled off my wedding ring.
It was tight, and it took two tries.
I set it on the papers, and the click of the gold on the wood carried to the back wall.
Nobody in the hall moved.
Then Winifred crossed the floor and slapped me.
Her ring caught my cheekbone and opened it.
My head snapped sideways, and I tasted blood.
"Wolfless," she said. "You were a charity case from the day you came, and you were never once grateful."
Torin had a growl he kept low in his chest whenever other people were close.
It had been there all night, and it grew loud when his mother hit me.
He reached for me, and I put my palm flat against his chest to hold him back.
The growl stopped under my hand.
It always did.
I had stopped asking myself why.
"Sign it," I said.
I took my hand away and held out the pen.
Torin looked at the papers, and then at the blood running down my jaw.
He didn't read a single line.
He signed in one stroke under my name, and he pushed the pen across the table so hard it rolled off the edge.
The Elder rose at the head of the council table.
"Witnessed," he said. "Thirty days. If the ring stays off until the Blood Moon, the divorce is final, and the Luna keeps her dowry land."
Winifred's face went tight at that last part.
Camille had stopped halfway across the floor, and she was no longer smiling.
I started toward the doors.
Torin caught my wrist.
I looked down at his hand, and then up at his face.
His eyes had gone gold, and his fingers weren't steady.
"Keep it off, Orla," he said, so low that only I could hear. "The whole thirty days. Please."
In four years, he had never said please to me.
I pulled my wrist out of his grip and walked out through three hundred wolves, and not one of them said a word.
Joss Finnegan, Torin's beta, was already holding the elevator open.
He didn't say anything either. He pressed the button for the garage.
The doors closed, and I put my hand to my cheek.
The cut had already stopped bleeding.
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