Ten years ago, Belle Madrigal was blamed for her sister’s death and cast out of her pack. Her Alpha father’s final words “Why did she die, but not you?” drove her into exile. She lived among humans, hiding her identity, her wolf, and her pain.


Now, at twenty-eight, Belle learns her mate is none other than Christian Martin, the powerful Alpha of the strongest pack and heir to a billion-dollar empire. But instead of love, he offers her a contract: marry him for one year so he can fulfill the requirements of his inheritance.


Belle accepts to save her parents’ home but finds herself in a loveless arrangement, mocked by the pack and haunted by the past. Then Christian returns with another woman, the one he truly loves… and it’s Belle’s sister, long thought dead.


As secrets explode and bonds unravel, Belle must decide if she can forgive the mate who rejected her or burn the past down with him in it.

The wind had changed by the time Camille stepped through the archway of the seal chamber, thick with something she couldn't name. Not danger she had learned to recognize that a long time ago but something deeper, older, a memory stretched taut across time. Her boots echoed softly across the stone, the torchlight above her flickering with uncertainty. Beside her, Magnolia walked in silence, one hand curled at her side, not in fear but in readiness. They both knew what they were walking into now. The pages from the archive had confirmed what Camille had already begun to remember: Subject 1 wasn't lost, wasn't dead, wasn't hidden in some far-off ruin or sealed beneath a forgotten mountain. She was here, walking the same halls, breathing the same air, standing in the same cursed kingdom that had once tried to break them both.


Chapter 38 - Beneath the Seal, the Root Burns