[WARNING: Sensitive content ahead.]

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    Days pass with little regard for the anxiety building in my belly every time I crawl into bed at night, watching the phases of the moon, wondering what this next chapter of life will look like.

    Aside from a brief shopping excursion with Jessa—who ignores me almost the entire time and scoffs at every dress I try on—I don''t leave the house except for school and work, trying to avoid trouble.

    I spend any spare moment I can manage picking up extra shifts at Beaniverse to help pay for the atrocious bill at the mall. Who spends three hundred dollars on a dress? But Jessa insisted that it was the only one that didn''t make me look like I was wearing a silk potato sack.

    Lisa''s busy, too, so our texts are few and far between, mostly complaining about work and school.

    My family''s indifference weighs on me like a thick blanket, but beneath it, a tiny bud of hope sprouts—maybe, just maybe, I''ll make it to the gala without incident. A week remains before the event that could change my life, or just as likely, confirm my place as the outcast.

    Today, like the rest of the past two weeks, appears to be yet another day of unsettling peace as I head home after class with groceries in my passenger seat.

    Phoenix is stopping by for dinner, so I have his favorites on the menu—a creamy garlic and parmesan roasted chicken, paired with bacon-wrapped brussels sprouts tossed in maple syrup and balsamic vinaigrette.

    It sounds fancier than it is, but it really is delicious, thanks to the internet recipes I''d found years ago.

    As the appointed alpha heir to the Blackwood Pack, Mom always fawns on Phoenix. Dad was thrilled enough that he had a son with alpha potential, but when Alpha Renard''s last son was killed in a small skirmish with renegade wolves and Phoenix was named heir, he strutted more like a peacock than a wolf for at least a month afterward.

    One day he will be Alpha Phoenix Blackwood, but for now, he''s still a Grey.

    I juggle the flimsy plastic grocery bags with the grace of a dying fawn as I make my way into the empty house.@@@@

    The peace of these past few weeks must have rotted the self preservation sphere of my brain, because I don''t pay any attention to my surroundings as I unlock the front door and walk in.

    As I step further inside, a breeze tickles my neck and the door slams with a force that can only mean trouble, bringing a familiar and unwelcome scent to my nose.

    Todd Mason, my childhood bully and ever-present tormentor, is here. Inside. With me. Right now.

    Ready to finish what he''d started a couple weeks ago.

    He stands right in the entrance of my home, his face twisted into a sneer that chills my spine. I can''t even step away as my brain struggles to catch up to the situation, watching as he reaches behind him to lock the door.

    "I hear you''ve been playing princess, thinking you''re being sent to find some fuckwit willing to take you as a mate." His voice drips with malice as he steps forward, slapping a hand against my chest.

    He chuckles, squeezing my jaw harder. "You''ll be our little pack whore, Ava. Even without a wolf." The relief when he lets go is replaced only by a horror as his hand slides slowly down my neck, between my breasts, and rests gently against my belly, pushing in, before sliding a little farther to cup between my thighs and squeeze.

    "You won''t be good for much else, but at least we can fill this with little pups."

    I''m beyond throwing up. I can''t even feel most of my body anymore. Everything is dark around the edges, but his words keep slithering into my ear, poison to everything good inside me.

    He holds my hips in both hands and pushes his erection against me, rocking hard, nibbling on my jaw, leaving a trail of slime. "You''re lucky enough to be a pretty little defect, Ava. It won''t be too hard to use you." He groans, rocking faster against me, pulling my legs around his hips. "Fuck, Ava. I''m going to breed you until you learn your place, you understand?"

    Yeah, I get it.

    Kind of hard not to, as he rocks and grunts and moans.

    I don''t think my body is even mine anymore.

    He''s panting in my ear, and I realize too late that he''s giving me instructions. The fist in my abdomen brings me back to the moment that I was trying desperately to escape in a corner of my mind. I concentrate on the pain as he shoves me onto my knees and opens his jeans in frantic movements.

    "Beg me for it, Ava," he rasps, forcing my hand around the length of him, smaller than I thought it would be and smelling like a gym bag full of dirty underwear.

    But then I hear a familiar engine, and Todd freezes, his head tilting as he listens. Then he shoves it all into my mouth anyway, jerking in a frenzied kind of way as my lips split at the corners and I gag, my entire body heaving with the force of my rejection.

    My mouth is full of something bitter and nasty in seconds, and he growls at me to swallow as he shoves his dick back into his jeans, just in time for the door to open.

    My brother''s distant brown eyes take us all in, pausing on the groceries scattered all over the floor. He doesn''t seem to notice me on my knees in front of Todd, except for a slight lift of his upper lip in the faintest sneer. He nods to Tom in a curt motion. "Mason." I know he knows what happened, because his nostrils flare. He has to scent it in the air. But he does nothing.

    Nothing.

    Todd''s smiling, rolling his shoulders back even as he lowers his head in submission. "Alpha heir. Ava was just telling me you were coming home for dinner. I was just stopping by to check on her." He speaks with an intimacy he shouldn''t be able to claim, and my belly rebels against it all—his words, the taste in my mouth, and everything I had just endured.

    I dash to the bathroom, ignoring Todd''s laughter as it follows behind me. But the tears that come with my forceful retching aren''t for the assault. They''re not for my innocence. They''re not for the rules of this new, changed game.

    No.

    They''re for the brother who knows what he walked in on. The one who ignored it all. The one who doesn''t give a shit that his baby sister was just assaulted in her own home.

    Fuck.

    I can''t stay here. No matter what.