Cassia Phoenix always dreamed her mate would be her refuge—the one to give her the home she never had, the life she craved. But fate is cruel, and dreams are lies wrapped in pretty promises.

When she finally finds her mate, it’s not salvation. It’s a sentence. 

He’s already claimed by another, and she's nothing more than a mistake he’s determined to erase. Every day, he reminds her that she is unwanted. Unworthy. Unloved.

Being an omega, She spent her life on the fringes of her pack, invisible and expendable. But this? This is worse. 

So she runs.

To Winter Lake, a place that shouldn’t exist, where the rules of the world don’t apply. There, she might find a sliver of peace—if her mate doesn’t hunt her down, and if the powerful alpha of this forbidden pack doesn’t discover the truth about who she is. About what she is.

Staying is dangerous. Impossible, even. But then there’s him. The brown-eyed shifter who saves her from the storm, whose strength and promises make her question everything she thought she knew about fate, loyalty, and belonging. He makes her want to stay. To fight. To believe.

But when she’s spent her entire life running, how does she stop?

With my vision still more blurry than clear, I struggle to focus on the woman standing a few feet away.


"Do you know how shockingly easy it is to get one of these things?"


Since I can barely make her out, I'm left to rely on guesswork to guide me about what she's talking about. I can only think she means the taser that shocked me into unconsciousness.


I blink a couple more times and then my vision clears. I'm sitting on the ground, more slumped than sitting against a tree at my back, but the tree isn't my focus; the blonde woman waving a black and silver object in her hand is.


All this time I thought Zia was the one who'd tried to kill me, but the gray hooded top that Kieran's mate is wearing tells me I was wrong about Zia, just as I was wrong to suspect Lucian's father.


Chapter 60 - All This Time