Chapter 1

I went to the pack station to report my husband missing, my hands trembling as I clutched the hem of my hoodie.

“My husband, Damon Callahan, has been missing for five days. Please, you have to help me.”

The officer looked up. “Damon Callahan? You said that’s your husband? What’s your name?”

“Arianne Callahan.” I twisted the fabric between my fingers. “Have you heard anything about him?”

His expression changed. He slapped a hand against the desk.

“Arianne? Ma’am, give us your real name. This isn’t a game.”

“I am Luna Arianne Callahan.”

He stared at me. “Little blind girl, don’t think you can fool anyone just because you look like someone important.”

My chest tightened.

Then he turned toward the LED screen. A reporter was already talking.

“Across the city, everyone is celebrating Luna Arianne Callahan’s pregnancy. Alpha Damon Callahan has gifted his mate a luxurious mountain retreat and a pack ceremony worth millions. Her social media accounts have exploded with attention, with new posts appearing almost daily.”

Then Damon’s voice filled the station.

“This New Year, I only want my mate to be safe, happy, and healthy.”

A woman laughed behind him.

Bianca.

My blood went cold.

Bianca. Not me.

Five years ago, I lost my sight in a pack accident. Damon had been devastated, but the elders insisted that no Alpha should be bound to a blind mate. Eventually, they found Bianca Laurent, a woman who looked enough like me to take my place.

I still remembered Damon’s reaction when he first learned about her.

“Get her away from me. Arianne is my mate, and she’s the only woman I will ever love.”

That night, he came to the infirmary and held me against his chest while tears soaked my shoulder.

“Tomorrow, we’ll complete our bond,” he promised. “Then you’ll officially be mine, Arianne. My mate for life.”

Everyone knew he loved me.

Everyone knew he hated Bianca.

So why was she now standing beside him, wearing my face and living my life?

Had Damon forgotten me?

Before I could find an answer, something crashed down without warning.

A billboard struck me.

Pain exploded through my skull, and darkness swallowed everything. The last thing I heard was Damon shouting my title.

“Luna!”

Then I blacked out.

**

When I opened my eyes, harsh white light forced me to shut them again. My eyes burned, and for one terrifying moment, I thought I was still trapped in darkness.

Then I opened them.

The room slowly came into focus.

The walls.

The curtains.

The bedside table.

I could see.

After five years, I could actually see.

But before I could understand what had happened, voices reached me from outside the door.

“Alpha, how much longer are you going to let Bianca pretend to be Luna Arianne? It’s been five years.”

I froze.

Beta Maddox.

“I don’t know, Maddox.”

Damon.

His voice was rough, almost exhausted.

“The elders refused to accept a blind wolf as my mate. I loved Arianne too much to give her up, so I lied. I told them her sight had returned. Then I let Bianca take her place.”

My breath caught.

Maddox sounded furious. “Those elders are gone. Why are you still hiding the truth?”

“Because Bianca is pregnant.”

Silence.

Then Damon spoke again, quieter this time.

“I don’t know when it changed, but I can’t seem to breathe when she isn’t around. After all these years of pretending, I don’t know how to let her go.”

Maddox’s voice cracked.

“You have feelings for Bianca? After what her brother did? He caused the accident that blinded Arianne. Your mate has lived in darkness for five years because of him!”

“Enough,” Damon growled. “Bianca wasn’t responsible for her brother’s actions. He’s already imprisoned. He’ll never return to the pack.”

“You’re still covering this up,” Maddox said. “Arianne is isolated in the mountains with no signal and no idea what’s happening. She lives in that glass house you built for her, completely protected from the truth.”

He paused.

“But what happens if she finds out?”

My hand covered my mouth.

The glass house.

For years, I had thought it was Damon’s greatest gift to me. He had designed it so I could live safely, away from the whispers and pity of the pack.

Now it felt like a cage.

I turned toward the bedside table and found the portraits Damon had drawn for me.

The first showed us during a desert hunt, when he broke his leg and I stayed beside him until we were rescued.

Another showed him climbing a cliff during a snowstorm to bring me a rare mountain herb.

One captured the night he brought wolves from the northern clans to dance beneath the full moon because he knew how much I loved it.

Then there was the glass house.

Every detail had been designed around me, the blind mate he promised to protect forever.

I picked up the last portrait.

Damon was kneeling before me, his eyes full of the love I had once believed in.

“From now on, I’ll be your eyes, Arianne. You’re the only woman in my heart, and you always will be.”

I stared at the painting.

Every memory had become a lie.

He had hidden the truth while another woman took my place. He had kept me safe only because my ignorance made the deception easier.

My hands began to shake.

I carried the portraits to the fire.

One by one, I fed them to the flames.

The drawings curled and blackened, our memories disappearing in seconds.

“Your love isn’t something I want anymore, Damon,” I whispered. “And your protection was never freedom. It was a cage.”

I dropped the final portrait into the fire.

“I won’t live inside your lies.”

The fire alarm suddenly shrieked through the house.

I stood there watching the flames consume everything Damon had once given me.

For five years, I had believed he was the one person who would never betray me.

Now I knew the truth.

He hadn’t needed to leave me to replace me.

He had simply hidden me away, built a beautiful cage around my life, and convinced me that it was love.