She was dead. Her heart had stopped beating the instant she’d heard the news. Veyr, Master of the City, the man she loved…had mated another woman. Even now, weeks later, the realization blindsided Cyan, stole her breath and ripped through her chest to tear out her already broken heart. She stopped, a wave of lightheadedness washing over her, and clutched at the corner of the work-surface for support.

He’d mated Vanessa McCauley, the blonde-haired, beautiful Lycan princess everyone had expected him to mate. Cyan had been nothing but an aberration, a midwinter madness quickly forgotten. The sooner she accepted that, the better.

She straightened up and looked at herself in the reflection cast by the night darkened window over the sink. Her reflection looked back at her, and even she had to wince. Dark shadows nestled under her eyes, her cheeks were gaunt and her hair resembled a rat’s nest. She’d lost weight in the last couple of weeks, but it hadn’t made her feel any better. Instead of feeling sexy and svelte, she was hollow and worn out.

“Probably something to do with that asshole,” she muttered as she grabbed some baking trays from the cupboard to slam on the side, but she was kidding herself. Her tiredness no doubt had more to do with the fact she was on her own now, in more ways than one.

Repudiata Stipantis.

Not pack.

She’d forsaken her pack, divorced them and the Lycan way of life to live amongst the humans. Tears welled, but she closed her eyes tight and gripped the baking tray until the urge to cry passed. It happened a lot, but she wouldn’t give in. She had to get used to not being surrounded by others of her kind… No, not “of her kind”. She wasn’t Lycan. Not anymore. She couldn’t shift, so she didn’t belong among them, not after the humiliation she’d caused her pack. Picked and then abandoned by the Master…they’d probably removed her name from the birth records as soon as she’d spoken the ritual words to sever her connection with them.

She swallowed hard and opened her eyes, looking down. The baking tray in her hands was a mangled write-off. With a sigh, she dumped it in the trash and turned back to the kitchen of the small home she’d rented. Baking paraphernalia scattered across the surfaces, and to one side boxes filled with cupcakes waited. Leaning a hip against the counter, she allowed herself a small smile she didn’t feel.

Who knew that her skill at eating cakes could so easily translate to baking them? At a loss for something to do when she’d arrived, and not wanting to take any of the money her brother had offered, she’d applied for a job at a local café. Their new line of cupcakes had proven to be so popular that within a week earnings were up, and the elderly owner had ceded control of the kitchen.

At least one thing was going right. That, plus her boss, Mrs. Norris, had no idea she was Lycan-born, which meant there were no uncomfortable questions about her background, or about the scar on her shoulder.

Unbidden, her hand rose, and her fingertips brushed against the mark. It was still there, even though Veyr had forsaken her and taken another to mate. That shouldn’t have been possible, but perhaps Cyan wasn’t Lycan enough for it to matter? She certainly hadn’t been woman enough to hold his interest. The scar would fade soon, and become just another relic of the life she used to have.

Perhaps she could get plastic surgery? As soon as the idea occurred to her, she dismissed it. Any hospital would know what she was as soon as they tried to operate on her, and a trail was the last thing she needed. Plus, her wolf cried in misery at the thought. Cyan hushed it as she would a child until it calmed down and retreated into a small ball in the back of her mind. Poor thing. It still thought that Veyr, their mate, would come for them.

She didn’t. She’d stopped believing in fairy tales weeks ago.

---

“I’ve told you before, Master. No one in the Trevais pack has anything to say to you.”

Nick Trevais stood in front of Veyr in the entrance hall of the Trevais pack house, his arms folded and a closed expression on his face. His eyes though, burned with a banked anger that Veyr knew from experience was very dangerous. Instinct warned him that he needed to tread carefully.

At one time he’d considered Nick to be a pushover on the Alpha’s council, the one who would always capitulate in the interests of keeping the peace. That had been before Veyr had cast Nick’s sister aside after mating her and taken another woman to mate. Or so most of the Lycans believed.

Only four people knew the truth about the night Vanessa McCauley had been found near-naked and apparently brutalized in Veyr’s bed. Only four people knew that Jacob McCauley had blackmailed Vanessa and manipulated events. Nick Trevais was not one of them.

Desperation rolled through Veyr’s veins, lodging under his heart and cozying up to the misery that had made its home there when he’d realized that Cyan had left. Perhaps it was time someone else knew the truth.

“Nick, surely you don’t believe the rumors?” he asked, his voice careful.

He knew some of the pack were listening in on their conversation. Their presence pressed against the closed doors around them, and their scents were so strong they might as well have been in the hall. Not Cyan’s though. He hadn’t scented her on any of his daily visits here. If he had, he’d have taken the place apart to find her, speak to her. Beg her forgiveness.

Nick gave him a hard look. “The ones that say you took my sister to mate, bit her, then ditched her to bed the McCauley girl?”

Shit. Put that way, it sounded bad. Real bad. Nick’s face said that was exactly what he believed.

“And this from a man who’s met Jacob McCauley?” Veyr folded his arms in response. He’d barely slept since Cyan had left, and his patience was thinner than a catwalk model. “You think I’d let Cyan go? After everything I went through to get her?”

“She’s not something for you to ‘get’!” Nick snapped, his eyes maxing out with amber. “She’s a person, not a fucking possession, you asshole.”

Veyr almost heard the collective gasp as Nick cussed him out. Any other time and any other wolf, he’d have just torn the guy’s throat out. No one insulted the Master of the City and got away with it. But this was Nick, the man who should have been his brother-in-law.

He sighed. Their society was based on honor, the very thing that had almost trapped him into a mating with Vanessa, and even now, protecting her honor was wrecking his life. He couldn’t allow that anymore.

“Nick, I know…I am an asshole. I gave Cyan space after… all that, and I shouldn’t have. I should have just come clean and admitted that Jacob played me. Played us all. I did nothing to Vanessa. But pack honor…”

Nick passed a tired hand over his face. When he looked up, his expression was haggard, and pain lurked in the back of his eyes.

“Veyr, if I knew where she was… I’d tell you,” he said, his voice, everything about him defeated.

An uneasy sensation crept down Veyr’s back. Something was wrong here, and it wasn’t just an Alpha protecting a member of his pack. “Surely she realized after Trenton mated Vanessa and took on the McCauley pack…”

“She doesn’t know. She’s not here, Veyr. Hasn’t been for weeks. Not since the day you were supposed to mate Vanessa McCauley,” Nick paused, tilting back his head as though praying for strength or fighting back tears. Finally, he looked at Veyr, his eyes watery but his expression like granite. “Repudiata Stipantis. She’s forsaken, Veyr. It’s over.”

“Forsaken? Come on, Nick. That’s not a nice joke to make.” Veyr laughed, a little unsteadily as it felt like the blood drained from his body. For a wolf to forsake their pack meant that they had turned their back on everything it meant to be Lycan, on their whole world.

“I’m not joking.” The other Alpha’s voice was steel. “Because of you, she left us. She left her family, her pack and her home to escape you. To escape the shame. Now if you’ll excuse us, Master, you are not welcome in this house, or in this pack. I suggest you leave. Now.”

Veyr staggered from the Trevais house, down the front steps and out to the waiting car. His driver said nothing, just drove him back to court as Veyr looked out of the window while the city flashed by.

He saw none of it. Instead, the word ‘forsaken’ rolled through his mind, over and over, and each time it did, his anger grew. He’d been too busy trying to be the ‘Master of the City’. Too busy making sure pack honor was adhered to and that no one suffered because of one asshole alpha, he hadn’t considered how it would affect the woman he loved. He’d thought she was just lying low, staying out of the limelight while the dust over the whole McCauley incident settled. Once it had, in the neat little plan in his mind, he’d talk to her, explain everything and they would have their happily ever after.

And he was a fucking idiot.

He sighed and raked his hand through the short strands of his hair. How had he not foreseen this? Crap, he’d forced the woman he loved to a life of exile. Condemned her to live alone, without others of her kind around her, because of what he’d done

The car pulled up outside court and he leaped from it almost before it had stopped moving. Scattering servants in his wake, he headed for his office. The door crashed into the frame as he shoved it open, making Jace, sat at the desk, jump in shock.

“She’s gone. Cyan. She’s forsaken.” Veyr growled, his voice maxed out with his wolf. “I don’t care what you do. I don’t care if you have to tear this fucking city down, but find her and find her now!”