The Cursed Alpha's Secret Wolfless Bride

Galilea's POV:

The day they sold me to a monster, I sat at their dinner table, smiled through their toasts to my death, and calculated exactly how much it would cost to destroy them.

They didn't notice. They never noticed.

Twenty years in the Thorne household had taught me one lesson: the most dangerous woman in any room is the one everyone ignores. I was the orphan. The stray. The wolfless charity case they dressed in rags and sent to scrub floors while their precious Rosalie practiced curtsies for princes.

I was also Shadow-the invisible hand behind the Whisper Net, the intelligence network that had toppled three noble houses, bankrupted a duke, and placed spies in every Alpha council from the capital to the northern wastes.

And tonight, Eleanor Thorne was going to tell me I was being sold.

She didn't disappoint.

"You are to be married." She spoke the words like she was ordering tea. "To Alpha Enzo Barnes of the Black Moon Pack."

Enzo Barnes. The Cursed Alpha. The Mad Wolf of the North. The monster who'd torn his last fiancée apart with his bare hands and left her body in the courtyard for the crows. They said his episodes painted rooms red. They said his screams echoed through the mountains like the howls of the damned.

I let my hands tremble. I let my eyes fill with tears. "Please, Mother. Please don't send me to that beast."

"The decision is made."

"Then send Rosalie. She's your real daughter-"

Her hand cracked across my face with the practiced precision of a woman who'd spent two decades perfecting the art of cruelty. My head snapped to the side. The sting was familiar. Almost comforting.

"Rosalie is destined for the Alpha Prince," she hissed. "She won't be wasted on a cursed animal. You-a stray we pulled from the mud, a wolfless scrap we should have left to die in the blizzard-you should be grateful. An Alpha wants you. It's the highest you'll ever climb."

She turned and swept from the room, her guards slamming the door behind her. The lock turned with a heavy, final click.

I stood in the silence, my cheek still burning.

And then I started to laugh.

I laughed until tears streamed down my face. I laughed for the girl who'd spent twenty years begging for scraps of affection from people who'd murdered her real family. I laughed for the woman who was about to turn their greatest triumph into their worst nightmare.

Then I stopped laughing and got to work.

I closed my eyes and reached out with my mind. The Whisper Net answered instantly-a chorus of voices, a web of intelligence spanning every territory in the kingdom.

Shadow. We felt your pulse spike. Status?

The Thornes are selling me to Enzo Barnes, I sent back. The Mad Wolf of the North.

A pause. Then, a dry response from Phoenix Knight, my second-in-command. The one who kills everyone who gets within arm's reach?

That's the one.

...You're going to use this, aren't you?

This isn't a marriage, I sent back. This is an infiltration. The Black Moon Pack sits closer to the royal court than I've ever been. I'll have access to intelligence on every Alpha council, every noble house, every dirty secret the kingdom has buried. And the Thornes just handed me a front-row seat.

What do you need?

Everything. Activate all assets in the northern territories. I want a full dossier on Enzo Barnes-his curse, his weaknesses, his inner circle, the real story behind his dead fiancée. By the time I arrive, I need to know more about my new husband than his own Beta does.

And the Thornes?

My smile was a blade.

They want me gone. Fine. But I'm not leaving empty-handed. Ten million gold coins. Deposited in a sealed trust with the Ironhold Vaults before the wedding. If they refuse, I'll bury their precious daughter's engagement under so much scandal that no royal house will touch them for a century.

A low whistle echoed through the link. You're going to extort the family that's selling you into a death sentence?

I'm going to make them fund the war I'm about to bring to their doorstep. Initiate Protocol Eclipse. I have a wedding to prepare for.

Understood, Shadow. And Galilea?

Yes?

Make him regret it. Make them all regret it.

I opened my eyes. The cold morning light filtered through my barred window-the window I'd stared through for twenty years, dreaming of freedom.

The lock was still on the door. The guards were still in the hall. But I had already escaped.

They thought they were sending a lamb to slaughter.

They were sending a spy into the heart of the wolf's den. A healer who knew exactly which nerves to sever. A strategist who'd been playing this game since before Rosalie learned to spell her own name. A woman who had spent two decades learning patience-and was finally ready to collect.

The Thornes would pay. The monster would be tamed. And every last secret this kingdom had buried would be mine.

One marriage. One monster. One chance to burn their world to the ground.

And I was just getting started.