Chapter 3

The midday sun blazed mercilessly over the rundown amusement park, scorching my skin even through the suffocating rabbit mascot costume.

Sweat soaked through the cotton padding, seeping into half-healed wounds. Each breath I took felt like breathing through a damp rag, and the festering gashes beneath the suit burned and itched like hell.

During my break, I slumped into the meager shade of a palm tree behind the carousel, mindlessly forcing cold, tasteless rice from a cheap bento box down my throat.

Then—I heard it.

A laugh. Light, flirtatious. Familiar.

I looked up.

Him.

Alpha Andrew.

He was strolling toward the ice cream truck; his arm wrapped around her.

Serena.

She wore a pale pink sundress, her smile radiant under the sun, eyes shining like she owned the damn world. Her long hair fluttered in the breeze, and on the side of her neck—A fresh bite mark.

It gleamed in the light. Silver. Deep.

The exact shape of the mark that once belonged to me.

My fingers trembled. The bento box slipped from my hands and hit the pavement with a thud, scattering rice across the concrete.

Andrew’s golden eyes swept the area and landed—on me.

I froze.

He frowned and gently detached himself from Serena, walking toward the shadows where I crouched.

“What are you doing here?” His voice wasn’t harsh. Just… puzzled. Too calm.

I stared up at him through the black mesh of the mascot head. Even after everything—even after he let them break me—he was still painfully beautiful. His silver hair shimmered under the sun like strands of light pulled straight from the moon.

Two years. And somehow, he looked untouched.

“Do you need help?” he asked, reaching toward me.

His fingers brushed the edge of the mascot head, trying to remove it.

I flinched, recoiling instantly. My bad leg caught on a pebble, and I stumbled backward, gasping.

Then—He caught me.

His arm wrapped instinctively around my waist, steadying me like he had so many times before.

For a split second, time froze.

His cedar scent enveloped me—warm, nostalgic, cruel. It pulled me straight back to a rainy night, to the promises he made as he held me in his arms and whispered, I’d always be safe.

Safe.

Liar.

“Let go!” I snapped, jerking away from him. My voice came out raspy, shredded from screaming through too many nights of pain.

“Last time you said you’d help me,” I spat, “I took a poisoned dart to the chest for you—and ended up in a cell while my skin rotted off my bones.”

Pain ripped through my ankle just then—the steel nail flared up again. I bit back a cry, but the weight of my body pulled me off balance.

I reached out, instinctively.

That’s when I saw it.

Dangling from his wrist—My moonstone bracelet. The one he gave me for my eighteenth birthday. Handmade, enchanted, his.

It slipped free from his wrist and hit the pavement with a delicate ding-ling—the soft jingle of betrayal.

And just like that, she was there.

Serena.

Strutting over like she was walking on a red carpet, her eyes full of venomous curiosity.

“Alpha Andrew,” she cooed, clutching his arm, “who is this filthy little mascot?”

Her gaze flicked down my body—over my misshapen leg, my trembling, mangled fingers.

Her smile sharpened.

I turned to leave, but an angry voice stopped me.

“You worthless crippled rabbit!” the supervisor barked. “Who told you could take a break?”

An electric baton slammed into my lower back—right on the still-healing wound. ZAP!

The pain tore through me like lightning. I crumpled to my knees; breath knocked from my lungs.

Through the haze of agony, I looked up.

Andrew was still standing there. His jaw clenched. His fists curled. But he didn’t say a word. He didn’t stop them. He turned—and walked away.

Serena leaned into him, laughing sweetly, feeding him a spoonful of strawberry ice cream.

The pink cream slid down the corner of his lips, soft and sticky under the summer sun.

Just like the blood that once dripped from my fingertips onto the cold prison floor the night they nailed me down.

I curled up on the blistering pavement, the concrete burning through the fabric of the mascot suit. Sweat mixed with tears, and the jingle of the bracelet echoed in my ears, mocking me.

He used to say I was his moon. Now I was just a shadow. But the moon always rises again.

And when it does—I’ll make sure it bleeds.