Alpha's Regret: The Seventh Time was Forever novel Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Chapter 1 – She signed the divorce papers.

"Luna, Alpha Ravyn has sent another divorce agreement." Beta Corvine’s voice was careful, almost brittle, as if a single wrong word might shatter the air between them.

"He said he would reconsider if you agreed to accept Daisy as your co-Luna. He’s been telling the pack you’ll accept it anyway, that you love him too much to go through with a divorce and..."

Corvine froze, the rest of his sentence died in his throat. Luna Seraphine sat upright on the hospital bed, pale fingers steady as she signed her name at the bottom of the document. No hesitation or trembling. Just the quiet scratch of pen against paper.

For three months, this room had been her world. Sterile white walls, the low hum of healing machines. The sharp scent of antiseptic clinging to everything, and this was the seventh time divorce papers had found their way into her hands.

The first had come before Ravyn traveled to the Grimroot Pack with a suspicious condition. Either she allowed him to become the sole signatory to the pack’s accounts, or she signed the divorce.

The second arrived on their seventh wedding anniversary. He wanted Daisy, her former nanny’s daughter, to move into the pack house like when they were little.

The third came on Seraphine’s birthday. Daisy should become their son Bryan’s nanny, Ravyn said, so Seraphine could ’focus on pack duties.’

The fourth arrived on Alpha Ravyn’s own birthday, requesting Daisy as his personal assistant.

The fifth came after Daisy publicly humiliated her before the pack. Ravyn sent the papers and demanded Seraphine overlook the disrespect or accept the divorce.

The sixth arrived on their son, Bryan’s sixth birthday. Daisy should move into the Luna’s chamber, since Seraphine "never used it anyway."

Each time, Seraphine had torn the papers apart in front of the beta, her expression calm even as her heart cracked a little more.

When she had nearly lost her life saving the pack, exposed to a chemical attack that destroyed her health, she had expected some form of care, concern, or even pity.

Instead, she received the seventh divorce agreement and this time with a new condition. Accept Daisy as co-Luna, and that was the last straw for the camel’s back, an insult to her dignity.

That was when Seraphine finally understood that this marriage had been dead long before today.

Six chances, all wasted. Whatever remained was no longer worth saving. She would take her son and leave the pack for good.

"Luna..." Corvine finally breathed, eyes wide as he stared at the signed document. "Why did you sign this time?"

Seraphine looked up at him and smiled faintly. "My mother once told me that seven is the number of perfection," she said quietly. "If something can’t be saved six times, it won’t be saved on the seventh."

The world had changed. Packs were no longer isolated from humans. Werewolves blended in, worked among them, built corporations and empires in their cities.

Technology made shifting in public impossible, so the pack was still needed.

New moon festivals were also celebrated only within pack borders and was a time when all werewolves far and near would converge together, except those married to humans.

Every pack member worked outside the territory now. Only the omegas, Lunas, and betas remained permanently behind, tasked with guarding the land and maintaining the heart of the pack.

Alpha Ravyn was the second-richest man in New York City. Few knew that much of that success rested on Luna Seraphine’s shoulders. Her strategies, negotiations, secret abilities, strengthened its administration, making it the second largest to the Grimroot pack.

And yet, all she had ever received from him was indifference, a punishment for a mistake in the past which was not even her fault.

She was tired of fighting for his attention, begging for his care, and waiting for affection that never came.

This time, it would be just her and her son. After all, Bryan was the reason this marriage had existed in the first place.

Seraphine peeled the sheet away and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

Men like Alpha Ravyn had no idea how complicated human love truly was, like the freedom to desire many, yet commit to one. Instead, he despised being bound to Seraphine. If that night had never happened, he would never have married her at all. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝕨𝕖𝗯𝚗𝚘𝕧𝕖𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝕞

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