The Heartless Alpha’s Beloved Luna (Avery and Gideon) novel Chapter 415

Deirdre’s POV

I couldn’t believe that ten years had passed already.

If you looked at my face—my new face-you would never know it. There wasn’t a hair out of place. Not a wrinkle in sight. I had made sure of that throughout all of the tens of thousands I had spent on cosmetic procedures, injections, and dermatologist visits over the years.

I looked like a woman frozen in a time that never existed.

A woman with a different name, a different past, and no history of having everything taken from me.

But the truth was, there was no amount of botox or fillers or “subtle” facelifts that could change what had really happened. My nose might be different, my eyes might hide behind colored contacts, the freckles I had tattooed across my face might never fade, but there was no hiding from the events of ten years ago.

Not really. Not in the ways that mattered.

Ten years had passed since I had woken up in that abandoned greenhouse, delirious and confused with a fog in my head that took weeks to go away. A decade went by, and I had lived an entire lifetime in that span; I had suffered, survived, and worked hard as hell to rebuild what had been taken.

In the beginning, I lived on the run. Gideon hunted me likea dog, but I always managed, somehow, to stay one step ahead. I lived in caves and abandoned hovels in the woods. I lived off of what little food I could hunt and forage on my own. Mostly, I moved.

It wasn’t until two years in that Gideon’s pursuit of me let up, just a little, just enough to give me a chance to breathe.

That was when I found the rogues.

They were a larger tribe in the northern territories.

Nomadic. The idea of joining them seemed perfect; large enough to go unnoticed by outsiders amongst their numbers, and their nomadic lifestyle meant that I could keep moving, evading Gideon, without having to survive on my own.

It should have been simple-an opportunity to rest, to regroup, and to begin planning my next moves.

But it was anything but. I was accused of stealing on my first night simply because I had taken a secret second helping of dinner. I was starving, but they didn’t care. In their eyes, I was a newcomer who had taken their resources, and I had to pay.

I lived five years like that, slowly morphing myself into a woman who never existed. I was no longer Deirdre-Deirdre had died in that greenhouse. I was Katya, the kind, thoughtful governess with no sordid past to speak of.But although Deirdre was gone, I hadn’t forgotten the true purpose I had set out for over ten years ago.

Gideon was mine. That title was mine.

Like hell I was just going to give all that up.

I heard he had never gotten over Avery. That he spent the entire ten years searching for her. Some even said he lost his mind during that time. It seemed as good a time as any for Katya to swoop in, sweet and understanding Katya, who could help him overcome his painful past and move on. To love again. To give the title of Luna to her instead of the woman who was probably dead.

At least, that was the plan.

But then I found out that Avery wasn’t dead. In fact, she had returned to the packs, and Gideon was pursuing her again.