Chapter 23

Chapter 23

“I heard Shawn Norman is being recalled from the spearhead team,” I said, my teacup clinking against my saucer as I daintily sipped my tea across from Lima Regent Annalise Hale.

Annalise chuckled, sipping her own tea and taking a small bite of a petit four, “I swear, Giselle, you have eyes and ears everywhere.”

“A good Lama should, as I’m sure you know,” I replied, giving Annalise a simpering smile. It was times like these I wished the old bag would just up and die. Sucking up to her was such a chore.

“Yes, a good Lama should be the heart and soul of the pack,” Annalise agreed. “In touch with all its concerns. Unfortunately, Mason does not see Shawn as the threat he is to the status quo.”

I shrugged. Who gave a f*ck about Shawn Norman or the status quo? I had a surefire way of restoring the status quo, for me and for the pack. “Well, if he’s being recalled, surely there is another open spot on the spearhead team that needs filling.”

Annalise raised an eyebrow at me. “Oh?” she said.

This was annoying. The cunning woman knew exactly what I was getting at, yet she was going to make me say it out loud like it was some sort of revelation. “Kora could take his place.”

“Hmm.” Annalise set her tea down on its saucer on the spindly table between us with a soft clink. “Im not sure i

it would be. wise of me to try that same trick twice. Mason’s already almost exiled me once.”

Once I was Luna, there would be no “almost” about exiling the tiresome old bat. Not that she was that old. She was young enough that her death would seem suspicious. Pity.

“We both know how bad she is for the pack,” I continued, trying to press the point. While I agreed we had already tried and failed at that trick, there had to be something we could do to get rid of the alleged soon–to–be Luna.

“Indeed,” Annalise said thoughtfully. “Indeed, she is. But, Giselle, it is never wise to try the same trick twice. That is something you will learn if you become Luna.”

If? What was this “if business, now? Every time Annalise and I had spoken before, she’d treated my becoming Luna as á foregone conclusion. Was Kora truly a threat to that? “I assure you, Luna Regent, I will become Luna of this pack.”

“Not if you continue sleeping around,” Annalise replied, spearing me with a sharp look.

Like son, like mother, it seemed. “Sometimes tactics must be used to ingrain oneself into the inner workings of a pack,” 1 sniffed. “I only do these things to support Mason’s rule.”

“And yet, I never slept around behind Carter’s back to ingratiate myself to the pack,” Annalise said. It’s unbecoming of: Luna, Giselle.”

I clenched my fists in my lap. “Yes, well, perhaps not all Lunas govern the same way.”

Annalise shook her head and sighed. “I think I may have pinned my hopes on you too soon

“What are you saying?” I protested, looking up, my eyes growing wide.

“I’m saying I no longer believe you are a fit Luna, Giselle, Annalise said.

My jaw dropped. “What?”

“You heard me.” Annalise passed another cucumber sandwich onto my plate as though she hadn’t just shattered my world.

I slapped the plate aside, letting it tumble and crack on the floor, dumping the meager contents of the sandwich on Annalise’s fine parlor carpet. “Oh, now you think Kora Monroe is a fit Luna?!”

Annalise shrugged and calmly summoned one of the near–invisible servants to clean up the mess. “Better than you, Giselle.”

I couldn’t believe this b*tch was going to stab me in the back. After all my bowing and scraping. “Kora Monroe is just using Mason! She’a spy for the Shadowmoon pack, just like her father!”

“Do you have any evidence of that?” Annalise asked, one eyebrow arched.

“You want me to waste time going around and gathering evidence while she’s plotting to betray us?!” I shot to my feet. “You’re a fool. Annalisel”

Annalise also rose. “I am disappointed by you, Giselle. By your outburst now, and by the way you’ve conducted yourself behind my back. You will leave my parlor now, and you will never be welcomed back into it again.”

“We’ll see about that,” I shot back. I stomped out of the parlor, shaking off the guard who’d peeled himself off the wall to

escort me out

I made my way out of the castle and onto the grounds, then into the woods. I sat down on a stone and finally let out a screant of Frustration. It was all coming apart at the seams.

Damn Kora Monroe, anyhow!

Mason was going to be mine. The position of Luna was going to be mine.

And I was going to get both by any means necessary.

It was dark in the back of the bar where I’d secured a table. Annalise Hale might think my sleeping around was “unbecoming of a Luna,” but it did give me contacts outside the pleasant panderers in the pack.

I was meeting with one now. A dissident who had a big c*ck and an even bigger ego. “Charlie” I got up from the table and gave him a hug, deliberately pressing my b*dy against his a little too close and for a little too long.

“Giselle.” Charlie rumbled, groping my a’s before we both sat down.

1

“I need a favor, Charlie,” I said with a cute little pout.

“Does it have anything to do with that b*tch Kora Monroe?” Charlie asked, his l*ps quirking up in a knowing smile.

“Yes.” I drew little circles on the back of his hand with my fingertip. “She’s ruining all our plans.”

“What plans were those?” Charlie teased.

I swatted him. “Our plans of me becoming Luna, of course.”

“Of course.” Charlie captured my hand and k*ssed the back of it, then turned it over and added another little bite to my wrist. The same fateful bite he’d given me before.

Stupid blockhead. I gently pulled my hand away.

“We need to get rid of her, Charlie. We need to make her go away and never come back. Or Mason will never look at me,” I whined, leaning over the table to give him a very nice glimpse of my cleavage.

“Ahuh,” Charlie said, more interested in my boobs than what I was saying.

Men were all the same. So easy. And if it weren’t for Kora Monroe, Mason would be just as easy to lead around by the d–ck.

“Can you get a message to the Shadowmoon Pack? Pretty please? See if there isn’t some way to take her off our hands?” I simpered, giving my breasts a little jiggle.

“Well, there is a rumor that a certain someone’s second mate might want her back. Especially now he’s got competition for her affections…” Charlie muttered, reaching out to thumb one of my n*pples through my dress. “But it’s not that easy, Giselle. It’s gonna cost you.”

I smiled at him. “I already have the room,” I whispered.