THE REGRETFUL ALPHA AND THE PREGNANT LUNA

A scream clawed up Georgia Shields's throat, but died as a strangled gasp.

Her eyes flew open.

Her heart hammered against her ribs. Cold sweat soaked through her designer nightgown. The room was dim, lit only by the ambient glow of the city skyline outside The Plaza's top-floor suite.

Then she heard it. A low, guttural growl vibrating through the floor from the master bathroom. Pure, unrestrained animalism that made the fine hairs on her arms stand on end.

The frosted glass door exploded outward.

A towering figure stumbled out. Lantis Kensington. Imperial Marshal. War hero. Also one of Georgia's fiancés—the man who had driven his sword through her heart in a life that no longer existed. His uniform was half-torn, his immaculate blond hair a wild mess, and his golden eyes were shot through with blood-red veins.

Georgia's gaze flickered past him to the sleek electronic calendar on the wall.

Stardate 2045.

She was back. Back to the night it all began.

She remembered what happened next.

In her previous life, right here in this suite, she did something unforgivable.

It was her foster sister Meredith who encouraged her to put the drug into Lantis's drink. Meredith is the adopted daughter of the Shields royal family, who has played the role of a loving younger sister for years, but secretly plots every public downfall of Georgia.

And Georgia did as told. She dripped pheromone inducers into his cup, then used her own body to lure him into bed. A night of madness.

Since then, she has left a mark on his spirit. A mark of a "zero" woman. Worthless. There is simply no healing ability.

They were already engaged, but Lantis never loved her. That mark meant he could never get rid of her. A "zero" woman he never wanted, now forever etched into his spirit.

And she, blinded by infatuation, destroyed him and six other fiancés over the following years. Until the seven of them joined forces to exile her. In the end, Lantis personally stabbed her heart with a sword.

But this time, she had done nothing. She had just woken up. In the original timeline, nothing had happened yet—she hadn't moved toward him, and the Inducer was still sitting in the jewelry box she had never touched.

So why was Lantis like this?

Georgia didn't have time to work it out. All she knew was this: if she stayed, if she let this play out the way it had before, everything would happen again. The destruction. And the sword through her heart.

She had to leave. Now.

Georgia threw back the covers and tried to stand, but her legs were jelly. Her knees buckled. She hit the carpet with a soft thud.

Lantis's head snapped toward her.

"Get... out," he rasped. "Now."

In her past life, she had crawled toward him—not out of strategy, not out of calculation, but because she had loved him with a mad, consuming love. Down to the bone. The kind of love that would have let her grind herself to dust just to fill the cracks inside him.

This time, Georgia scrambled backward. Her eyes were wide with a terror he had never seen before. .

She retreated until her back hit a sofa, grabbing a pillow and clutching it to her chest. A pathetic shield.

Lantis stared. A flicker of confusion cut through the haze. This reaction was wrong. She was supposed to be throwing herself at him.

A fresh wave of agony ripped through him. He fell to his knees, his hands digging into the carpet, knuckles white.