Hunter is pacing in the waiting room when I get there and I can't help the sneer that lines my face. He has some nerve! That’s one thing I'll give him. He actually has the nerve to come here and show his face to me again. I can feel the anger lining Hunter’s face, the annoyance bunching his shoulders, and the impatience in his prance. One sentence spills out my mouth when he turns and meets my eyes, “Who let you in?” Hunter scoffs and chuckles, running his hand through his hair, “I come to see you and the only thing you can ask is who let me in?” I nod, “Who, the fuck, let you in? And did I ask you to come see me, Hunter? I don’t want to see you, get out.” I can feel venom leaking from my tone and I had promised myself I wouldn't be this way. I promised myself I wouldn't act like I was angry or bitter about anything. I wouldn’t act like the sight of him annoyed me, like his presence made images flash behind my eyes. I promised myself that I wouldn't act in a way that showed him h
Scarlett bursts into the room with panic leaking off her face. She bypasses the council members, bypasses Fen and the one person I thought she’d be happy to see, and comes straight to me. She doesn’t have to lean down much to whisper into my ears yet the only thing she says is, “He knows.” I frown and look up at Scarlett but there’s a certainty in her eyes. Mixed with the slight signs of panic and breathlessness, there’s certainty in the eyes of my mate and I don't doubt her for a second. I still have to ask though, my voice a low whisper, “Knows what?” A flicker of mild amusement threatens to make Scarlett’s lips curl but she leans low again and answers, “Hunter, he knows. He’s just acting like he doesn’t.” An annoyed voice interrupts us, “Does the Luna plan to take any more of our time?” Greta’s comment makes Scarlett’s aura peak but I tilt my head to whisper into her ear, “Ignore her.” Scarlett nods and straightens up, facing the council, “I’m sorry for the disturbance. I ha
Scarlett’s pov.“I told you not to tell him!”Elara comes in weeping, her lips shuddering and tears rolling down her cheeks. She heads for Roman and screams at him, “I fucking told you not to tell him! Why’d you tell him!”Something about Roman’s stillness right now makes me feel a trill of fear but I know him, and I trust him. Roman looks up at Elara from his table and replies calmly, “Were you planning to keep him from his father forever?”Elara slams her hands onto the table, her lips pursed in anger and she bursts into a sob. The sound makes me jolt a bit. It makes me feel like her sorrow is leaking off her, trying to find its way into me and when I look at Roman to find him staring at me, a hard look in his eyes, I nod and walk over to them.I offer consolingly.“Roman didn’t have to tell Hunter about Axios’s existence, Hunter already knew. He felt Axios, all the way from the Nightshade pack the moment you two came here. It was out of our hands already, Elara.”“Did he have to te
The member of the Alpha council I see puts a weird look on my face because it’s none other than Priam.Roman told me of how Priam supposedly traded information with the Alpha council that got him to change the council’s position and make him a member, the youngest member to ever be on the council.Roman doesn’t believe Priam exchanged any regular information with the Alpha council, and now that he’s here, I can't help but feel something nervous creep up my spine.Danis comes to mind almost immediately but I push him out as fast as he comes in. Priam has an added ring of silver in his watery peach eyes, and now when he smiles I can't help but think that smile is conniving.“What do you want?”I dump myself into the seat facing him and massage my temples. I don’t sound warm or welcoming and I know it but Priam simply chuckles, his voice deeper than I remember it and raspier.“I thought I would be welcomed like an old friend. You don’t have to be this cold, Scarlett.”I already feel like
Roman comes back with further news about Hunter’s reaction.We have dinner together as he tells me Hunter didn’t keep up his look of surprise when he saw Axios. He looked slightly startled when Axios couldn’t speak or didn’t want to see him, but apart from that he didn’t do anything else, he didn’t insist that Axios would follow him back to the Nightshade pack. He didn’t try to make a fuss about not having his child be brought straight to him.He didn’t make the kind of trouble anyone would have expected him to make, and that’s strange.“I feel he knows something.”Roman is cutting a huge chunk of steak with determined focus, his hands working as his mouth comments, “I feel Hunter knows something about Elara and the boy and that’s why he’s acting this way. He says he’s yet to decide if he wants the boy to go back with him, and that’s just bullshit.. because he’s always wanted a son right? And what Alpha doesn’t want their son to go back to their pack with them?”Roman catches himself
Maya pops in before she goes to school to ask me a question.“Is Ax going to leave us?”I lean down and shake my head, tousling her hair lightly before patting it back down, “I don’t think so, not soon anyway.”Maya nods like she just wanted to confirm that before turning and heading back out the door. Roman steps out of the room-sized wardrobe and cocks an eyebrow up at the door, his question clear, yet my answer is a sigh as I flop back onto the bed. “I think she knows. No, she definitely knows, and knowing Maya, she’s waiting for me to give her a proper explanation. Is it bad I’m not ready for that yet?”Roman walks over to me and sits on the bed, his hand settling on my stomach and sending slight tingles down my spine, his eyes are hot on me as he asks, “How’s the baby?”I freeze for a second, before hesitantly nodding and answering, “The baby’s… in there, and hopefully fine. Honestly, I’m a bit scared.”Roman asks why and I fumble around for words, for a viable explanation but no
Fen leads me to the underground security rooms to give me what I really needed, which according to him is an advanced version of the digital map, and a physical map as I requested. I tell him thank you and head back out, my eyes scanning the walls as I go. I grab breakfast in the dining halls and this time, breakfast is different. Female Ironclaw werewolves stand to welcome me in, everywhere I turn I'm met with a smiling face and adoration-filled eyes. I almost thought I'd have a bit of trouble getting the acceptance of the females in Roman’s pack but that wasn’t the case. They seem to want to get to know me. It’s strange to feel that’s strange, I know, but it surprises me all the same. One of them switches my water with orange juice and when I summon the courage to cock an eyebrow up at her instead of just keeping shut and turning the whole thing weird, she chuckles and winks at me, “Vitamin C, for the baby.” A smile tugs at my lips and I thank her for it, she giggles and nods as
I park in the security outpost the Ironclaw warriors that guard the border reside in. They receive me a bit awkwardly but when I tell them I want to go exploring, they offer to follow. I have to refuse and say I need to do this myself and only then do they let me be. I head off alone, my heart pounding in my chest and my legs now clad in what the warriors call protection. It’s really just some long pants but they work. The forest is cool and cold when I walk in. There’s a clear path, beaten down and worn by the stomping of feet, and as I take careful cautionary steps farther and farther in, I feel the forest begin to come alive. The sunlight peeks through the canopy of leaves overhead, a gentle wind ruffles the trees, but there’s more. The chirp of small birds, the fast skittering of animals hidden from my sight. Fey yearns to rise to the surface and that surprises me. She’s excited, and she never really gets excited but as I let her watch through my eyes, I feel fascinated by wh