INICIAR SESIÓNAngel’s povBastien's car pulled up at eight fifty-five.I watched it from the window of my room, already dressed, and did not go down. His driver came to the door at nine, polite and patient, and I told him I had my own arrangements and thanked him. He nodded and left, and I heard the car idle at the gate for another few minutes before it pulled away.My phone buzzed. Bastien.I declined the call and finished my coffee.Victoria's car arrived at nine-twenty, a quiet grey sedan driven by one of her personal staff, who handed me a note in Victoria's handwriting that said simply: Finn is already inside. He asked to ride with you.I folded the note and got in.Finn was sitting in the back seat with his hands in his jacket pockets, looking out the opposite window when I opened the door. He turned, and smiled with relief. "You came," he said."I said I would."He nodded, looking back out the window as the car pulled away.We sat in silence for a few minutes. "I've been thinking," Finn s
Angel's Pov I heard my name from behind. I was mid-conversation with Sera's cousin, one of the unit leads who had started warming to me after the northern corridor operation, and I finished what I was saying before I turned around.He was standing a few feet away with Elijah beside him, and it took me a moment to recalibrate to the fact that he was here, in this restaurant, at this specific dinner.Elijah looked at me with the easy condescension of someone who had never needed to be careful with me and had no plans to start. "Didn't expect to see you still standing," he said pleasantly. "Heard the pack wasn't exactly rolling out the welcome mat."I didn't answer him.Kian had gone still beside me, all his attention suddenly and completely reorganized toward the situation."Kian," Bastien said, "She's a married woman. Whatever arrangement you've made here — it's not appropriate.""Interesting position," Kian said. "From a man who spent the better part of a year walking into events wit
Bastien's povElijah had been watching me watch the elevator since we sat down, and I had been pretending not to notice."Say it," I said."I didn't say anything.""You're about to."He smiled and reached for his bread. "I'm just thinking about how you drove across the territory on a weeknight to watch your estranged wife fail in public." He broke the bread in half. "Very healthy. Very dignified.""I came for dinner.""You came because Kian reserved the top floor of the most visible restaurant in the northern quarter to celebrate an Omega he's known for two months, and you needed to see with your own eyes whether anyone would actually show up." He set the bread down and looked at me plainly. "And the answer, by the way, is probably no. His senior wolves aren't coming to a dinner for an Omega they already resent. They're powerful and they're proud and they have better things to do than toast someone they've spent three weeks trying to run out."I reached for my wine. "She overreached h
Angel's povThe northern border problem had been building for three weeks before Kian placed the reports in front of me.I was still assigned as a tutor, handling theory sessions and training younger wolves. But over the past week, Kian had been sending me patrol logs and terrain reports to review after hours.A rival pack had been testing the boundary markers along the ridge. Not full incursions. Small probing runs, pulling back before proper engagement.Rael’s unit had handled that corridor before. Without them, the gap was already showing.Two nights ago, after I returned another set of notes, Kian looked through them and asked, “If you had to fix this, how would you do it?”I answered. The next morning, he had me stand in front of the patrol units.“Temporary instruction,” he said. “You’ll follow her plan.”Some of them looked doubtful. I understood why. I had no rank. On paper, I was just a tutor, but Kian did not explain further. That was enough.I spent two days studying the te
Angel POVKian’s fingers brushed over my lips, and I froze in place. My heart started beating fast. I looked up at him, but the moment our eyes met, my breathing turned uneven. His touch was light, but it made it hard to stay calm.He spoke softly. “I’ve never lacked women’s attention.”I frowned slightly because I did not fully understand what he meant. His words sounded simple, but there was something behind them that I could not grasp.I looked at him and asked, “Then why didn’t you choose the woman you loved to marry?”The question came out before I could stop it. The moment I said it, I felt a little tense, but I did not take it back.Kian did not answer immediately. He looked at me for a second, then spoke.“I don’t want to do anything because someone forced me to.”My breath fell out of rhythm, I was shocked.His words were simple, but they made my chest feel tight. I did not dare to think too deeply about what he meant. I forced myself to stay calm, even though my thoughts were
Angel's povBy morning, my name was everywhere.I made the mistake of scrolling through it while the kettle boiled. Within two minutes I had read enough to understand that whoever put that post together had done their work carefully. The comments were angry. People were sharing it with their own additions, each retelling making me worse than the last.Someone had dug up an old photograph of me and Bastien at a pack event and cropped it to look like I was gripping his arm against his will. Another account had posted a supposed transcript of a conversation between me and Lillian where I threatened her. I didn't recognize a single word of it.By the time I set my phone face-down on the counter, the trending tag had climbed to second position. By the time Lily came padding out of her room in her school socks, rubbing sleep from her eyes and asking if there was toast, it had reached the top.The comments had stopped being about the story and had become something else entirely.She should b
Angel’s POVThe music slowed into something soft and I moved without thinking, letting the rhythm guide me. There was no audience now, no judging eyes or gossip. Just the empty dance floor and the stranger leaning calmly against the railing, watching with an expression I couldn’t decipher.For the
Angel’s POVThe club was playing a bass tune when I arrived. It was a little bit crowded, filled with faces I didn’t recognize. The unfamiliarity of it made me feel at ease. For once, I wasn't surrounded with anyone who would judge me. I came here to unwind and temporarily forget my current situat
Angel’s POVDespite having graduated from the Royal Academy with excellence in combat, transformation theory, and wolf-pack administration… none of it mattered when no one wanted to hire me.The world didn’t judge me by my skills. It judged me by my past.Still, everyday, I woke up, got dressed, ti
Angel’s POVDana was already waiting outside the Packhouse gate when I stepped out with my suitcase.She stood with her arms folded, sweater sleeves pulled over her wrists. Her gaze swept over my bandaged leg, the swelling along my calf, and the exhaustion that was apparent on my face.Without a wo







