Chapter Five

Taylor's POV

I didn’t remember running.

One second Dante’s arms were around me, and the world felt heavy and warm.

The next, cold air hit my face, and I was staring at a blue pond.

“What the…?” The word didn’t come out. Instead, something like a soft growl rumbled from my chest.

The surface of the pond rippled, and I froze.

A white wolf stared back at me.

Is that me?

I leaned closer. The reflection leaned too—white fur, bright blue eyes that seemed too sharp to be mine, and a body that looked both powerful and strange. I’d never seen or heard of a white wolf in my entire life.

My heart beat faster.

The Moon Goddess did this.

“But why?” My thoughts spilled out silently. “Why bring me back like… this?”

The water shifted again, and for a moment everything inside me tightened.

“She gave me the second chance you asked for,” a calm, serene voice answered.

I nearly jumped out of my body. “Who are you?”

“My name is Lunex, your wolf.”

Excitement bubbled in my chest. “I have a wolf?”

“Yes, Taylor.”

My thoughts began to come back to me in a series of headaches. Brandon cheating on me and Clara standing beside him.

“How do you plan to make them pay?” Lunex growled in my head.

“We’ll figure that out later. First I need to see my father.”

*********************

My chest went tight with every step I took into my father’s pack.

I looked around at the gloomy sight in front of me. I stepped past the rust-eaten gates, and my heart clenched.

This… this was my father’s pack? The houses sagged like they’d given up years ago, roofs patched with whatever scraps they could find. The air smelled of smoke and old sweat, clinging to worn clothes and overworked bodies. A faint tang of illness hung in the air. The warriors looked thin, their eyes hollow, and even the ground felt tired beneath my feet.

“This wasn’t like this before,” I whispered under my breath. “This place used to shine.”

I continued to walk until I reached the main hospital office. The healer looked up from a cluttered table. He blinked at me like he was seeing a ghost.

“Luna Taylor?” he whispered. “By the moon… it’s really you.”

I nodded. My throat felt tight again.

“Where’s my father?”

He stood slowly. “We didn’t think you were alive. The message we received said—”

“Take me to him,” I cut in.

He hesitated before turning toward the hallway. “Prepare yourself.”

My voice broke before I could stop it.

I pushed past him and walked through the hallway.

A bitter taste filled my mouth.

Our surroundings looked even more worn out with every step we took.

He shouldn’t have been in a place that smelled like old medicine and dirty napkins. He was an Alpha.

He should have had proper care. Proper everything.

“How—” I tried. Inside my skull, Lunex growled and paced around.

But I couldn’t stop the small, bright shock that ran through me as the healer opened a door.

My father lay on a bed too small for him, pale, thinner than I’d ever seen him. Tubes snaked around his arms. His breathing was shallow.

My knees went weak.

“Daddy…”

My voice trembled as I walked to his side. Tears pooled in my eyes. His eyes fluttered but didn’t open.

I sat slowly. My fingers brushed his cold, stiff hands.

Hold it together, Taylor. Don’t break here. Not in front of him.

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered. “I should’ve known something was wrong. I should’ve come home.”

Guilt wrapped around my chest like chains. For a second, I couldn’t breathe.

The healer spoke softly behind me. “He has good days and bad days. He’d be much better if he were on the Clarynt special injection. It slows the illness and could potentially destroy the virus.”

My head snapped up as a loud growl escaped my lips. “Then explain to me,” I snarled, “why the Alpha of this pack is lying here untreated when we pay heavily for top-league medical treatment.”

The healer winced. “We’re out.”

“That doesn’t make sense.” Electricity sparked under my skin. “This pack keeps this medicine in the reserves for a reason. Where did they go?”

“We used to,” he said quietly. “But Alpha Brandon’s pack requested that we send all our supplies and funds to them. We were told you ordered it.”

My heartbeat stopped.

“What?” The word scraped out. “I never— Why would anyone think—?”

“Luna Clara said so,” he finished.

A chill ran down my spine.

“Clara?” My voice shook.

I blinked, and the world was all water and sky and my own white eyes staring up at me.

“She came one day to feed the Alpha his meal, as she does whenever she’s around,” the healer said, his voice small as a mouse, “and she ordered the supplies moved. She told us you authorized it.”

My vision narrowed into a tunnel as I realized what he’d just said.

“She brought him food?” My voice was a hoarse whisper that wasn’t mine. That must have been how she’d been poisoning him.

“Yes.” The healer folded his hands. “She’d come to feed him or ask Tina, her personal maid, to do it for her. No one else was allowed.”

The room sharpened. I could smell fear beneath the antiseptic, hear the healer’s pulse stutter when I lifted my head. Heat spread under my ribs, sharp and restless, and my fingers curled before I realized I was clenching them.

Revenge lit like a small, hot fire under my ribs. I wanted to run, to tear, to make them feel the cold that my father felt. I wanted blood. My head bowed, and I inhaled the scent of the room.

“Who allowed them?” I asked the healer finally.

He hesitated before he whispered, “Luna Clara—but with authority from the elders.”

I tasted betrayal like metal. The elders. How could they do this to us? The guilt crawled over me like frost. Did I fail them by being gone? Was that why they did this?

The wolf in me shook and then breathed slowly. There was no time for guilt to fester into paralysis. There was no time to drown. The Goddess did not wake me for that.

“Effective immediately,” I commanded, “all transfers to Brandon’s pack are terminated. Reverse every shipment, every payment, every order. Bring our healers home. And prepare the new drug budget for my signature.”

The healer blinked like he wanted to cry.

“Luna Taylor,” he said. “If you make those changes, they’ll turn on you—”

“If I sign,” I said, cutting him off, “it becomes law. I am Luna and sole heir to this pack. You answer to me. Do it now.”

There was a silence like a held breath. Then the healer moved.

The rest of the afternoon passed with signing and putting it all in place.

The healer looked up at me when everything was done and nodded. Relief was a thin, bright line across his face. I saw it, and it did something to me. Not joy. Not yet.

Lunex hummed sadly in my mind. Many have suffered, she murmured. But we will set it right.

It was time to stop running.

Time to stop crying.

Time to stop letting other people decide my story.

I was done being afraid.

Lunex smirked in my head. “What next?”

I smirked back. “It’s time to visit my dear mate.”