LOGINThe aroma of sizzling butter filled the kitchen long before the sun had fully risen. Ava moved around her domain with quiet efficiency, her apron dusted with flour, her expression stern in the way of someone who had been worrying since dawn.Alexa stepped in first. There was a softness to her character this morning, a looseness to her shoulders, a glow she couldn’t quite hide. She tried to tug her hair behind her ear as if that could conceal the warmth still clinging to her skin from the night before.Olivia noticed. Of course she did. She had been with Alexa long enough to read every shift in her mood.“Well, well,” Olivia murmured as she slid onto a stool at the counter. “Someone looks… refreshed.”Alexa shot her a warning glare, but the smile tugging at her lips ruined the intimidation. “Don’t start.”“I didn’t say anything,” Olivia replied, eyes sparkling. “But someone had a very good night.”Ava turned from the stove, her brows raised not in amusement, but in concern so sharp it
The moment Gabrielle and Alexa stepped through the door of the mansion, the silence pressed against them like a physical force. Olivia and Antonio rose from the sofa, tension already crackling in the air from the stiff set of Gabrielle’s jaw and the way Alexa avoided meeting anyone’s eyes.Antonio cleared his throat. “How was the meeting master?”“Don’t,” Gabrielle snapped, voice cutting through the room like steel. His coat hit the rack with more force than necessary.Alexa stiffened. “Gabrielle….”He turned sharply toward her, eyes burning. “Not. Now.”Olivia shot Alexa a look” what happened?” but Alexa could only shake her head. Her chest felt tight, her pulse too fast. She had known he wouldn’t take it well. She had known the moment Cordelia laid her hand over Alexa’s and guided her through the oath.“Second in command. Bound to Gabrielle. Bound to the Thorn.”And Gabrielle hadn’t known. Not beforehand.Antonio stepped cautiously forward. “Gabrielle. Maybe”Gabrielle’s glare snapp
The Weight of the ThroneThe black marble steps leading into the Thorn’s council hall had always carried a heavy presence, but tonight they seemed carved from something colder, darker. A sense of urgency pulsed through the air like an unseen current. Gabrielle felt it before they even drew close, his hand instinctively drifting toward Alexa’s lower back, guiding her, shielding her.The emergency summons had come less than an hour ago ,a sharp, abrupt call from Cordelia, her tone clipped, expectant. Alexa didn’t ask what it meant. She had learned enough to feel the shift in the air when the Thorn moved.Inside, the hall buzzed with a muted chaos. Members whispered furiously, glancing at the entrance as though waiting for the next blow. Ever since Cordelia announced Alexa as Gabrielle’s second in command, the entire foundation of the Thorn had shaken. The old bloodlines bristled. The power-hungry seethed. The loyalists murmured. And the traitors ,those hidden among them watched quietly.
The great hall of the Thorn did not return to order after Gabrielle and Alexa left. It sat suspended in a stunned, simmering paralysis like someone had cracked the floor open and everyone was waiting to see who fell first.Cordelia remained seated at the head of the long table, her white gown glowing against the gloom. The expression on her face was the same one predators wore after cornering prey.patient, watchful, amused.No one dared speak.Not yet.Finally, Councilman Strathmore,a thick-necked, silver-haired man with a temper known city-wide slammed his palm down on the table.“This is madness,” he hissed. “Absolute madness. Cordelia, you overstep.”Cordelia didn’t flinch. “I overstep every day. That is why you all still have a Thorn to sit in.”Strathmore’s jaw clenched. “You named a civilian. A civilian girl,Gabrielle’s girlfriend as Second-in-Command. You’ve destroyed centuries of structure.”Murmurs of agreement rippled through the chamber.Cordelia pressed a single finger to
The next morning rose colder than usual, as if the sky itself sensed something shifting beneath the city,something ancient, powerful, dangerous. The Thorn rarely called emergency meetings, and when they did, they were never for anything comforting. Gabrielle knew this. Everyone in the mansion knew this. Even Alexa felt it without anyone saying a word.When the message arrived,encrypted, urgent, bearing Cordelia’s private seal,Gabrielle didn’t speak. He simply stared at the glowing screen, the tension wrapping around his shoulders like armor.“We’re both attending,” he finally said.Alexa paused mid-buttoning her coat. She hadn’t expected he would bring her after the chaos of last night. But something in his expression, a quiet storm she had only seen a handful of times, told her he wasn’t merely being bold. He was preparing for something.“Is it safe?” she asked.“No,” Gabrielle answered truthfully. “But necessary.”The drive was silent. Even Antonio, sitting in the front seat, didn’t
The house was quieter than usual, wrapped in a thick, uncertain silence that stretched from room to room like a veil. Alexa had retreated to the bedroom after Gabrielle walked away, but the confrontation from earlier lingered between them like a wall.Gabrielle remained in the study for nearly an hour after the call ended. He didn’t pace, didn’t slam his fists into the desk, didn’t unleash anger the way he used to. He simply stood there, staring at his own reflection in the darkened window, breathing slowly through the tightness in his chest.Cordelia’s voice still echoed in his mind:“Interfere with her, and you will answer to me.”He had faced enemies fiercer than death itself, stared vengeance in the eye without blinking but yet Cordelia’s words unsettled him. Not because he feared her power, but because she had spoken with the authority of a woman who had already begun shaping the board. A woman who knew she was dying and had nothing left to lose.And Alexa…She had walked straigh







