03: The parent's bargain

"You sneak." Mom's voice came out quiet. Which was almost worse than shouting.

"We took you in. Gave you a home. A family. And this is how you repay us?"

"Mom-"

"I am not your mother-"

"Julia." The Beta's voice cut across the room like a blade. Sharp and final.

Mom went silent, her jaw tight.

"We don't know anything for certain,” said the Beta. “Until we ask her directly."

"The evidence is difficult to ignore, Gor-"

"Is it true?" He spoke over her, his gaze fixed on me. Still and careful. The way he looked when he was deciding something. "Are you sneaking around with the young Alpha?"

The room contracted. My throat closed around every word I might have said.

My hesitation was its own answer. Mom moved before I saw it coming.

The slap cracked across my face and the force of it dropped me to my knees. My right hand flew up to press against the burn spreading across my cheek.

"How could you!" Her voice broke. "He belongs to Carla. Your sister's."

He does not. He has never asked her out or shown any interest in her. Has never looked at her the way he looks at me. The pack decided this, not him.

I kept every word behind my teeth and kept my eyes on the floor.

"This is what happens," Mom continued, her voice rising now, "when you take in a stray. Garbage… a rogue's daughter. A cursed, wolfless-"

"Julia. Enough."

The Beta's sharp voice cut her off.

He crossed the room slowly and lowered himself to his haunches in front of me so that we were eye level.

"Look at me, Layla."

I looked. The disappointment in his face was worse than the slap. It settled into my chest in a way that physical pain wouldn't. This male was the only father I ever knew.

"You will end it," he said. Quiet and absolute. "Not later. Not tomorrow. Immediately. And you will not tell Draven why. You will simply make him understand that it cannot continue. That he belongs with Carla. She is the right choice." He paused.

"And you will say nothing of this conversation to him, to Carla, or to anyone. Do you understand?"

Make Draven understand…

The thought moved through me with a dim, helpless sort of irony. No one made Draven do anything. Even his gentleness was a choice, not a concession.

"I understand," I said. "But I can't make him-"

"You'll find a way." Mom's voice came from somewhere behind me.

The Beta stood. Returned to his desk. Lifted a paper and set it down again.

"Your college acceptance arrived today."

My head jerked up. Hope flickered only to die instantly at his next words.

"Draven and Carla must happen."

His eyes held mine.

"Or you can forget about medical school.”

Mom's reflection moved in the dark window glass. I could feel her satisfaction without having to look up at her.

I thought about the first time I set foot in this house. Seven years old. A rescue from a rogue raid with nothing. Not even a last name.

I've spent the past eleven years making myself small enough to be kept. Useful enough to be worth the keeping.

A medical degree was the one future I had built entirely by myself. I had worked hard. Studied. Pulled countless all nighters to get this far. It wasn't charity given to me. I earned that acceptance.

That degree was my one chance to become something more than a wolfless burden.

And now it was about to be taken away

Without it… What would I have? Nothing.

"I understand," I said again.

"Good." He threw a folded napkin at me. "Clean your face before you go."

✶⋆ ♡ ⋆✶

The night air was cold when I stepped outside, and I was grateful for it.

I pressed the back of my hand to my cheek as I rounded the corner toward the cottage. My thoughts were moving too fast to catch. Draven's text, the Beta's face, Mom's voice finding new shapes for old cruelties.

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, a hand closed around my arm and in one smooth motion I was against the wall with the cold stone at my back.

And Draven was in front of me.

He was still in the same clothes from earlier. He must have come through the east gate, the way he did once before when he didn't want to be seen.

His eyes dropped to my cheek and something shifted in them. Quick and dark. It was gone in an instant.

"You didn't text me back." His voice was a whisper.

He stood close enough so the warmth of him cut through the cold evening air. His thumb found my jaw, tilting my face toward what little light there was.

"I was starting to think you were trying to drive me mad."

My throat tightened.

He was here. He was warm and steady and looking at me like I was the only thing in the world that mattered. And I had just come from a room where I'd promised to destroy this. What did I do? How do I begin the conversation?

"Draven," I started.

"What happened to your face?"

The question was quiet, but for the first time, she heard a crack in his usual calm.