Chapter 3

I had slipped the mate bond termination contract among the confirmation papers for Irina's mine acquisition plan the day Irina and Eric had departed for the mine.

At the time, Eric had been in such a hurry to leave that he hadn't even bothered reading through the contents carefully before signing them all.

The next morning, the Council of Elders had told me that the bond dissolution would be processed and finalised within ten days.

That was seven days ago, so there were only three days left.

Sighing in relief, I called Anya Henderson, my adoptive mother. She was also currently one of the seven permanent members of the Silvermoon Alliance's governing council.

The Alliance's territory was an agreed-upon neutral ground after the humans and werewolves signed a peace treaty, so Eric's influence wouldn't be able to reach me there.

Three years ago, the Alliance had invited me to head the Trade Analysis Department. However, Eric had only just inherited the Frostclaw pack at the time and told me that he needed me. Thus, I had rejected the Alliance's offer and stayed behind to help him overhaul the pack's affairs from the ground up.

Anya had warned me, "Even if he's your fated mate, it won't be easy for a human to gain a standing in a werewolf pack. It's still not too late for you to leave now."

Since I had deeply believed in Eric then, I had ignored her advice.

Now, I wanted nothing more than to change the choice I had made three years ago.

"Freya." Anya was silent for a long while before she finally spoke. "Are you sure that you won't stay behind for his sake again this time?"

"I'm sure. Besides, he's already signed the termination contract."

"What termination contract?" a voice asked from the doorway.

I turned around, only to see Eric standing by the door to the study, a frown on his face as he stared at me.

Before I could say anything, his phone lit up with a message.

He glanced down and read the message quickly, his lips curving up slightly.

When he looked back at me, however, the smile had completely vanished, along with his suspicion.

"Are you still handling work at this late hour?"

He had clearly forgotten what he had overheard just now.

Ending the call, I set my phone down. "Just some stuff to do with the mine acquisition."

Eric swept a glance over the documents on my desk. "Are you still not done with handing over the acquisition authority to Irina?"

"Soon."

The frown on his face deepened. "You've been rather distracted lately and not putting your entire focus into work. Irina is officially taking over tomorrow. Don't deliberately delay things just because you don't want to hand things over to her."

I didn't explain myself.

Seeing that, he turned and returned to our bedroom. Several minutes later, his laughter drifted out from behind the closed door.

He was sending Irina voice messages, and when he laughed, it sounded so relaxed and earnest.

I couldn't even remember when the last time he had directed such a laugh toward me was.

Shutting the study room door, I began flipping through the Alliance's trade legislations from the past three years.

Although I had grown up there, it had been a long time since I left the Alliance. I would need to relearn everything—the conditions of the various packs, the new trade legislations, and the interspecies trade provisions.

For the first time in years, I shifted my attention from Eric and focused back on myself.

"What is that? Trade legislations?"

I hadn't heard Eric come back.

He picked up a document, flipping through a few pages before a laugh burst from his lips. "These are way beyond the scope of just our pack, and it involves more races than just the werewolves. Do you even understand what you're reading?"

The very first time the Frostclaw pack established trade relations with the other packs, I had been the one to handle the negotiations.

However, it seemed like Eric had long since forgotten that the flourishing trade the Frostclaw pack currently enjoyed was built on my analysis and negotiations. To him, all that I had achieved was simply luck.

I gathered the scattered papers and stacked them in a neat pile. "I'm just reading them for fun."

Eric set down the document he was holding, not asking any more questions.

What he didn't know was that, three days from now, I would become the youngest-ever Head of the Trade Analysis Department in the history of the Alliance.

As for the interspecies trade license that he had been after for years?

That would be the first matter I handled after taking office.