LOGINMelindaThe chamber went dead silent, every eye swinging between the silver-haired man standing in the doorway and the small group of us gathered near the podium. My stomach dropped straight through the floor."Guards," the presiding elder barked, though his voice wavered with uncertainty. "Seize him.""Before you do that," the silver-haired man said calmly, not moving an inch despite dozens of council guards suddenly converging from the chamber's edges, "you should hear what I actually came to say. Unless, of course, you'd prefer to remain ignorant of the true danger standing in this room.""You murdered two elders," Voss said, his voice hard. "You have no standing to demand anything here.""I didn't murder anyone," the man said, and something in his tone made my skin crawl, calm and certain in a way that suggested he actually believed it."I removed two individuals who discovered my operation and threatened to expose it before
CarlAshley stood in the doorway, pale and trembling, her clothes still torn from the chapel, dark circles bruising the skin beneath her eyes. For a long moment nobody moved, all of us frozen in the grey morning light, staring at the last person any of us expected to be waiting on the other side of that door."Ashley." Her name came out of me rough, disbelieving. "How did you even get here before us?""I ran," she said, her voice hoarse, cracked from exhaustion or crying or both. "The second Petra had the twins safely in the car, I ran here. I couldn't go home, I couldn't face any of this pretending I didn't know what I know." Her eyes shifted to Melinda, something raw and desperate behind them."I had to warn Voss myself before the council convened. I had to try to fix at least part of what I helped break.""You could have gotten yourself killed," Melinda said, though her voice held none of the fury I expected, only something closer to e
MelindaThe car jerked hard as Kian slammed the brakes, tires skidding against loose gravel, and we all lurched forward against our seatbelts. My heart shot straight into my throat as the headlights swept over the figure standing motionless in the middle of the road."Don't," Carl said quickly, his hand already braced against the dashboard, his body angling protectively in front of me even in the cramped back seat. "Everybody stay calm. Kian, can you see who it is?"Kian squinted through the windshield, his hand hovering near the door handle. "It's not one of ours and it's not moving like a threat, not yet."The figure stepped closer into the wash of the headlights, and my breath caught.It was a woman, tall, cloaked in dark travel clothes, her hood pulled low enough to shadow most of her face but there was something in the way she carried herself, steady, unhurried, that made every strategist instinct in me scream that this wasn't a rand
CarlEvery instinct in me screamed to lunge, to close the distance and tear that blade away before it could so much as nick her skin, but the cold press of steel against Melinda's throat froze me solid, half in and half out of the car, my claws digging deep grooves into the doorframe."There," the silver-haired man said, his voice shaking despite the composure he was clearly fighting to hold onto. "Good. Stay exactly like that."I forced myself to shift back, slow and deliberate, my human voice rasping out low and steady even though my heart was slamming hard enough to crack a rib. "Let her go, you don't need her dead. You said it yourself, you need her alive for whatever ritual you're planning.""I need her alive, yes," he said, his eyes darting between me and whatever was happening outside the car, where I could hear Kian and Rowan finishing off the last of his guards somewhere behind me. "I didn't say I needed all of her intact. A shallow cut t
MelindaI woke to the smell of stone and salt water, my wrists bound in front of me this time instead of behind, my head pounding in rhythm with my heartbeat. For a long moment I couldn't remember how I'd gotten here, wherever here was, until the memory came crashing back all at once. The dais. The amber light burning up my legs. Carl going down hard under an iron rod, blood on his temple, his body still."Carl." I forced myself upright too fast, the world tilting violently around me. "Carl!""He's not here." The silver-haired man's voice came from somewhere close, calm as ever, and my eyes finally adjusted enough to make out my surroundings. A stone room, small, lit by a single lantern hanging from a hook near the low ceiling. No windows with just one door, heavy and shut."Your Alpha is likely still unconscious back in the ritual chamber, assuming your friends haven't already found him.""If you've hurt him…""I haven't touched
Carl"No." The word tore out of me before I'd even fully processed it, my body moving before my mind caught up, ignoring every protest from my battered ribs as I shoved past Kian toward the empty dais."No, no, no, she was right here.""Carl." Kian grabbed my arm, his grip firm despite the blood still running down his own face."You've been out for almost ten minutes and a lot happened.""Ten minutes." I stared at him, the words barely registering. "Ten minutes, and nobody stopped them from taking her?""We were fighting a small army, Carl, in case you missed it." Kian's voice cracked with exhaustion and something rawer underneath, guilt maybe, or grief."Rowan tried. He went down hard doing it, two of my best wolves are still unconscious near the breach wall. We were losing when you blacked out, and by the time we finally pushed them back, the silver-haired man and what was left of his men were already gone. Melinda wit
Carl’s POV You’ve been staring at that report for ten minutes Carl." Damon, my Beta, stood across the room with his arms tightly crossed over his chest. His posture was rigid, his jaw set in a hard line that had become permanent over the last seven days. I had not slept properly in the past s
CHAPTER FOURMelinda’s POVI sat on the edge of my small bed, staring blankly down at the wrinkled white paper in my hands. Hours had passed since the council meeting, yet my mind still replayed every second over and over again like torture.Carl’s freezing disappointment. I squeezed my eyes shut,
Melinda’s POV“Dr. Thomas," I breathed relieved, rushing to him.“Please tell them what you told me just twenty minutes ago in your office."He stiffly turned away from me refusing to meet my eyes, Fear crawled into my chest like ice. Something was wrong, terribly wrong.Sweat glistened along his
Melinda’s POV"Is it another no?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper. "Am I not pregnant again?"Dr. Thomas stared at the report in his hands without answering.My stomach sank.Of course. It was the same look he wore every time he told me the news I already expected.Three years of trying bu







