Chapter 4

Aurora’s Pov

I woke up shivering under three blankets, my whole body soaked in sweat. My skin felt too tight for some weird reason. 

The little concrete room smelled funky. I didn’t remember how I got here, only flashes running through my mind and also Marcus’s voice. Someone is carrying me.

The door opened.

Smith walked in first, shirtless, his chest marked with old battle scars I’d never let myself study before. Rio followed behind him silently, and locked the door once he was inside.

“Get out,” I said, though my voice barely had weight.

“No,” Smith said.

I pulled the blankets higher, my body shaking too hard to hide it properly. “I mean it, Smith.”

“Marcus told us everything,” he said, crouching beside the mattress. 

“He had no right.”

“He loves you,” Rio said quietly from the doorway. “He’s watched you die for eight months and said nothing because you asked him not to. That’s not betrayal, Aurora. That’s a man keeping his word until he couldn’t anymore.”

I didn’t have the strength to argue. The fever was pulling me under in waves now, and every part of me hurt.

Smith reached out slowly, like he expected me to flinch. When I didn’t, his hand wrapped gently around my ankle.

The burning I felt within me eased almost instantly.

I hated how much relief that brought me. 

“There’s only one bed in this safehouse that’s safe from surveillance,” Smith said. “You’re staying here with us tonight.”

“I’m not sleeping with either of you.”

“I didn’t ask you to,” Smith said. “I asked you to let us hold you.”

I wanted to refuse but my body was too tired to keep fighting a war I couldn’t win alone, not tonight.

Smith slid under the blankets first, giving me time to pull away if I needed to. I didn’t. His arms wrapped around my back slowly. 

Rio moved in on the other side, his arm settling beneath my neck without demanding anything more.

I lay between them, waiting for the fear to surface but it didn’t.

“You’re perfect,” Smith murmured against my shoulder. “Every inch of you.”

I didn’t believe him. So, I let my eyes close, safety settling over me like something I’d forgotten the shape of.

Then every light in the safehouse went out at once.

Rio was on his feet, a blade already in his hand. “Don’t move,” he ordered, low and sharp.

The emergency lights flickered on a second later, casting the room in a dim, bloody red.

I felt Smith freeze beside me before I even turned my head.

Written across the concrete wall, something was written.

WE KNOW ABOUT YOUR DAUGHTER, AURORA.

Beneath the stained concrete, sat a tiny pink baby sock.

~~~

I pulled on my boots and walked out into the main warehouse floor, where the tactical monitors hummed. Marcus Grey stood by the main console, staring at a flashing red sequence of code.

"You look better," Marcus said, his hazel eyes were pretty as he looked at me. He stepped forward, his hand lingering on my waist for a second before he snapped out of whatever trans he was in. The slow-burning tension between us built for years, but he always kept his distance out of respect for my past trauma.

"What did you find?" I asked, focusing on the screen.

"A mole," Marcus whispered, "Someone feeds our exact safehouse coordinates to the rogue faction. The encrypted wire traces directly back to the Supreme Alpha's inner circle."

I froze on the spot. "Dane Calloway."

"Yes," Marcus said. "Smith’s cousin. That’s not the worst part, Aurora." He turned to face me fully, his hands gripping my shoulders. "The rogues don't just hunt the task force anymore. They intercepted a message between Zara and the outer pack lines. They know about Maya."

The world seemed to stop spinning and it brought flashes to what I saw yesterday. "My baby…”

"They know she's your daughter with Smith," Marcus said, his voice filled with panic. "Ezra Hunt heads the rogue unit. He’s moving toward her location right now."

A sudden crash echoed from the upper catwalk.

We locked eyes. I drew my silver blade from my boot, my wolf surging forward with mothering fury.

Smith and Rio came out of the briefing room, their expressions wasnt so good. "The perimeter is breached," Rio shouted, racking the bolt of his assault rifle. "We have multiple rogues entering through the southern sectors."

"They are a distraction," I yelled, my voice loud with desperation. "Smith! Ezra has Cole and Maya. He knows about our daughter!"

Smith froze in disbelief. His grey eyes went completely wide, like they were about to bulge out

The Alpha of Alphas didn't ask questions. He didn't demand explanations for the secret. The mere mention of his child being in danger unleashed something monstrous inside him.

His bones began to crack loudly as his human form expanded. "Rio…Marcus. We kill everything in that warehouse and have no mercy for what or whosoever."

*********

The industrial south side of Chicago was a wasteland of rusted steel and abandoned factories. I was captured during the initial chaos at the safehouse. Ezra Hunt trained beside me for four years; he knew my weak points up to this very day. Now, I found myself chained to a heavy iron chair in the center of a damp warehouse floor, a heavy wolf-suppressing collar burning against my neck.

Across the room, my younger brother Cole was tied to a steel beam, his face bruised. Beside him, in a small woven basket, seven-month-old Maya cried out.

Ezra Hunt stood over the basket, a weird smile on his worn face. "You should have kept your mouth shut three years ago, Aurora. Reporting my crimes to the council cost me everything. Now, I'm taking your legacy."

"Touch her and I will tear your throat out with my human teeth, Ezra," I snarled, the iron chains rattling against my wrists.

"With what army?" Ezra laughed. "Mother Grey already scattered the task force. You're alone and done for."

The massive skylight above us shattered into a million shards of glass.

A massive black wolf descended from the ceiling like a falling shadow, landing directly between Ezra and the baby's basket. 

It was Smith…his black fur was soaked in blood.

Behind him, Ezra drew his blade, lunging toward Maya’s basket.

Smith didn't hesitate. He threw his massive body onto Ezra, his claws ripping through the rogue's chest. The impact threw them across the concrete floor.

Marcus sprinted towards Cole, slashing his ropes, while Rio cleared the perimeter, his eyes were locked onto me. Rio slid his blade into the lock of my chains, freeing my wrists. 

Then, he grabbed the wolf-suppressing collar on my neck and yanked it out with his Alpha strength and it all shattered on the ground.

My wolf surged back to life inside my veins. I didn't wait. I shifted instantly, my massive, broad-chested silver wolf roaring as I lunged across the floor. Ezra scrambled to get his dropped weapon, but my paws pinned his chest to the concrete. I looked down at my former friend, my hands inches away from his face. I could have killed him cause honestly my body was itching me to.

I pressed my paw harder into his chest, breaking his ribs, ensuring he would never fight again, before turning my back on him.

Cole already scooped Maya out of the basket, holding her tight against his chest. Smith shifted back into his human form, bleeding heavily along his ribs. He stumbled, but I caught him, shifting back to human form just in time to wrap my thick arms around his waist.

Smith rested his forehead against mine, his chest heaving as he looked down at our daughter in Cole's arms. "She looks just like you," he whispered, his hand coming up to cup my face.

Six months later, things changed. I stood at the windows of Smith's Chicago penthouse, the city lights twinkling below us. Maya was asleep in her crib in the adjacent room.

Marcus stood to my left, his hand resting warmly on the small of my back. 

Rio stood to my right, his eyes were watchful while behind me was Smith’s large arm looped around my waist, pulling my back against his chest.

We broke Mother Grey’s council. We rewrote the laws of the continent. There was no single Supreme Luna anymore. At least we know now that there was a council of equals, ruled by a plus-size Beta who refused to submit.

"Are you still trying to control the room, wildcat?" Smith murmured against my ear.

I leaned back into his warm hug, feeling Marcus's fingers trace my hip.

For the first time in years…I believed the war was finally over.

Then Maya cried out. It wasn’t normal for her to start crying out of the blue. “Maya, baby.. what’s wrong?” I said with a calm voice. Suddenly, the cry increased and every wolf in the penthouse looked at each other in concern.

The lights blinked countless times. Then a voice echoed through the apartment.

“Security breach.”

“Unknown Alpha detected inside the residence.”

Rio’s head snapped toward the nursery. Smith was already running but the nursery door…was slowly opening from the inside.