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Chapter 17: The Distance Between Them
publish date:
2026-11-07 08:00:00Serena
Dr. Maren doesn't start with the results. She starts with a cup of tea.
"You look like you haven't sat down since Tuesday," she says, sliding it across the desk.
"It's Friday."
"Then it's been a long week."
I wrap both hands around the cup. It's too hot to drink. I hold it anyway.
Marlowe is down the hall in the observation room, hooked up to a monitor and bribed into stillness with a tablet and a promise of star crackers. She was discharged tw
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Alpha's Regret: Chasing the Luna He Called Barren Chapter 17: The Distance Between Them
SerenaDr. Maren doesn't start with the results. She starts with a cup of tea."You look like you haven't sat down since Tuesday," she says, sliding it across the desk."It's Friday.""Then it's been a long week."I wrap both hands around the cup. It's too hot to drink. I hold it anyway.Marlowe is down the hall in the observation room, hooked up to a monitor and bribed into stillness with a tablet and a promise of star crackers. She was discharged two days ago. This morning I brought her back for scans, and I haven't breathed properly since the technician said *the doctor will want to talk to you.*"I'll be direct," Dr. Maren says. She opens a folder, then closes it, as though she's decided she doesn't need it. "We still can't classify what's happening. The scans show her wolf is further along than it should be for a five-year-old. The fevers seem to follow it. Every time her wolf pushes forward, her body overheats.""Pushes f
Alpha's Regret: Chasing the Luna He Called Barren Chapter 16: The Little Girl at the Office (2)
The girl looks at me. Her eyes are blue-gray, wide, and completely unafraid. She doesn't hide behind her mother's leg. She tilts her head and studies me like I'm a puzzle she hasn't decided to solve."Are you the man from the trucks?"Lysandra closes her eyes for half a second. "Marlowe.""What? Pia said a man from the trucks was coming.""I work with the people who move the trucks," I say. "And some of the ships, too.""The *big ships*?""Very big.""Bigger than the hospital?""About the same.""Wow." She says it like I've told her I own the moon. "Do you get to drive them?""No. I mostly sign papers.""That sounds boring.""It is.""I like drawing better.""I can see that." I nod at the marker on her jaw. "You're wearing some of it."She slaps a hand to her face, smears the purple farther, and looks so betrayed that his Gamma coughs into his fist.Reth hasn't settled. He
Alpha's Regret: Chasing the Luna He Called Barren Chapter 15: The Little Girl at the Office
SerenaMarlowe has taken over the corner of my office.She was discharged yesterday, with a folder of instructions and a promise to Dr. Maren that she would "rest very hard." Her usual sitter canceled at noon with a stomach bug. So here she is, cross-legged on the rug with a pile of picture books, a tin of markers, and the gray wolf propped against the sofa like a bodyguard."His name is Gus," she announces, to no one in particular."Since when?""Since ten minutes ago. He told me.""Did he say anything else?""He said you work too much." She doesn't look up from her drawing. "And that the snack drawer is empty.""The snack drawer is not empty.""It has *raisins* in it."I press my lips together to keep from laughing and go back to the Ashgate inspection plan. The meeting this morning is still sitting in my chest like a swallowed stone. His voice. The way he looked at my handbag. *Do you have family waiting for yo
Alpha's Regret: Chasing the Luna He Called Barren Chapter 14: The Meeting She Cannot Avoid
SerenaI draft the cancellation email three times.The first version is polite. The second is polite and cold. The third just says *No*, which I delete before my finger reaches the send button."You could still do it," Marcus says from the chair across my desk. He's holding his tablet against his chest like a shield. "I'd back you. But I want you to hear the other side first.""Go on.""Blackthorn controls the mountain pass and two of the three bridges we'll need if we ever expand east. We've been lucky so far. If we keep slamming the door, they'll make it very expensive to open another one." He lowers his voice. "And you've never once agreed to a meeting. Six proposals, six refusals. Now the Alpha himself asks for you and you vanish? That gets noticed, Lysandra."I hate that he's right.*If I run now, he knows. If I sit across from him with a straight face, he only suspects.*"Fine," I say. "I'll go.""Good.""Bu
Alpha's Regret: Chasing the Luna He Called Barren Chapter 13: An Alpha's Unwanted Interest
KaelThe report is forty pages long, and by page twelve I've read the same paragraph three times."Vogan Logistics." My Gamma drops into the chair across from my desk and stretches his legs out. "Operates in eleven human cities and four werewolf territories. Controls the northern freight corridor, half the neutral trade routes, and a warehouse network that's been called the most reliable in the region. Three different Alphas have given her written praise.""Written praise.""One of them called her relentless. I think he meant it kindly." He flips a page. "Her books are clean. Her employees stay. Her competitors hate her, but none of them can tell us why she keeps winning."I turn to the section on her background. It's two paragraphs long."This is all?""That's all." He lifts his coffee. "Before the company opened its first office, she doesn't exist. No school records. No old addresses. Her first lease was signed in human territory ju
Alpha's Regret: Chasing the Luna He Called Barren Chapter 12: The Woman Who Refuses Blackthorn
SerenaI replace my bank cards before nine.It takes four phone calls, two security questions about my mother's maiden name, which I answer with a lie I've told so often it comes out smooth, and one very long hold song. When I hang up, the cards are handled.The photograph isn't.I sit at my desk with a cold coffee and a spreadsheet I can't read. The numbers slide around the screen. Every few minutes my eyes drift to the corner of the desk where my wallet used to sit.It was the only picture I had. Me in that hospital bed, gray-faced and half-dead, Marlowe a pink bundle against my chest. I took it the day after she was born, when I was still sure someone would walk through the door and take her from me.Now Kael has it.*He saw it. He had to. He picks up a wallet that doesn't belong to him and he doesn't look inside? Not him.*I press my fingers against my eyes until I see sparks.The knock is soft. Marcus pushes the doo
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