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TIAGO MARQUES POV

CHAPTER THREE: WHAT THE ALPHA CAN'T SAY

I had spent five years perfecting the disciplined, necessary art of not thinking about Mateo Serrano, and Camila Serrano had completely undone that entire foundation in exactly nine days.

I sat alone at my desk above the training facility, my back to the wall of tinted glass overlooking the main pitch. Down on the grass, the first-team squad was finishing a light recovery session that I should have been leading. Instead, I was staring at the sleek glass screen of my phone, re-reading a text message from Diego Osório that made my jaw lock so hard my molars groaned under the pressure.

Handled the journalist. She'll back off.

I didn't believe that for a single fraction of a second. I had watched Camila Serrano navigate a hostile press room with the sharp, terrifying precision of a woman who had built her entire adult life around exactly one objective. Women like Camila did not back off because a cowardly sporting director made a vague, late-night phone call. If anything, Diego’s clumsy attempt at intimidation had just given her a fresh scent to hunt.

"You're brooding," Cam said, swinging open my office door and dropping into the leather armchair across from my desk without an invitation. He’d been doing that since we were fifteen years old, back when he first appointed himself my unofficial conscience and second-in-command. "It's very loud. I can hear the gear-grinding all the way down the hallway."

"I'm working."

"You're staring at your phone like it personally insulted your bloodline. That's not working, Tiago. That's just brooding with a very expensive prop." Cam leaned his elbows on his knees, his easy, casual posture shifting into something far sharper as he studied my face. "This is about the Serrano girl."

"It's about Diego overstepping his authority," I growled, setting the phone face-down on the mahogany desk.

"Sure. Keep telling yourself that. It's also entirely about the journalist."

I didn't bother offering a defense, mostly because Cam was right. For three generations, my family had been trained to manage and protect our territory in Lisbon with absolute authority, but I had always been far better at commanding the Marques pack than at hiding the raw truth from my oldest friend.

"She's digging into Mateo's death," I admitted, rubbing a thumb against the sharp bridge of my nose as a headache bloomed behind my eyes. "Properly digging this time. She isn't just relying on old grief. She’s got frame-by-frame broadcast analysis, medical archive requests, and apparently a photograph of my eyes doing something they had no business doing in front of a high-speed camera lens."

Cam’s relaxed demeanor completely vanished. His posture went rigid. "How bad is the photograph?"

"Bad enough," I said quietly. "Lucía Fernandes caught it during Tuesday’s rain session. Amber reflection. The light angle doesn't match a natural flash flare."

"We need that file deleted," Cam said, his voice dropping into his low, authoritative Beta tone. "Immediately."

"I know."

"Tonight, Tiago. Before she routes it to an external server."

"I know," I repeated, dragging both hands over my face. The deep, bone-weary exhaustion I’d been keeping at bay for months sat heavier on my shoulders than ever. "I'm not going to order a break-in to her apartment to steal a memory card, Cam. That’s a desperate, messy move. That’s exactly the kind of violation that turns a curious reporter into a relentless crusade."

"So what’s your play instead? You just let her keep pulling threads until she realizes an entire werewolf pack is running the top tier of European football?"

"My play is figure out exactly how much she knows about Mateo’s last sixty seconds before I make a move," I said. A tight, suffocating knot flared in my chest at the mention of the boy's name—an old, unhealed scar I’d carried silently for five long years. "She deserves the truth, Cam. She's deserved it from day one. I've thought about that every single day since he died, and I’ve never once had the legal or political freedom to give it to her."

Cam went silent, his dark eyes softening with a heavy, shared understanding. He didn't need me to spell out the legalities of our world. The truth behind Mateo Serrano’s death was not a private confession I could simply hand over over a cup of coffee. It was bound up in ancient pack law, tied to a territorial treaty maintained through blood, silence, and political leverage across the Spanish border. Breaking that silence didn't just mean personal ruin for me—it meant exposing our entire existence and igniting a blood feud.

"Henrique Cabral's people were the ones who brought that magical poison into the stadium," Cam said softly, his voice heavy with old frustration. "Not you. You’ve spent five solid years torturing yourself for a tragedy his pack set in motion."

"I was the Alpha on the pitch," I snapped, my voice rough and gravelly. "I was standing right beside him. I was the one who couldn't purge the toxin from his blood before his heart gave out. A human kid died on live television because two rival packs couldn't keep their dirty territory games off the grass. I don't get to wash my hands of that guilt just because it wasn't my claw that struck the blow."

"You've carried his corpse on your back long enough, Tiago."

"I'll carry it as long as I have to."

Cam let the silence stretch between us for a long moment. Then he leaned forward, setting his forearms on his knees, his expression dangerously perceptive. "Can I say something you're going to hate me for?"

"When has my reaction ever stopped you from opening your mouth?"

"You like her." Cam laid it out plainly, completely devoid of his usual teasing banter. "I watched you at the anniversary match last week. You abandoned play and crossed an entire stadium on instinct the exact second she stumbled in that stairwell. That wasn't captain's duty, Tiago. That was a male whose wolf has already made a choice his human mind is too terrified to admit."

I kept my mouth shut, refusing to give the thought space to breathe. The raw, terrifying reality was that the instinctual pull toward Camila Serrano scared me far more than Diego’s clumsy blackmails or Henrique’s looming wedding demands combined.

"It doesn't matter what I feel," I said finally, my tone turning to cold iron. "I am bound to Beatriz Cabral. The political pact has been locked in for two years. Breaking that contract now doesn't just insult Henrique—it opens up the exact same bloody pack war that took Mateo's life in the first place."

"So your grand plan is to marry a cold, conniving woman you completely despise just to keep an uneasy peace with the monster who murdered a kid?"

"My plan is to do what an Alpha is required to do," I growled, looking Cam dead in the eye. "Which is protect this pack, even if it costs me every single thing I actually want for myself."

Cam stared at me for a long, quiet moment, a mixture of stubborn loyalty and deep sadness behind his eyes. "For what it's worth... I don't think you're protecting anyone by sacrificing yourself. I think you're just letting Henrique win twice."

I didn't have a counter-argument for that. Recognizing that the conversation had reached its brutal limit, Cam stood up, adjusted his training jacket, and walked toward the heavy oak door. He paused at the frame, looking back over his shoulder.

"Handle the photograph," he said quietly. "Properly. Talk to her. Ask her to delete it instead of sending enforcers to take it. You've been looking for an excuse to get in a room with her again anyway."

He slipped out before I could throw a paperweight at his head.

Two hours later, night had completely fallen over Lisbon. The air outside the main stadium gates was cool, heavy with the scent of salty coastal rain and exhaust fumes. I found her standing near the sidewalk, wrapped in a dark trench coat, staring at her phone as she waited for a taxi that was clearly running late.

My inner wolf stirred immediately, a low, warm hum vibrating against my ribs just from being within twenty feet of her scent. I pushed my instincts down, stepping out of the shadows of the security arch.

"Miss Serrano."

Camila spun on her heel, her sharp, intelligent eyes narrowing the instant she recognized my face. The defensive wall went up instantly, her posture going taut and guarded.

"Captain," she said, her voice dripping with cool sarcasm. "Did you come out here to deliver another vague threat? Your sporting director already covered that angle this afternoon."

"Diego Osório does not speak for me," I said flatly.

"No? He sounded exceptionally confident that he had your full backing."

"He's an idiot who thinks he can manage things he doesn't understand." I took two deliberate steps closer, stopping just short of invading her personal space. The yellow streetlamp above caught the sharp angles of her face, highlighting the deep, dark circles of exhaustion beneath her eyes—and the fierce, unyielding fire burning within them. "I'm not here to threaten you, Camila. I came out here because you deserve considerably better than being warned off by a coward who isn't brave enough to look you in the eye."

A flicker of genuine surprise crossed her features, quickly replaced by cautious, sharp curiosity. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about your brother." My voice dropped into a low, quiet register, the weight of five years of silent grief settling heavily over every word. "I am not going to give you every answer you want tonight. I can't. Not yet. And I need you to understand that my silence isn't because I'm trying to hide behind a lie. But I will give you this much: whatever picture you've built in your head over the last five years, it wasn't as simple as an undetectable heart flaw. And it wasn't as simple as me being the monster you've spent half a decade hating, either."

Her breath hitched sharply in her throat, her chest heaving as she stared at me. "Then what was it, Tiago? What happened to Mateo?"

"I can't tell you the rest," I said, my chest aching at the raw, agonizing grief visible on her face. "Not yet. But I promise you this, Camila: I have spent every single day since that match wishing with everything in me that I could have saved him. I would trade every title, every scrap of reputation, and my own life if it meant your brother had walked off that pitch instead of me."

She stood frozen under the streetlight, her sharp eyes searching my face, desperately hunting for the practiced lie she’d been expecting to hear for five long years. Whatever she found in my eyes instead left her looking visibly shaken, her defensive armor fracturing for the first time.

"Why are you telling me this now?" she asked, her voice trembling slightly.

"Because Diego had no right to call you," I said, holding her gaze with steady, absolute honesty. "And because I am sick of watching you carry the burden of this investigation alone when a piece of the truth belongs to me. And..." I paused, forcing my human mind to admit what my wolf already knew. "Because against every logical, professional instinct I possess, I would much rather have you trust me a little than hate me completely."

Headlights suddenly swept over the curb as an yellow taxi pulled up to the sidewalk, breaking the suffocating tension hanging between us. Camila glanced at the car, then turned back to me, the fiery, stubborn light returning to her dark eyes.

"This doesn't change anything," she said, her voice dropping into a fierce promise. "Whatever you just said... it's not enough to make me stop."

"I know."

"I'm going to keep digging. I'm going to find the rest of it."

"I know you are." A genuine, quiet smile tugged at the corner of my mouth—the first real smile I’d felt in months. "I would expect nothing less from you, Camila."

She held my stare for one last, breathless second before pulling open the taxi door and slipping into the backseat. I stood alone on the damp curb as the red taillights faded into the Lisbon traffic, feeling, for the very first time in plenty years, like I had finally done something honest—and having absolutely no idea if that honesty had just saved us, or guaranteed our absolute destruction.