Roses

Vanessa's POV

The tear made it as far as my cheekbone before I caught it.

I dried it quickly with the back of my wrist, not breaking stride, not turning back. My palm was damp against the doorknob and I could feel the slight tremor in my fingers that I refused to allow anywhere else. I stopped just past the threshold. Something in me would not let me simply walk away.

I turned around.

I looked at my husband and let the smile come back. Slower this time. Sadder, though I would not have called it that then.

"Are you choosing her," I said, "over me."

It was not really a question. I think we both knew that.

Ronan's jaw shifted. "I need you to watch how you speak about her."

"I am speaking about the situation."

"You are being deliberately ugly about it. A Luna is supposed to seek peace. A Luna holds a pack together, Vanessa. She does not stand in doorways making things harder."

I said nothing.

"Honestly." He exhaled and shook his head, and the look on his face was one I had never seen directed at me before. Patient. Tired.

"Sometimes I think you would have been better suited as a warrior. The Luna role was never really." He paused, choosing his next word carefully. "Natural on you."

The smile on my face did not waver. I was grateful for that. Whatever my father had put in me, whatever those years in his house had carved into my spine, it held.

"Alright," I said.

I stepped back. The door swung gently shut between us, and I stood in the corridor and listened to my own breathing until it steadied.

My wolf was not steady. She pressed against the inside of my chest, low and aching. I placed one hand flat against the wall and gave her a moment. Then I straightened and walked to the guest room at the end of the hall.

Everything got worse the moment I walked into the guest room. The rest of the days passed, each day reminding me that I was replaceable. I'd decided to pick up some routines just so that I could distract myself from whatever that's clouding my mind.

I woke early. I dressed without looking at the mirror for too long. I took my meals when the main table was quiet and said what needed to be said at pack meetings and said nothing else.

Mandy's careless Jabs were persistent, but I ignored them anyway. She wasn't worth arguing with. I reminded myself over and over again that I was a Lycan wolf and Mandy was nothing but a beta wolf, easy to break and easier to kill off.

What kept me was the garden. It sat behind the east wing of the packhouse, enclosed on three sides by old stone walls that held the warmth long after the sun moved off them. I had planted every rose in it, on my hands, knees on the floor.

Ronan had been beside me on Saturday morning two years ago complaining that he did not see the point of flowers that would not survive the first frost, while I ignored him completely and pressed each bulb into the dark earth. He had handed me tools without being asked for the rest of the afternoon and pretended he was not enjoying himself.

I was on the stone bench nearest the far wall, coffee warming both palms, Nadia having brought it out without being asked the way she always did, when my ears caught the sound of footsteps on the path.

I did not turn around. I did not need to.

As a Lycan, my eyes were no sharper than any other wolf's. But my hearing was a different matter entirely. I could identify every member of this pack by their particular sound. The way an elder dragged his left foot slightly,the way the younger warriors hit the ground harder on the right side. I had catalogued them all without meaning to.

These footsteps were unfamiliar and annoying. Someone who wanted to be heard approaching.

"I have to say," Mandy's voice arrived before she did, "I did not expect the garden to be this lovely.”

I took a sip of my coffee.

She appeared at the edge of my peripheral vision and stopped a few feet away, one hand resting on her stomach as always, her eyes moving across the roses.

"Nadia told me you planted all of these yourself." She tilted her head. "I think that's wonderful. Really. That kind of dedication."

A small appreciative sound. "I could never."

I said nothing.

"The thing is." She exhaled slowly and turned to face me more directly. "The roses are a problem. The scent. It is quite strong and my healer has said that strong floral scents can be difficult in the later months. For the baby,” she paused, waiting for implications.

"I am sure you understand. Or. Well." The pause stretched just a beat longer than necessary. "Maybe not personally. But I am sure you can imagine.”

I looked at her for the first time.

She held my gaze with something that had learned to look like warmth.

"I was thinking lilies would be lovely here instead," she continued. "Much softer. I have always preferred them. And obviously I am not asking your permission, I just thought it would be nice to mention it before." She turned her head slightly and raised her hand, her fingers snapping almost immediately.

The gardener appeared from around the corner of the wall. He was already holding a spade.Something went very still in me.

"You can start along the far bed," she told him pleasantly.

A rush of adrenaline pumped through my veins, my jaw tightening. I took a deep breath, trying to calm my racing heart.

"You will not touch those roses."

My voice came out quiet. The gardener stopped.Mandy looked at me with patient, practiced surprise.

"Vanessa. The baby."

"The baby," I said, "is your concern. This garden is mine."

"Everything in this pack is a shared concern now." She rested both hands on her stomach. A gesture so practiced it almost made me tired. "I am carrying the most important thing in this pack. My healer's instructions exist for a reason. I would think that someone in your position would understand the importance of putting the pack's heir above personal sentiment." A soft, almost sympathetic tilt of her head. "But then, you wouldn't really know. Would you. What it is to carry something.”

That was it.

I set my coffee cup down on the stone bench. I stood up slowly. I took one step toward her, then another, and I watched her eyes track the distance between us with the first genuine uncertainty I had seen in them.

The words were the exact catalyst that triggered my Lycan instinct. My wolf surged through my muscles, sweat dripping down my forehead. The goal was simple: Slit her throat but I had better suggestions.

Her chin lifted.

"You would not hit a pregnant woman," she said, her hand tightening on her stomach.

I took another step.

The closer I got to her, the more her expression shifted from something calculated, replaced by something else entirely.

Suppressing the predatory instinct in me was much harder than I realised. She swayed, her mouth opening and closing at the same time. Then…she grinned.

Before my brain could calculate properly, her knees hit the floor instantly, her voice tearing through the morning as she screamed my name.

“Ronan!” she cried harder.

My brow furrowed, confusion flickering across my face as she rolled on the floor, yelping in what seemed like pain.

The door from the east wing crashed open.

Ronan crossed the garden in four strides, dropping to his knees beside her, hands moving across her, voice urgent and low.

Then,he looked up.

His eyes found me standing exactly where I was.

"What the fuck did you do to her?”