Chapter 2

SOPHIA'S POV

Three years earlier, Alpha Blake arrived at our doorstep, unannounced and entirely too confident for a man about to be turned away.

"I'd like to ask for your daughter's hand," he said, standing tall in our front room like he already belonged there, as though the outcome of the conversation had never once been in doubt.

My father didn't hesitate. "I can't give you my daughter. She'll find her own mate within our pack."

"With respect, Alpha, I don't think that's your decision to make for her," Blake said, holding his ground despite the flat refusal.

"It's exactly my decision." My father's voice sharpened, the warning in it unmistakable. "Now I'll ask you to leave my house."

"You haven't even asked her what she wants," Blake pressed, glancing toward the staircase as if he expected me to appear.

"I don't need to. Leave, Alpha Blake, before I make you," my father said, and something in his tone finally ended the argument.

Blake tried to argue further, but my father cut him off with a look that ended the conversation entirely. He left, and the door shut behind him with a weight that seemed to settle over the whole house.

I confronted my father the moment the door closed. "Why would you turn him away like that? You didn't even ask what I wanted."

"I don't want you leaving this pack," was all he'd say, not looking up from whatever had suddenly become so important on his desk.

"That's not an answer, Father," I said, my frustration mounting.

"It's the only one you're getting."

"You can't just decide my whole life for me and expect me to say thank you."

"I can, and I did. This conversation is over," he said, and the finality in his voice told me there was nothing left to gain by staying.

I stormed out rather than keep arguing with a wall.

The next day, the Black Wolverines attacked without warning, the sound of it tearing through the pack grounds before anyone had a chance to prepare.

We were outnumbered until Blake and his rogues appeared out of nowhere and turned the fight around, cutting through the chaos with a precision that felt almost rehearsed.

"Where did they even come from?" I shouted at Leah over the noise, both of us pressed against the side of the house as the fighting raged nearby.

"I don't know. I don't care. Just get inside!" she shouted back, pulling at my arm.

In the aftermath, once the worst of it had passed, one of our warriors approached my father, still catching his breath. "Alpha, we owe him everything," he said. "If he hadn't come, we'd have lost the whole eastern line."

My father asked Blake plainly what he wanted in return, the gratitude in his voice tempered by wariness.

"I want your second daughter as my mate," Blake said, not hesitating for a second, as though the answer had been waiting on his tongue the entire fight.

"Done," my father said, the word landing with a finality that startled even me. "You'll have her."

Just like that, I was going to be Alpha Blake's mate.

"Wait. Me?" I asked, still catching up with what had just happened, looking between the two of them for some sign this was a mistake.

"You," my father said. "Unless you object."

"No. I don't object." I didn't, not then. Not for a long time after, either.

Later, once the grounds had quieted and the wounded had been tended to, Leah found me with a curious look on her face. "Where do you even know Alpha Blake from? He saved our lives today. Why's he so interested in you?"

"We met a few months ago," I told her, the memory surfacing easily. "A car rear-ended mine at a stoplight."

"That's it? A fender bender?" she asked, clearly unconvinced that was the whole story.

"He was a true gentleman about it," I said. "Checked that I wasn't hurt, apologized about six times. I got back in my car and drove off without thinking twice."

"And now he's asking Father for your hand." Leah shook her head, something between disbelief and amusement crossing her face. "That's insane."

"I know." My phone buzzed with a message from a number I didn't recognize, and that single message was what set everything else in motion.

I left New York without telling anyone. I packed what I could carry and got on a plane to Canada, the city disappearing beneath the clouds before I'd even had time to second-guess myself.

"Ma'am, is this your first time in Toronto?" the driver asked once I'd settled into the back of the cab, watching me in the rearview mirror.

"First time anywhere without my family," I said, staring out at the unfamiliar streets. "Long story."

"Good or bad kind of long story?" he asked, amused.

"Ask me again in a few months," I said, managing a small smile despite myself.

He laughed and let it drop, and I spent the rest of the ride watching a city I didn't know yet slide past the window, telling myself this was the fresh start I'd promised my mother I'd find.

On my first day at Mondragon Corporation, too nervous to watch where I was going, I walked straight into Derick Mondragon while digging through my bag, papers scattering between us.

"Watch where you're going," he growled, and my heart started hammering. The memory of him slapping Leah, years ago in my father's house, flashed through my mind before I could stop it.

"I'm sorry, I wasn't looking," I managed, crouching to gather what I'd dropped.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded.

"I'm starting my new job here today," I said, straightening.

"Here? My company?" he asked, brow furrowing.

"That's what the offer letter said."

"I wasn't told."

"That's not really my fault, is it?" I said, surprising myself with the boldness of it.

His secretary appeared beside us just then, breaking the tension. "Mr. Mondragon, this is the new hire."

"I heard." He looked at me a moment longer, then gave a curt nod and walked off without another word.

At my desk, I felt every bit of the distance my colleagues kept from me, the whispers following me even as I tried to look busy.

"Did you hear who that is?" one of them whispered, not quietly enough. "The Ashwood girl. From the rival pack."

"Why would Mondragon even hire her?" another murmured back.

Then Derick walked in and everyone rose at once, the room snapping to attention.

"I have an announcement," he said, his eyes finding mine across the room. "Starting today, all photocopying goes through our new employee." He pointed at me. "She'll handle it for the company."

"Can you handle it?" he asked, something sly in his smile.

"Yes. I can do the job," I said, meeting his eyes and refusing to look away first.

"We'll see," he said.

His smile widened before he turned and walked back to his office, leaving me to face the room alone.

Not ten minutes later, an employee dropped a stack of paper at least five centimeters thick onto my desk without a word of explanation.

"Photocopy these," she said, without introducing herself.

I picked up the top sheet. Blank. "There's nothing on these," I said, confused.

"I'm Mia," she said, smiling in a way that told me this wasn't a mistake. "I'd do as I'm told if I wanted to keep this job. Five minutes. Bring the copies to my desk."

I photocopied five hundred blank sheets in under five minutes and dropped them on her desk myself.

"Done," I said. "Anything else?"

She didn't thank me, just snatched them up and started flipping through, hunting for a reason to complain. "These edges aren't even."

"They're photocopies of blank paper, Mia. There's nothing to align," I said, my patience already thinning.

"Watch your tone," she warned.

A second employee arrived minutes later with another stack, dropping it beside the first. "Five copies of each sheet."

"You're kidding," I said, feeling a headache building behind my eyes.

"Is there a problem?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. "Want to file a complaint?"

"No. I'll do it," I said, already reaching for the first page.

I got to work instead. By the time I finished, hours later, she came back and told me to throw all the copies away.

"You're kidding me," I said, staring at the towering stack. "All of this, for nothing?"

"They were never needed. Toss them," she said, already walking away.

I crumpled the sheets into the bin myself and walked out with my jaw tight, refusing to let anyone see me cry until I'd made it outside. Betrayed by my stepsister, rejected by my Alpha, and now this.

"You'll survive this," I told myself under my breath, walking home through streets still slick from the afternoon's rain. "You've survived worse."

I was still telling myself that when I reached my building and found someone waiting on the front steps, arms crossed, watching me approach.

"Leah?" My stomach dropped before I'd even fully placed the face in the dark. "What are you doing here? Nobody in Canada knows where I live. Nobody's supposed to."

"Don't flatter yourself. I didn't come all this way for a reunion," she said, not moving from the step.

"Then why are you here?" I asked, exhaustion making the question sharper than I intended.

"We need to talk. Tomorrow. Not tonight, I'm exhausted, and you look worse than I feel," she said, already turning to head down the street.

"Talk about what, Leah?" I called after her, but she didn't answer.

She just watched me climb the last of the steps toward her, and whatever she'd actually come to say, the look on her face told me I wasn't going to like it.