Chapter 5

Scarlett’s Pov

Tiffany’s apology came out like it physically hurt her to produce.

“I am sorry, Scarlett. I should not have said those things.”

She looked me dead in the eye the entire time she said it, smiling with her mouth while everything else on her face promised we were far from done. I held her gaze just long enough to make it uncomfortable, then turned and walked away without a word. She was not worth the energy and I had actual things to do.

I spent the next hour moving through the gathering with purpose. The Spring Gathering was not just a social event, it was where alliances were quietly formed and favors were exchanged and every powerful Alpha in the region showed their hand whether they meant to or not.

As the future head of Moonlight I needed to know who to trust, who to watch and who to keep at a careful distance. I worked the room with a glass of champagne in my hand, asking questions that sounded casual and filing every answer away carefully.

At some point I became aware that someone was watching me.

I had sharp senses, always had, trained from years of being alone in places where I had nobody to protect me but myself. I turned around quickly but caught only the edge of a dark jacket disappearing into the crowd. I scanned the room for a moment, found nothing obvious, and decided to let it go.

I eventually drifted out to the garden for some air. The fountain was lit up and the noise from inside was a low hum out here. I stood beside it and let myself breathe for a moment.

Then I heard footsteps.

Tiffany came across the garden holding a wine glass, her face arranged into something that was supposed to look like a peace offering. She stopped beside me.

“I really am sorry about earlier,” she said, her voice soft. “I hope you are not still upset.”

I said nothing and kept my eyes on the fountain.

She took one step closer and her voice dropped drastically to something only I could hear, shedding the performance entirely.

“You lowly pathetic little Omega,” she said quietly. “You have been holding onto Killian and humiliating me in front of people who actually matter and I have had enough of it. You should have stayed in your lab where you belong.” Why don’t you just die?

She put both hands on my back and shoved.

Now, Tiffany did not know this about me, because nobody really paid attention to the orphan girl in Silver Moon, but I had spent years in every fighting class available to me, and then extra hours after, because when you grow up with nobody watching your back you learn quickly that your own two hands are the only guarantee you have. My body read her movement before my brain even processed it.

I stepped to the side, grabbed her momentum and redirected it, and Tiffany went straight into the fountain.

The scream she let out could probably be heard from the next pack’s territory.

Killian appeared from nowhere, because of course he did, and pulled her out of the water. Tiffany wrapped herself around him immediately, soaking wet, her mascara running, looking up at him with her bottom lip trembling.

“I only came out here to apologize to her properly,” she said between gasps. “I was trying so hard and she just, she hates me so much Killian, I think it is because of how close you and I are, it is my fault, I am so sorry.”

Killian turned to look at me with genuine hurt on his face, like I had done something to a person who had not just whispered threats in my ear two minutes ago.

“Scarlett, that was cruel.”

“Was it,” I said.

“Tiffany came to make peace with you.”

“So I heard.”

Tiffany sniffled loudly into his shoulder. “Killian, if you do not say something then everyone here will think that Silver Moon’s Luna can just attack pack members without any consequences. That is not fair.”

Killian’s jaw moved. “What do you want me to do?”

Tiffany pulled back and looked up at him. “She pushed me in. She should get pushed in. It is only fair.”

I stared at the two of them. I genuinely could not tell if Killian was going to agree or if this was the moment he would surprise me and develop a single working brain cell.

No, he did not surprise me.

“Tiffany did apologize to you earlier,” he started, his voice doing that thing where it tried to sound reasonable. “And now that things have gone this far, you should probably also….”

Tiffany was already taking a step.

She did not wait for him to finish. She came at me with everything she had, both hands, all her weight behind it, and the force of it caught me off guard just enough that I stumbled backward toward the fountain, my heel caught the stone edge, as I lost my balance.

I was falling.

And then I was not.

An arm came firm around my waist from behind, pulling me back against a chest. It smelled like cinnamon, tobacco and maybe bergamot, the chest felt like it had been built specifically to stop things from falling.

The movement was so clean and so fast that for a second I did not fully understand what had happened.

Then I heard the baritone voice, low and close to my ear.

“Mate.”