บททั้งหมดของ THE ALPHA’S GHOST: บทที่ 21 - บทที่ 30

ETHAN'S POVThe moment Kaye said she would go, something inside me broke open. I refused before I even thought. The word came out raw and sharp.“No. You will not walk into a trap alone.”“It has to be me,” she said. Her voice was steady but her hands were shaking at her sides. “They asked for me. They will kill Carly if anyone else goes.”“I do not care what they want,” I snapped. “They will not touch you. Ever.”The bond twisted between us, pulling, tightening, rising like a storm trapped in both our chests. Every breath hurt. Every word was a wound.Kaye stepped closer, her eyes bright with fear and fury. “If Carly dies, you will break. I feel that through the bond. Do you even understand what that means for me?”“Yes,” I said. “Which is why you are not going.”“You cannot stop this,” she said. “You cannot stop what they already started.”My wolf snarled at her words, but something in me recognized the truth.We argued until voices cracked and throats burned. The bond kept throwing

ETHAN'S POVThe world did not quiet after the attack. It only changed its shape, becoming something sharp and unfamiliar. I moved through the packhouse like I had stepped into another life, one where the halls I had known since childhood no longer welcomed me but watched me with suspicion.Sarah’s betrayal tore through the pack like a fresh wound. She had been with us for four years. She had saved wolves who would have died. She had tended wounds that even my wolf had not trusted others to touch. She had stood beside us during famine and border conflict. She had treated Carly for a broken wrist when she was fifteen. She had smiled at me like she belonged here.Now ten wolves lay injured because she had opened the doors herself. Three of them hovered close to death. Two children were among the wounded. My hands shook every time I thought about it.Carly was still missing.Every instinct in me reached for her and found nothing but empty space.The rogues left no scent. No footprints. No

ETHAN'S POVThe room felt smaller as every piece of truth finally settled into place. It did not settle gently. It crashed through years of trust and loyalty until the air shook with the weight of it. Jon Tulip was not only tied to Kaye’s past and the fires that killed her father. He was tied to Lucas. He was tied to Sarah. He had been tied to both packs long before the world burned. He had walked through the shadows of our histories like someone writing a script long before any of us understood we had been cast in it.Lucas had been my Beta for six years. He had been beside me through every council meeting, every patrol assignment, every decision that shaped territory and peace. He had been near the center of everything. Sarah had placed herself as pack doctor, perfectly positioned to study every wolf, to gather blood and lineage and vulnerability. Carly’s name had been on Jon Tulip’s list. Kaye’s name had been marked as pending. Too many threads pointed to the same place. The timeli

ETHAN'S POVCarly’s eyes had barely finished forming the last terrible words before her entire body went rigid. The silver glow pulsed once, bright as moonlight reflected on metal, then flickered out. Her head dropped back onto the pillow as though something had cut the strings holding her upright.“Carly,” I said, crossing the room in two steps. My voice cracked under the strain.She did not answer. Her breathing went shallow, thin as thread. The monitors beside her bed blipped softly while Dr. Liston rushed forward, checking her pulse, checking her eyes, checking her airway. His hands trembled.“She has fallen unconscious again,” he said. “Her vitals are stable but… her brain waves have shifted. Something has changed inside her.”The helplessness that tore through me had teeth. I tasted blood where I had bitten my cheek. My wolf pressed against my ribs, frantic, searching for a threat he could fight. But there was nothing to fight. Nothing to tear apart. Nothing to kill.Only my sis

ETHAN'S POVI had barely left Carly’s side for ten minutes. Ten minutes to force myself into the hallway, to breathe air that did not taste like fear, to gather my thoughts before they crushed me. The bond tugged at me with Kaye’s unease, sharp enough to draw me toward her.When I turned the corner, I saw her on the floor outside Carly’s room, silver veins burning under her skin. And sitting beside her was someone. Quiet, scarred, soft-spoken. A tracker who avoided crowds. A wolf who never raised his voice. A wolf who rarely looked me in the eye.But now he looked at her with steady confidence, and she looked back at him with the kind of fear that made my wolf rise.“What are you doing,” I demanded, moving down the hall.Theo did not flinch. He stood slowly and faced me. He met my eyes directly, without bowing his head. No wolf of low rank should ever look at an Alpha this way. The air thickened under the weight of it.Kaye got to her feet, startled by the sudden tension humming betwe