All Chapters of Rejected, Then Wanted by My Triplet Alphas: Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

Neva's POVNews of Rourke's demand traveled faster than I could process it, Cassian's face still ashen when he finally found me hours later, unable to meet my eyes as he repeated his father's exact words. I did not blame him for what Rourke had twisted his defense of me into. I understood, with a clarity that frightened me, exactly how carefully that man had constructed the trap, turning his own son's loyalty into a weapon aimed straight back at me. Cassian had stood there in my doorway with his hands shaking, offering to refuse, to fight the order, to run me clear of Nightpine himself if it came to that, and I had watched something in him break a little further at his own helplessness, the guilt of the party finally compounding into something he could not simply joke his way out of this time.A month. That was all the time remaining before some northern buyer, whoever they truly were, arrived to collect whatever this family had spent nineteen years preparing me to

Neva's POVDorian moved fast the moment the training yard's noise swelled loud enough to cover our footsteps, pulling me through corridors I had cleaned a thousand times without ever once knowing what lay beneath them. My heart hammered with every step, half from the danger and half from the ache of watching Lucian walk into that yard knowing exactly what it would cost him. I had never once, in nine years of scrubbing every corridor in this house, imagined that the walls themselves might be hiding an entire level beneath them, a whole world built into the foundations while I mopped floors above it, entirely unaware of what my own hands had been walking over all along."This way," Dorian murmured, guiding me down a narrow staircase tucked behind a linen closet I had dusted for years without ever questioning where it led. His hand found the small of my back as we descended, steady and warm, and despite the fear pulsing through every part of me, some traitorous corner

Neva's POV"Sit," Vivienne said, gesturing toward the overturned crate I had abandoned moments earlier, as though we were settling in for tea rather than standing in the buried ruins of nineteen years of careful deception. "You look exhausted, Neva, and I imagine you have a great many questions I am finally prepared to answer."I did not sit. Some stubborn, exhausted part of me refused to let her dictate even this small piece of the conversation, whatever composure I could still claim after everything the vault had already stripped from me across the past hour."Answer them standing, then," I said. "I'm not interested in your hospitality."Something almost like amusement crossed her composed features, gone as quickly as it appeared. "Very well." She folded her hands in front of her, unhurried, entirely at ease despite the accusation hanging thick in the cold air between us. "Ask your questions. I will not lie to you further. There is little point

Neva's POVDorian's words hit me through the mind link like a physical blow, urgent and fading fast, the connection already growing thin around the edges of his consciousness. Go now. I did not wait to process my own fear, did not allow myself even a moment to grieve the sight of him broken in that training yard. There would be time for grief later, I told myself, if there was any time left at all after tonight, and I forced my legs to move faster than fear alone could have carried them. I ran instead, straight to the kitchen, the only place in this house where I still knew every hidden corner well enough to move faster than anyone chasing me.Marlow met me there, already waiting, her face pale but resolute, and I understood instantly that word had somehow reached her before I even arrived. I did not ask how. Some things in this house, I was learning, moved faster and quieter than any spoken message, carried on instinct and loyalty rather than words."The

Neva's POVI did not wait to see whether the vehicle belonged to friend or enemy. Nine years of survival instinct took over before conscious thought could catch up, and I dove sideways off the road into the shallow ditch running alongside it, scrambling into a concrete culvert half buried beneath overgrown brush and years of accumulated debris. The stone was freezing against my back, damp and uneven, and I curled myself as small as possible around the bag clutched to my chest, willing my own heartbeat to quiet enough that it would not somehow betray me to whoever was searching the road above.I pressed myself flat against the cold stone, my whole body trembling, and watched through a narrow gap as headlights swept across the road above me, slowing, searching, clearly hunting for exactly the kind of fugitive I had become in the space of a single terrible night.Voices carried faintly on the cold air, warriors calling to each other in the clipped, efficient