All Chapters of Once Lost, Twice Found: Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

Mara’s POVI woke up angry, and the anger didn’t burn out after breakfast. It sat under my skin, too sharp to ignore.Ann’s words kept replaying in my head: “Find a better hobby.”The look she’d given me before she walked away stung more than it should have. I hated it. I hated the idea that Jack might be proud of her for it. That thought pushed me out of Blackwood before the sun had fully warmed the courtyard.I told myself I was doing my duty.Gamma’s work wasn’t supposed to be personal: investigate, protect the pack, keep trouble from the Alpha’s door. Ann had arrived from nowhere, refused to explain herself, and somehow ended up living in the Alpha residence.That deserved scrutiny. Jack had warned me not to dig into her past for personal reasons. Fine. This wasn’t personal, and I knew that he should have known better than to say that when he knew the reality of how personal this was.The neutral town between three territories was the kind of place where rumors gathered like dust

Ann’s POVTristan found me near the eastern garden just before dinner. I had been walking alone, moving slowly with one hand resting beneath the curve of my stomach while the evening air moved softly through the trees. The babies had been active all afternoon; every small movement distracted me, and every kick made me stop and smile as if it were the first time I had felt them. For a few minutes I actually managed to forget everything else.Then I saw Tristan standing ahead of me. He was not smiling, and something tightened inside me the moment I reached him.“Ann,” he said.I slowed my pace. “Tristan,” I answered.He waited until I stood beside him, then his eyes swept the garden to make sure no one was close enough to overhear. That careful look

Ann’s POVJack was gone for less than ten minutes. He returned carrying a tray crowded with enough food for three people and set it on the low table beside the sofa.“What is all that?” I asked.“Dinner.” He began arranging bread, roasted vegetables, chicken, fruit, and two bowls of soup. “For you and me. After the argument, I figured that we could use the peace of eating together, you know?”I stared at the spread. “Are you expecting Tristan?”“No.”“Then this is too much.”“Careful. That almost sounded like a complaint.” Jack’s mouth twitched. “And since I’m guessing you skipped lunch, you and the pups need the nutrition, so eat.”“I’m not complaining.”“Good.” He sat as if the last hour had not included an argument about trust, an investigation into my past, and the awful thing I had said about dying for him. Somehow, despite all of it, he had still remembered dinner.A few weeks ago, I would have wondered whether I was allowed to eat in his office or whether taking a second piece

Mara’s POVTristan fell asleep before I did. That should have made leaving easier, but it didn’t. I lay beside him in the dark, staring at the ceiling as his breathing deepened and the room grew still around us. For hours, I kept telling myself I was still going. The kiss had changed nothing. Staying for one night because Tristan asked me to did not mean I had forgotten why I packed my bag in the first place.I needed answers, not guesses. I did not need Jack’s blind faith or another warning from Tristan that I would destroy everything if I kept digging. Logan Fisher was looking for a woman who was young, small, brown haired, and frightened. Someone had vanished from Silverstone around the same time Ann turned up in Jack’s vehicle. Maybe it was not her. But if it was, I needed to know why Silverstone’s Beta was searching for her. I had to find out before Jack grew so attached to Ann that nothing I uncovered would matter.Moonlight spilled across Tristan’s face. He looked different when

Ann’s POVI knew something was wrong before Jack even opened his mouth. He walked into the sitting room with his shoulders tight and his jaw clenched hard enough for me to see the muscle jump beneath his skin. I had been sitting by the window, a cup of tea cooling between my hands as I watched the late morning light spill across the gardens. The second I saw him, I stopped mid-sip, my tea instantly forgotten.“Jack?” I asked.For a second the anger in his face softened, only slightly. “Mara left,” he said.I blinked. “What?”“She left Blackwood sometime after midnight.” I stared at him, sure I had heard him wrong. “Left?”“We don’t know yet whether she left the pack or went somewhere else,” he said. I frowned. That made even less sense. Mara had spent weeks acting like Blackwood belonged to her more than anyone else. She never let anyone forget that she was Gamma, that she had earned her place, and that I was the outsider. And now she had just walked away?“When?” I ventured.“Just af