Chapter 12
At first, my driver, Chad didn’t react. I think he couldn’t. The moment the vase shattered against the doorframe-missing me by inches-he stiffened like something primal had just been triggered in him. But the second he realized I wasn’t hurt, he exhaled sharply and rushed toward me, his eyes glowing faintly gold.
A side effect of being around too many alphas, maybe. Or maybe… something else.
This man wasn’t even a shifter-not officially. But the time he spent with Riven and the others must have rubbed off on him. Chad had always been fiercely loyal, but tonight… he looked like a sentinel ready to bare teeth and rip throats.
That vase wasn’t thrown by an enemy. It was my mother.
If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I would’ve said she’d never dare. But there was no mistaking the hatred in her gaze as I stepped onto the threshold of my childhood home-a home that had never really been mine.
Even though I’d been startled, I wasn’t surprised.
I’ve always known my parents didn’t love me. Not the way parents are supposed to. I just didn’t expect them to show their true colors so openly… the moment I walked through the door. “Don’t,” I told Chad quietly, lifting my hand to stop him when he tried to follow. “I’ll go in myself.
Wait here.”
His jaw clenched, but he nodded. I could hear his heart beating harder. Smelled the faint tang of adrenaline in the air. Even without being a wolf, Chad’s instincts were screaming that something
was wrong.
He wasn’t wrong.
I stepped carefully over the shattered porcelain scattered across the marble floor and moved into the lion’s den-the living room.
There they sat, like royalty on a pair of thrones they never earned. My father, Alpha Robert Moonveil, old, but still feared-and Myra, his eternally disappointed Luna. Flanking them like perfect little ornaments were Lexie and… him.
Darius, Alpha of the Nightbane Pack.
Even in the dim lighting, I felt his gaze like a burn. He hadn’t stopped staring since I walked in. And sweet, perfect Lexie noticed. Oh, she noticed.
Her fists clenched against her silk dress, and her lips twisted into something that might have been a sneer-or maybe it was a smile. With her, you never could tell. She was both a wolf and a snake. Pretty. Deadly. And venomous.
stood straight, keeping my tone even. “Dad. Mom.”
Robert’s face darkened instantly, and the air vibrated with tension, like the shift of energy before a dominant wolf lashes out. “You still have the nerve to call me Dad?”
He pushed himself up halfway from his seat, veins bulging along his temple. “You’ve brought nothing but shame to this bloodline! Darius already told us-you were gone. Off the radar. Where the hell did you disappear to, huh?”
Chapter 12
372 22.08
9:01 pm D DGM.
His voice rose with every word, and I could feel the heat of his fury wrapping around me like a
noose.
“You’re a married woman, Avelyn. A Luna, no less! But you… you run off and return days later bringing bodyguards like you’re staging a coup. What do you think this is?”
I didn’t flinch.
He always yelled like this. Raising his voice made him more right. Like volume equaled authority. As if his title gave him the right to decide what kind of life I was allowed to live. Lexie stepped in with a sickeningly sweet voice, her hands fluttering to his arm. “Dad, don’t be upset. Avelyn has always been like this. You should be used to it by now.”
My fists curled at my sides.
There she was-Lexie, the golden fake child. Always the peacekeeper. Always the smiling liar. Playing innocent while feeding the fire behind the scenes. She used to bite me under the table and smile when no one noticed. That hadn’t changed.
Outside the room, I felt the shift in Chad’s energy. His patience broke.
He pushed the door wide open and walked in, his footsteps heavy with restrained rage. He didn’t snarl, didn’t growl-but his presence felt like a growl should have sounded.
“Sir, Ma’am,” Chad said firmly, with a voice deeper than usual. “Those men outside-they’re not here to intimidate. They’re carrying gifts. Gifts from Ma’am Avelyn. For you. Because she still shows respect where none has ever been returned.”
That silenced the room.
Alpha Robert’s mouth opened, then shut again. The fire in his eyes faltered for a moment. Luna Myra blinked.
“And who the hell are you?” Robert spat finally, narrowing his eyes.
Before Chad could answer, Lexie pounced on the opportunity like a wolf in heat.
“Oh, this is who you’ve been running around with while you were gone?” she said in a falsely concerned voice. “Avelyn, I don’t want to meddle, but Alpha Darius is your husband. Do you really think it’s appropriate-?”
“Ma’am,” Chad interrupted, more respectfully than she deserved, “I’m just a driver.”
But Lexie’s lips curled into a cruel grin. “A driver? Really? Wow. Avelyn, you must really be starving for attention if this is what passes for a company now.”
She turned to our parents. “Look at him! He’s as old as Dad. If she wanted a man, she could’ve at least picked one who didn’t look like our uncle.”
I should’ve expected it. The insults. The disrespect. The games.
But what I didn’t expect was Darius’s silence.
He just sat there.
Watching me.
Judging me.
His wolf might not be speaking, but his mind had already passed its verdict. The look in his eyes said it all: You cheated. I know you did.
213 22.09
9:01 pm D
It didn’t matter that I hadn’t. It didn’t matter that no one had even asked where I’d been, or why I’d vanished. It didn’t matter that I’d returned tonight to make peace.
They had all decided I was guilty.
So I stood tall, not because I felt brave-but because I’d already broken inside.
“Tell me something, Dad,” I said calmly, ignoring the slight tremble in my chest. “Why did you ever acknowledge me as your daughter, if you’ve always hated me this much?”
The silence that followed was cold. Hollow. Brutal.
Because he had no answer.
Because he never really did see me as one of them-not completely. Not since the night I first shifted, and my wolf didn’t resemble his line at all. Not since the seer whispered that I carried old blood. An ancient lineage. A power that came from somewhere far older than our pack.
I’d been a threat since the moment I took my first breath.
But now?
Now I was done begging to belong.
