Chapter 2

Viktor didn't speak for two full breaths. Then: "Come to the packhouse. We do this in person."

Half an hour later, I sat in the Silvercrest main hall. Viktor across from me, Margaux at his side — fingers on his arm like she'd been born there, wearing a smile she hadn't earned.

Above the fireplace, my mother's portrait. Elena Corsini Voss. She'd painted tiny moonflowers into the border herself — silver petals you could only see if you stood close. I used to press my nose to the frame as a pup and swear I could still smell her.

She never could have imagined this. Her daughter bartering herself away beneath her painted gaze.

"There's nothing to discuss," I said. "You want me sent to the Ashworth Coven — a vampire territory no wolf has entered willingly in three centuries. Fine. Cutting all pack ties is my only condition."

"Watch your tone. You're still sitting in my hall."

"Isn't this exactly what you've been angling for? Ship me south, pocket the ceasefire funds, and Margaux moves into the Luna's quarters by morning."

"Don't you dare—"

"Am I wrong?" I held his gaze — steady, unblinking, refusing to bare my throat. "Then let's talk about Mom."

The fire shrank to blue.

"The night she found out about you and Margaux. The night she drove past the western border alone." Each word slow and placed. "You broke a fated bond, Viktor. The Moon Goddess chose her, and you threw it away. And while she was out there losing control of everything — you were still in Margaux's bed."

His mouth opened. Closed. Nothing.

"Who killed her — your wolf knows. Even if you've spent ten years muzzling it."

When he finally spoke, the authority was gone from his voice. "You want to sever the bond? Fine. As of tonight, you are no longer Silvercrest. No longer mine."

"Deal."

At the door, I stopped. "Don't forget to tell the Ashworth Coven what they're getting. Not the Alpha's daughter. Just a bondless she-wolf with no pack scent."

The door closed behind me. My legs held until the corridor. Then my knees buckled and I pressed my forehead to the cold stone wall, breathing in sharp pulls that tasted like nothing. No pine. No pack. No home.

All this time, I'd wanted to ask Dominic what I really was to him. A mate — or just an unmarked she-wolf he kept underground where no one could see.

But I never dared. After my mother died, he was the only warmth I had left. I was terrified that if I pushed, I'd lose even that last scrap of heat.

Now, to leave him, I was willing to freeze.

Over the next three days, I burned through Viktor's accounts. Two couture gowns. A jewel set. A watch that cost more than most wolves made in a year. The charges screamed toward ten million.

Viktor called on the third night, vibrating with fury. I reminded him six hundred million in ceasefire funds made ten million look like a tip, and hung up.

That evening, old Henrik called from a hidden number. Lyra Engel had moved into the packhouse — into my room. And my mother's moonflower garden had been ripped apart and converted into Lyra's recovery suite.

I drove back.

Every moonflower my mother had grown was torn from the soil and dumped beside the waste bins. The air reeked of bleach. Not a whisper of her scent remained.

Lyra sat in a new recliner, wrapped in cashmere. When she saw me, her face arranged itself into practiced softness. "You must be Sera. It's so lovely to finally meet you."

I didn't look at her. My eyes were on the moonflowers on the ground — petals still holding their faint silver shimmer.

"Who gave you permission to touch my mother's flowers?"

The tears came instantly. The tremble right on cue. "I didn't know… the healers say I need a quiet place—"

"Enough."

Viktor strode in, positioning himself between Lyra and me — shoulders squared, full Alpha posture. He had never once stood between my mother and the things that were killing her.

"I came to see what was left of her." I picked up a broken stem. White petals edged with silver — still reaching for a moon that had already moved on. "Now I know. Nothing."

I tucked the stem into my jacket, close to my ribs. "I won't be back."

Two hours later I stood on a rain-soaked curb with a suitcase and a frozen account. No territory. No pack bond. No den.

The downpour came after dark. One heel snapped clean off. I dragged my case through the streets, cold crawling into the hollow place beneath my ribs where the bond used to live — that faint second heartbeat Dominic had never completed, now throbbing against emptiness.

Then I stopped.

The old stone chapel. I'd been here a month ago. Picking white peonies. Rehearsing it in my head — the aisle, the dress, the look on his face when he saw me. His voice, low and rough the way it only got when he was inside me, saying I do.

Rain hammered my face. I couldn't tell which drops were the sky's.

I sank onto the steps and let it break open. For the moonflowers ripped from the earth. For my mother's garden erased. For the girl who'd stood inside these doors with flowers in her arms, so sure she was loved.

She was dead now.

I don't know how long I stayed. Long enough for the cold to stop feeling like cold and start feeling like the truth.

Then the rain stopped falling on me.

A black umbrella. Dominic on the steps, suit soaked through, holding it angled entirely over my head. Water ran down his jaw, dripping off the sharp line of his chin. He didn't adjust. Didn't move the umbrella an inch toward himself.

He didn't ask why.

"Get in the car."

His voice was ice. The angle of the umbrella was not.

Back at the apartment, I changed into dry clothes and took the hot milk he handed me. The mug burned my palms, but the warmth couldn't reach the place that mattered.

"Do you know Lyra?"

His hand paused mid-reach. "Three years ago, she took a silver bullet for me during a rogue ambush. I owe her my life. That debt isn't settled."

"That's all?" I looked up at him. "Do you know what she is to my family?"

He gave me a look I recognized too well — not anger. A warning. The same look his wolf gave right before it shut a door.

"Sera. Whatever happened between you and your father — don't take it out on Lyra. Her wolf is fragile. She can't handle that kind of pressure."

He knew everything. Every ugly detail. And his first instinct was to shield her.

I took the milk toward the guest room without another word. Passing the hallway shelf, I stopped.

Third shelf. A row of handwritten postcards. Paris, Florence, Barcelona — all in Lyra's careful script, arranged by date, preserved like relics under glass.

Every letter I'd ever written him had been thrown away. "Sera, we can't keep anything that could expose our bond."

I stood there, fingers tightening around the mug until my knuckles went white. My chest hollowed out, piece by piece, like something was being scooped clean with a spoon.

I pulled the ledger from under my pillow.

"He keeps another woman's letters like sacred things, but destroyed every note I ever wrote. −10."

"Balance: 75."