Chapter 43 Brother’s Fire
Kier's POV
When the boardroom emptied, the storm inside me didn’t ease.
The glass walls still hummed with her voice, her scent clung to the polished table like smoke. Sable had spoken to me like no one in this city ever dared. No rival, no partner, no human executive had that audacity. Only her. Only ever her.
And goddess help me, I loved every second of it.
She was different now—sharper, harder, five years of distance forging her like steel. She’d walked into my boardroom and met my Alpha presence with her own brand of defiance. She hadn’t just resisted the mate bond between us; she’d learned how to wield it like a blade.
But the bond still thrummed under her skin and mine, relentless, undeniable. She could lie with her words, with her stance, with her carefully polished human life—but her scent never lied. She wanted me. Just as much as I wanted her.
The difference was, she thought she could choose otherwise.
And I had to prove her wrong.
Back in my office I loosened my tie, pacing behind my desk. The hum of the city drifted in through the windows—traffic below, steel cranes creaking as they swung loads across the skyline. My mind replayed the way Sable’s eyes had met mine when she challenged me. There had been no tremor in her voice, no flicker of doubt.
My phone buzzed it with a message.
Liora: Why wasn’t I aware of a follow up meeting with Everbright?
I ignored her message. She hadn’t been at the meeting today for a reason. After the last meeting it was clear her presence annoyed Sable and I did not want anything or anyone ruining my chances with Sable.
Liora was becoming a problem.
Liora was capable, cunning, useful—but she was also forward, and her advances in my office had been a mistake I would not allow to repeat. Not when. Am trying to win Sable back. Not when the mate bond between us was already coiled so tight.
So, Liora will be excluded from all things Everbright. I will explain to her later.
I was still replaying the meeting, trying to steady my own pulse, when the office door opened.
Jaxon stepped inside, closing it with a snap that carried all the weight of his Beta blood.
“You didn’t tell me,” he said flatly.
I leaned back in my chair, masking the growl that threatened to rise. “Tell you what?”
He crossed the room in three strides, planting his hands on my desk. His hazel eyes—so like Sable’s, but harder now—burned into mine. “That she was here. That she was alive and sitting in your boardroom.”
My jaw tightened. “I didn’t think you needed to know until she was ready to tell you.”
He laughed, sharp and humorless. “Until she was ready? She’s my sister. You don’t get to decide if I’m allowed to see her.”
The wolf in me bristled at his challenge, but I kept my tone even, controlled. “I didn’t. She found you.”
“That’s not the point,” he snapped. He paced once, then spun back to me. “Why did you hide this? Why keep me in the dark?”
“Because she’s mine!”
The words came out before I could stop them, harsher than I intended.
Silence fell, heavy and dangerous. Jaxon’s jaw flexed, his nostrils flaring. For a heartbeat, I thought he might come across the desk.
Then he straightened, his voice colder than before. “There may be a mate bond between you two but she is my fucking sister. Last time I checked she ran away from you.” He jabbed a finger at me. “You think this is just about you. It’s bigger than that. The pack has been holding itself together by threads since she left. Was this all just to get her back?”
I stood then, the Alpha in me rising to meet his challenge. I wouldn’t let him tower over me. “The pack doesn’t need us standing still in the woods while the world around us evolves. It needs us here. Building something stronger. This isn’t about her—it’s about the future of our people.”
Jaxon’s eyes narrowed. “You mean your future.”
“Our future,” I corrected, voice low and dangerous. “You think I wanted to leave the pack. I came because I had to. Because without this, we would’ve crumbled.”
His stare didn’t waver. “Or because you couldn’t stand the sight of a pack missing its Luna.”
The words landed like claws across my chest. My fists clenched, my wolf snarling inside me. He wasn’t wrong. But he wasn’t right either.
“If that was the case I would have chased after her years ago and dragged her back.” I stepped closer, closing the space between us, our gazes locked—Alpha and Beta clashing in a silent snarl. “I built this because if I didn’t, none of us would have survived. You included.”
Jaxon’s nostrils flared, his pulse hammering beneath his collar. “And in the meantime, she was out there alone,” he said, his voice low now, like a knife instead of a roar. “Did that ever matter to you?”
“It mattered every damn day,” I snapped. “I don’t expect you to understand what it’s like until you find your mate. To feel every emotion, even the hard ones knowing there is nothing you can do. To feel the mate bond pulse, the only instinct you have is to close the distance between yourself and your other half.”
“I was there I remember how it made you.”
Jaxon’s expression shifted, some of the fury draining into something like grief. “I was there I remember how it made you.” He shook his head. “She’s here now,” he said quietly. “And I’m not going to let you scare her away.”
My pulse thudded, the bond surging alive at the thought. “I’ve been waiting five years for her,” I said, each word slow, deliberate. “I don’t plan on letting her go anywhere.”
He left without another word, the door slamming shut behind him.
I stood alone, staring at the skyline beyond the glass, my reflection a shadow over the city I’d built.
He was right part of me did build this for Sable. I wanted her to return to something more than what she was running from.
And now she was here.
And she still wanted to run.
The wolf in me growled low, a sound that vibrated in my chest, echoing against the glass walls. She thought she could slip through my fingers again. She thought five years and a city of strangers could keep her from what she was.
Not this time.
I turned back to my desk, palms flat on the polished surface, the faint imprint of her scent still clinging to my skin. Outside, the city lights burned like embers. Inside, the fire I’d been stoking for years roared to life.
This wasn’t just about Ironclad anymore. It wasn’t even about the pack.
It was about her.
And I’d built this empire to make sure when she came back, she’d have no reason to leave.
But as the night settled and the office went quiet, a thought whispered through the noise.
What if it wasn’t enough?