Chapter 10
Elena's POV
I'd read about this, heard whispers from other wolves who'd been forced into arranged matings. When you tried to bond with someone who wasn't your true mate, your wolf fought back. Rejected the connection. And if you pushed too hard, if you tried to force something that your instincts knew was wrong, the rebellion could manifest physically.
Nausea rolled through me. I barely made it to the bathroom before I was sick, my body rejecting everything inside it as if trying to purge itself of the wrongness.
When there was nothing left, I slid down to sit on the cold tile floor, my forehead resting against my knees.
I couldn't do this. Couldn't marry Damon, couldn't complete a bond with someone my wolf didn't recognize. But I also couldn't not do it—my family's survival depended on that alliance, on maintaining the Vance protection.
Trapped. I was completely trapped, caught between my body's instinctive rejection and my family's desperate need.
The hours crept by. I didn't sleep, just lay in bed staring at the ceiling while my body continued its quiet rebellion. Every so often, another wave of pain would hit, stealing my breath and making me curl into a protective ball until it passed.
Around one in the morning, I got up and went to the window. The snow had started falling again, gentle flakes drifting down to cover the dead gardens below. I pressed my forehead against the cold glass and watched them accumulate.
Movement caught my eye. A figure standing at the edge of our property line, just barely visible in the darkness. Tall, broad-shouldered, utterly still despite the falling snow.
My heart jumped. For one wild moment, I thought—
I came out to the balcony, wanting to see the figure more clearly, but the moment I stepped outside it was gone. Maybe it had never been there at all. Maybe exhaustion and pain were making me see things that weren't real.
I returned to bed and pulled the blankets over my head, trying to block out the world.
Tomorrow would come anyway. It always did.
---
Dawn arrived gray and cold, the sun barely managing to penetrate the cloud cover. I dragged myself out of bed feeling worse than I had the night before—my whole body ached like I'd been beaten, and my head pounded with each heartbeat.
But I had class. Had responsibilities. Had to maintain the illusion that everything was fine.
I showered quickly, dressed in layers against the cold, and forced myself to eat a protein bar that tasted like cardboard. By six-thirty, I was heading down the stairs with my backpack, planning to catch an early shuttle to campus and lose myself in the library until my first class.
My father's voice stopped me halfway to the door.
"Elena. My study. Now."
I turned slowly. He stood in the doorway of his office, looking haggard but sober, his expression grim. This wasn't a request.
My mother appeared at the top of the stairs, wrapped in a silk robe, her eyes still swollen from crying. She met my gaze briefly, then looked away. No help there.
I followed my father into his study, my stomach knotting with dread.
My father walked to his desk and stood with his back to me, staring at something I couldn't see.
"Sit down," he said quietly.
I perched on the edge of the leather chair facing his desk, my hands clasped in my lap to hide their trembling.
When he finally turned to face me, I saw something in his expression that was almost worse than last night's cruelty. Defeat. Complete and utter defeat.
"I owe you an apology," he said. "For what I said last night. It was unforgivable."
I didn't respond. Couldn't trust my voice not to break.
"But I need you to understand something." He moved to the desk, opened a drawer, and pulled out a thick file bound with red ribbon. "This is our future. Or what's left of it."
He untied the ribbon and spread the contents across the desk. Medical reports. Financial statements. Territory protection agreements stamped with the Vance seal.
"My wolf is dying," he said flatly. "Every shift hurts more than the last. The pack doctor says I have a year, maybe eighteen months, before I lose the ability to transform completely."
My breath caught. Losing your wolf wasn't like losing a pet or a friend. It was losing half of yourself, the part that connected you to your pack, your ancestors, your very identity. For an Alpha, it was effectively a death sentence.
"Without an Alpha, we lose our territory protection," he continued, his voice mechanical, like he was reading from a script. "The Vance pack has guaranteed our borders for three generations, but that agreement is contingent on pack leadership. Once I can no longer shift, we're considered a failed line. Our lands get absorbed, our assets seized, our people scattered to other packs as low-ranked refugees."
He looked at me then, and I saw the fear beneath the bitterness. Raw, animal fear of losing everything.
"You're our only hope," he said. "If you marry into the Vance family, if you complete the blood pact, they'll be obligated to support us. To maintain our territory, protect our interests. Your position as Damon's mate would guarantee it."
"What if he doesn't want to marry me?" The question came out smaller than I'd intended.
My father's jaw tightened. "Then you make him want to. You're Moon Silver line, Elena, even if you can't shift yet. Your presence calms aggressive Alphas. Use that. Make yourself indispensable to him."
"I can't force someone to—"
"You can try a hell of a lot harder than you've been doing!"
My stomach turned. "How am I supposed to do that?"
He leaned forward, bracing his hands on the desk. "Spend more time with him. Let him mark you, if that's what it takes. Get pregnant, for all I care. Just secure the bond before spring equinox. That's when we need the business engagement, or the protection agreement expires."
The room spun. He was telling me to—what? Seduce Damon? Trap him into marriage?
"I know this is hard," my father said, mistaking my horror for reluctance. "I know you're young, that you wanted choices. But we don't have the luxury of choices anymore, Elena. We have survival. And sometimes survival requires sacrifice."
He straightened, his expression hardening into something I barely recognized.
"You're twenty-one years old. In another year, you'll be past the normal age for first shift. If you can't transform by then, you'll be classified as deficient. Unmatable. Worthless to any pack."
Each word landed like a blow.
"Alex would have been perfect," my father continued, and there was something almost dreamy in his voice now, like he was talking about a fantasy instead of a dead child. "Strong, capable, a natural Alpha. He would have carried this family into the future. But he's gone. You're what we have instead."
He walked around the desk and stood in front of me, looking down at me with eyes that held no warmth at all.
"So you need to prove you're worth the space you're taking up. Worth the resources we've spent raising you. Worth surviving when he didn't."
I stood on shaking legs. "I should go. I have class—"
"Spring equinox," he said again. "That's three months. Get it done, Elena. Or we lose everything."
I walked out of his study on numb feet, his words following me like ghosts.