Chapter 21 LUCIAN
LUCIAN’S POV
The council hall smelled of old wood, ink, and too many wolves.
I stood at the head of the long oak table, staring through the tall windows instead of at the men gathering below. Their voices blended distant and muffled because all I could hear was her.
Aria.
The way her breath had hitched when I kissed her. The sound, a soft, broken moan had carved itself into my skull and refused to leave. I’d gone into that kiss intending to be controlled, restrained, just to taste her once… but she’d kissed me first. Brave. Sweet. Unintentional maybe, but it had undone me.
“You’re distracted,” Varos murmured in the back of my mind, his deep voice edged with amusement.
“You noticed,” I muttered back.
“Hard not to. You’ve been replaying it since we arrived.”
I clenched my jaw. “Enough.” I was barely keeping control.
“You should claim her,” the wolf said simply. “She already feels like ours.”
A chair scraped. Orion cleared his throat. The sound dragged me back to the present, the room full of watchful eyes and veiled hostility.
“Alpha Lucian,” someone said, I couldn’t even tell who.
“Yes,” I replied too quickly.
Orion’s brow lifted slightly, a knowing look flickering across his scarred face.
I took my seat, straightened my cuffs, and tried to look every bit the unshakable Alpha they expected. But inside, I was still reeling from a kiss that had tasted like surrender and home all at once.
Darius sat on my right, silent but observant as always. Malrik sat across the table, arms folded, jaw set, that perpetual sneer that said he didn’t think much of me.
“Shall we begin?” Orion asked.
The meeting droned on, talk of border patrols, rogue sightings, trade negotiations with Crescent Moon. My lips moved when they expected answers, my hand scrawled notes out of habit, but my mind… my mind was tracing the memory of her mouth under mine. The way her hands had trembled, how she’d gasped into the kiss before melting completely, trusting me even when she shouldn’t.
“Lucian.”
Nothing.
“Alpha.”
Still nothing.
“LUCIAN!”
The sound of my name cut through my haze. I blinked, realizing everyone was staring at me. Orion, Darius, and of course Malrik, who wore that smirk that always made my wolf’s hackles rise.
Darius raised a brow, tapping his fingers on the table. “You with us, Alpha?”
“I’m here,” I said evenly, forcing my tone into something close to authority.
Malrik leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. “Forgive me, Alpha, I thought perhaps you had better things to do than sit through the business of your pack.” The mockery in his voice was thinly veiled.
My wolf growled inside me, low and warning. I met Malrik’s gaze head-on. “If I ever have better things to do than serve my pack, Malrik, you’ll be the first to know because I’ll personally hand you my resignation.”
The smirk faltered, replaced by a flicker of discomfort. Around the table, the elders quieted.
Orion cleared his throat. “If we could return to the matter at hand,” he said carefully.
The rest of the meeting dragged on discussions of border patrols, resource management, and the rumors of unrest among the younger wolves. But the undercurrent was clear: they doubted me. They whispered that I’d abandoned them once, that my return was temporary, that I’d grown soft.
When one of the elders finally voiced it, “We need assurance that this pack won’t be left leaderless again” I stood.
“You want assurance?” I said, voice low but sharp. “Then hear it from me. I’m not leaving again. This pack is my home, my responsibility, and my priority. I’ve made mistakes, but I’ll die before I make that one again. Anyone who doubts that can step forward now.”
Silence.
Good.
I exhaled slowly and looked around the table. “There’s one more matter. Leadership structure.”
Malrik straightened.
“Darius will serve as my beta,” I said simply. “Effective immediately. All reports, including those concerning your former pack, will go through him. He’ll report directly to me.”
For a moment, I thought Malrik might protest. His jaw worked, his hands clenched, but he didn’t speak. He just nodded stiffly.
“Understood,” he said, though the tension in his voice was unmistakable.
“Good,” I said, dismissing him with a nod.
The meeting continued, but my thoughts drifted again back to the warmth of Aria’s skin beneath my palms, the faint hum of her heartbeat when I held her. My wolf was practically vibrating with the memory.
By the time the meeting ended, everyone else had filtered out except Darius.
He grinned as he leaned against the table. “You were gone for a good five minutes there. Let me guess, your mind wasn’t on supply routes.”
I gave him a flat look. “Drop it.”
“Can’t,” he said with a laugh. “You’ve got that look, the one where your wolf is still somewhere else entirely. I’d bet my last coin she’s the reason.”
I tried to ignore the way my chest tightened at just the mention of her. “Maybe.”
Darius folded his arms, amused. “You know, I’ve never seen you like this. You used to walk out of meetings thinking about strategies, not women.”
“She’s not just some woman,” I said before I could stop myself.
He smiled knowingly. “Didn’t think so.”
For a while, silence filled the room, comfortable and grounding. Then he straightened, more serious now. “Are you sure about this? About making me your beta?”
“Completely,” I said without hesitation. “You’re the only one I trust with my life, Darius. I can’t say the same for Malrik.”
He nodded, the weight of my words settling between us. “Then I’ll do what I can. And I’ll keep an eye on him. Something about that guy rubs me the wrong way.”
“Good,” I said. “If he even breathes wrong, I want to know.”
We spoke for a while longer about pack logistics, patrol rotations, and minor council disputes, but my mind kept drifting, to the woman waiting for me back at the pack house. The woman whose scent clung to me like sunlight.
When Darius finally left, I stayed behind, staring at the quiet council chamber.
Varos hummed contently. “You’re thinking about her again.”
I didn’t bother denying it. “Yeah.”
“Then go to her,” he murmured. “You’ve both waited long enough.”
And I didn’t argue.