Chapter 110 Sacrificial wolf

Chapter 110 Sacrificial wolf
NATE

I watched the crisp white hem of Iris’s jacket vanish around the corner of the alley, slipping back toward the sunlight and the suffocating masquerade of the grandstands.

I waited a beat, letting out a jagged breath, and turned on my heel to leave.

"Wait."

Celeste’s voice sliced through the damp alley air. She hadn't moved from the shadow of the wooden pallets, her unlit cigarette balanced between two fingers.

I stopped, glancing back over my shoulder. "What?"

"There’s something else," she said quietly, her single eye fixed on me with a heavy, unblinking intensity.

"What is it, Celeste? We don't have time for riddles."

"The spell," she began, stepping closer. Her boots crunched over broken glass. "It won’t actually require the blood of a slaughtered goat. But the shroud is dark, ancient magic. It demands a different caliber of sacrifice to seal the thread."

A cold knot tightened in my gut. "What kind of sacrifice?"

"A man," she answered flatly. "And a wolf. Or rather..."

The air in my lungs turned to ice. "A werewolf."

Celeste offered a thin, mirthless smirk, though her eye remained completely cold. "The good news is, I’m already drawing up plans to help you boys put that big bad wolf six feet under anyway, aren't I?"

I stared at her, the brutal reality settling into my chest like lead. "Are you... are you planning to use my father as the sacrificial lamb for your spell?"

"It’s the absolute least that bastard can do, don't you think?" Celeste whispered, her jaw tightening with raw venom. "Die, so Ava's daughter gets to live. It’s poetic justice after he turned her entire existence into a waking hell."

She wasn't wrong. A sick part of me felt a savage thrill at the symmetry of it. Ernest had bled everyone around him for decades; having his throat cut to anchor the shield protecting Iris was almost too good for him.

"Did you figure it out a way to kill him that doesn't end with Damon, Cole, and me getting executed by the High Council for patricide?" I asked, keeping my voice low.

"I’m working on the logistics," Celeste muttered, tucking the cigarette behind her ear. "The magic will mask a lot, but the politics are on you. Still... I don't like keeping this from Iris. She has a right to know the full cost."

"No," I said instantly, my tone leaving zero room for debate. "We don't tell her. We can't risk her backing out."

Celeste arched a scarred brow. "Do you honestly think she would back out? To save Ernest?"

"I think Iris is fundamentally a good person," I said, the words aching as they left my mouth. "She’s gentle. She’s sweet, she’s caring, and despite twelve years of being dragged through the dirt by all of us, she hasn't completely lost her soul. She wants him dead—I know she does. But I don't think she has it in her to participate in a cold-blooded, calculated assassination. The guilt alone could crush her. We want to spare her of it."

Celeste studied me for a long, quiet moment before letting out a rough sigh.

"Fine," she relented. "We keep it between us for now. Just take care of her in the meantime, Nathaniel. Do whatever the hell you have to do to keep your father’s hands off her."

"I'll try, I promise," I said, and walked out into the light.

The rest of the derby was an agonizing blur of polite applause, empty small talk, and Jessica digging her nails into my arm whenever the cameras swung our way. By the time the final bugle sounded, my head was throbbing with a brutal, localized migraine.
The Crawford town car was waiting at the private gates. The ride back to the estate was dead silent, the heavy privacy partition raised between us and the chauffeur. Iris stared out her window, her jaw set, while I leaned my head back against the leather, keeping my distance.
When the car finally pulled up the gravel drive of the manor, the front doors opened before the engine had even cut. A uniformed housemaid stood waiting at the foot of the stone steps.

"Master Nate," she said, dipping her head the moment my boots hit the gravel. "Your father requests your presence in his study immediately."

I glanced at Iris.

A profound, breathless wave of relief washed over her features. The tension drained from her shoulders, her dark eyes flashing with gratitude as she realized she had been spared another private audience with the monster. She didn't say a word—she just gathered the hem of her Chanel skirt, slipped past the maid, and disappeared up the sweeping staircase toward the safety of her room.

I adjusted the cuffs of my dress shirt, straightened my jacket, and walked down the dim corridor toward the study.

I didn't knock. I pushed the heavy oak door open and stepped inside.

The room was thick with the rich scent of expensive cigar smoke and aged bourbon. But Ernest wasn't alone. Sitting in the leather armchairs around the unlit hearth were four older men—senior council elders and high-ranking pack enforcers, men who controlled the territorial borders and the pack’s private banking vaults.

The moment the heavy door swung open, Ernest rose from behind his massive desk.

A radiant, triumphant grin broke across his face, his slate-gray eyes gleaming with terrifying, absolute pride. He extended a broad, welcoming arm toward me, commanding the attention of every elder in the room.

"Ah, there he is, gentlemen," Ernest announced, his voice deep, booming, and filled with unquestioned authority. "My son, Nathaniel. The future Alpha of the Bloodmoon Pack."

The words struck me like a physical blow, freezing the blood in my veins.

The future Alpha.

Not an heir among brothers. Not one of the Crawford triplets preparing to share the burden of the lineage.
He had used the singular.

In front of the most powerful wolves in the state, Ernest had just stripped Damon and Cole of their birthright.