Chapter 59
Rhianna didn’t know what time it was when Hardin and tia left the house.
The sky outside had already darkened, and the lights in Hardin’s small living room cast a warm glow, but it didn’t match the cold feeling inside her chest.
He’d only stepped out for a short moment.
“Lock the door behind me,” he had said.
“I’ll be back fast.”
"we'll be back soon, take care" Tia said
She nodded, though her hands trembled.
Now the house felt too quiet.
Too still.
She tried to distract herself by cleaning the little table, folding a blanket, and opening a window to get fresh air, but nothing eased the heavy pressure in her chest.
Her mind kept replaying the ceremony.
Brittany’s white dress.
Sebastian’s blank face.
The way nobody even noticed she was there.
I’m not even dead yet… and they replaced me.
She swallowed hard and wiped another tear away before it could fall.
She was walking toward the kitchen to drink water when she suddenly froze.
A soft sound came from the back door.
Not loud.
Just… wrong.
Rhianna held her breath.
Another sound.
A footstep.
Slow. Deliberate.
She stepped back, heart thudding wildly.
“Hardin…?” she whispered.
No answer.
Her throat tightened. She reached for her phone—
A shadow moved.
Before she could scream, a hand shot out of the darkness and grabbed her arm.
Rhianna gasped, stumbling backward.
“Don’t fight,” a harsh voice snapped.
But she did. She swung her elbow, kicked, twisted—anything she could do even with her weak body. Her heart raced so fast it felt like it would burst. Another man stepped out from the hallway, wearing a black mask.
“Grab her!”
“No—NO! LET GO!” she screamed.
A hand clamped over her mouth.
Her vision blurred from fear, the edges going white.
“Don’t hurt her inside the house,” one of them hissed. “Outside. Fast.”
Hearing that made her panic explode. She bit the man’s hand, hard enough to taste blood. He cursed, loosening his grip for one second—
And Rhianna ran.
She didn’t think.
She didn’t breathe.
She just ran.
Barefoot, heart pounding, tears blurring her eyes, she sprinted through the back door into the dark woods. Branches snapped under her feet. The cold night air slapped her face.
She heard them behind her.
“GO AFTER HER!”
“DON’T LET HER GET AWAY!”
She pushed harder, lungs burning. Her wolf was too weak to help her, but adrenaline carried her forward. She ducked under branches, stumbled over roots, and kept going even when her legs shook violently.
A sharp rock sliced her foot open. She hissed but didn’t stop.
Her breath came out broken.
Her vision swam.
She could hear them—
closer now, growling, cursing.
“She’s slowing down—GET HER!”
“No—please—” she whispered, voice cracking.
She turned sharply, slipping behind a fallen tree, but the world spun. Her chest felt too tight to breathe. Her feet bled in the dirt.
One of them spotted her.
“There!”
She ran again, but her body was too weak. Every step felt heavier than the last. Her footing slipped as she reached the riverbank, the water roaring loudly from recent rains. The river was wild tonight, the current black and deadly.
She stumbled backward in fear.
The men approached slowly, blocking both sides.
“End it here,” one said coldly.
“Throw her in. The river will finish it.”
Rhianna’s heart dropped so far she thought it would disappear.
“No… please… don’t…”
Her voice was barely a breath.
One of them lunged for her arm.
She jerked away, but her foot hit the edge of a slick rock. She slipped, arms flailing. She tried to catch herself, but pain shot through her skull as a branch struck her temple.
Her world flashed white.
Then—
She fell.
Straight into the freezing river.
The shock stole her breath instantly. Water filled her mouth, her nose, her lungs. She kicked upward, desperate, terrified, but the current was too strong. It dragged her under with violent force.
Above the roar of water, she heard faint shouting:
“Leave her! The current took her!”
“She’s done. Let’s go!”
Rhianna reached her hand toward the surface, eyes wide, lungs burning—
The water pulled her deeper.
Her chest tightened painfully.
Her vision dimmed.
Hardin…
The name echoed weakly in her mind.
The river swallowed her whole.
And everything went dark.The night was quiet again.
Too quiet.
The wind moved through the trees like a whispering warning, but the three figures standing near the riverbank didn’t pay attention to the cold or the shadows. Their breaths came out in white puffs, sharp and fast from the chase.
One of them—broad shoulders, hood up, gloves still wet—watched the river swirl violently.
“She’s gone,” he said, voice flat.
Not relief.
Not guilt.
Just the simple truth.
The second man paced back and forth, agitated. “You sure?” His eyes darted everywhere, searching for movement, for a hand reaching out of the water. “You’re sure she didn’t grab a branch or something?”
The first man turned to him slowly. “You saw how fast the current took her.”
Silence fell again.
The third one, the youngest, leaned against a tree, breathing heavily. His hands trembled—not from fear, but from the adrenaline that hadn’t faded yet.
“They wanted her dead,” he muttered. “The orders were clear.”
A cold wind swept through, rustling the leaves above them.
“And we did what we were told.”
The second man stopped pacing. “I still don’t get it. Why her? She’s… weak. Everyone knows it. What threat could she possibly be?”
The youngest scoffed. “You don’t have to understand. You just follow the order.”
“Still,” the second man said, lowering his voice, “she was Sebastian’s mate, wasn’t she? Should we really be getting between Alpha business?”
The first man stepped closer, grabbing the man’s collar and pulling him forward with a warning growl.
“Stop thinking about things that can get us killed,” he hissed. “You talk too much.”
The second man lifted his hands in surrender. “Alright. Alright. I’m just saying—this feels dangerous.”
The first man released him and looked back toward the river. His eyes narrowed, cold and calculating.
“It is dangerous,” he admitted. “But that’s why we’re not doing this for ourselves.”
A beat of silence stretched.
“For the council, then?” the younger one asked.
The first man didn’t answer.
He didn’t have to.
The three of them shared a look.
Every pack member had heard the whispers:
The council wants her gone.
She’s a risk.
She’s unstable.
She’s too weak to be Luna.
Kill her quietly.
The first man wiped his gloves against his pants. “We did our part. No one saw us. No one followed us. She ran—she fell—and the river took her. That’s the story.”
“And Hardin?” the second man asked, voice small.
The first man’s jaw tightened. “Hardin wasn’t supposed to be there. He wasn’t supposed to take her in.” His lips curled into a sneer. “He complicates everything.”
The youngest shifted uncomfortably. “You think he’ll find her?”
“No.”
The answer came fast, too confident.
“She was too weak to swim. Too hurt to fight. Her head took a hard hit. Even if she comes back up… the river will drag her miles away.”
He looked at the other two.
“That girl is dead.”
A heavy silence fell over all of them.
Then the first man gave a small nod.
“The deed is done.”
They turned and slipped back into the forest, moving quietly, leaving only wet footprints and broken twigs behind.
None of them looked back.
None of them waited.