Chapter 31 31
Damien POV
“Alpha, it’s good to have you back!” one of the guards called from the gate as my car rolled past, his tone far too cheerful for the storm brewing inside me. I couldn’t even force a nod. The best I managed was a grunt half acknowledgment, half warning not to approach me with any more well-meaning greetings.
By the time I pulled up in front of the alpha house, my mood had curdled into something dark and poisonous. Anger. Resentment. Disbelief. All of it aimed at Aurélie at the woman who let me mourn her for four years while she lived, breathed, thrived… and raised a child with another man.
“Alpha?” Lucas’s voice pressed into my mind-link, the beta undoubtedly alerted of my return.
“Lucas, meeting in thirty minutes.”
I cut the link before he could respond.
I needed a shower, needed to scrub away the scent of Darkvale’s woods, the mud still dried into my fur and skin from hours spent hiding like some novice scout. I hadn’t even bothered to return to the hotel room; I grabbed my bag and drove. The only thing I wanted was distance distance from that pack, from that valley… from her.
Half an hour later, Lucas and several of my most trusted warriors filed into the office. I stood behind my desk with my thoughts still tangled in the shock of her face, her scent, her voice. Aurélie alive. Aurélie with a child. Aurélie in another male’s home.
I didn’t even notice Geneviève until she knocked lightly on the open door.
“Alpha?” She looked surprised perhaps offended that I had returned without informing her. I didn’t have space in my head to care.
“Damien, what is going on?” Lucas and Geneviève demanded almost in unison, their eyes searching my face.
I had called this meeting, and yet the words refused to form.
A part of me the part still reeling warned me to keep Aurélie’s survival to myself. She must have begged Darkvale for sanctuary. To hide. To raise her and Fabrice’s child in peace. And if she offered them secrets to buy that protection…
I swallowed the bitter taste.
I would not speak her name. Not tonight.
“The Darkvale alpha refused to meet me,” I finally said. “But I breached their border and got a look at their security.”
“Why didn’t he meet with you?” Lucas pressed, suspicion rising in his eyes.
Because he knew who he was hiding.
“He was… unavailable,” I replied stiffly. “But I met his son.”
Lucas blinked. “His son? Is he of age?”
“No. He’s only four.” I paused before adding, “Which means their alpha is young—close to my age.”
One of my warriors leaned forward. “What would you have us do, Alpha?”
“Nothing. Not yet.”
I needed time to think, to plan, to process the reality of Aurélie walking the earth. She was still legally my wife, still Luna of Bloodnight. I had never accepted her rejection. Her disappearance hadn’t broken the bond. It had only taught me how to bleed.
After the meeting, I let my wolf out. He bolted into the trees, racing along the borders of our territory with fierce determination. His senses were sharpened, searching for threats, for weaknesses, for anything that reminded him of how easily he slipped through Darkvale’s defenses.
But that wasn’t what gnawed at us.
“You should have challenged him,” my wolf growled.
“They have a child,” I argued. “They’re mates.”
His response was a snarl. “Doesn’t matter. She is ours. And we have a contractual agreement.”
I stopped mid-stride.
The contract.
Our marriage had been arranged by my father one of the few things he did meticulously right. Every clause, every loophole crafted for leverage. If Aurélie was alive, if she was sheltered by another alpha, then somewhere in those documents was a clause that could force him out of hiding.
My wolf lunged back toward the alpha house. By the time we shifted and entered the hallway, he’d already reached for Lucas through the mind-link.
“Meet me in an hour.”
I barely made it two steps into the corridor before Geneviève appeared, strutting toward me in a bright pink blouse unbuttoned low enough to demand attention, paired with a black leather skirt and matching heels.
“Damien?” she drawled. “You’re back early”
“Not now, Geneviève.” My tone was sharper than intended, but I didn’t care. “I’m busy.”
Her lips pursed with offense, but I brushed past her and went straight to my office. Papers lined the desk; old contracts, archived alliances, pack treaties. I tore through them with renewed purpose until, finally, my fingers landed on the document I had been searching for.
Our marriage contract.
An hour later, Lucas joined me. I handed him the file, tapping the section I suspected held the leverage I needed.
“The alpha may claim the contract is void,” I said quietly. “But I’m going to use it anyway.”
I stared at the ink, at the signature she’d once written with a soft smile and trembling hands.
“Let’s see,” I murmured, voice cold enough to freeze stone,
“whether he’s willing to go to war… for her.”