Chapter 89 90
Aurélie POV
We need to leave.
I need to leave.
Being here being this close to him is doing things to me. Things I resent. Things I refuse to forgive myself for feeling.
Dominique is safe. That was the reason I came, and with that accomplished, there is no justification for staying. Damien is with Geneviève now, down in the pack cells, interrogating her. I don’t need to hear what she says, what excuses she gives, or how she spins the truth.
I was there.
I lived it.
And I will not be her victim again.
Fabrice also has expectant mothers arriving at our territory within the next few days transfers arranged with their Alphas, promises I gave in good faith. One of them is an Alpha’s daughter. He’ll want to personally oversee their arrival, make sure they’re settled properly.
Dominique and Delphine need to go home. They need familiarity. Stability.
They need their beds.
And I am an Alpha. My place is with my pack.
I need distance. Time. Space to understand why the Moon Goddess keeps shifting the path beneath my feet just as I think I’ve found my footing.
At first, I believed it was all meant to build an alliance against Damien something easily done from the shadows, behind an alias. But now? Now that everything is exposed, can I do it openly? And when Dominique one day becomes Alpha of the Darkvale Pack… would he ever forgive me for it?
“Fabrice,” I push through the mind-link, folding the borrowed clothes neatly and stacking them on the bed for the four of us. “It’s time we leave. Can you have all our warriors assembled in the front courtyard and ready to depart within the hour?”
“I can,” he replies, hesitation threading his voice. “Are you sure?”
“Very sure.”
Nearly an hour passes, and with every minute that ticks by, the urgency in my chest tightens. I need to leave soon preferably before he returns.
There’s one last thing I need to do.
For Fabrice’s sake, I want to speak to Florence alone.
I hear her moving about in Geneviève’s room, changing the bedding. From the window, I can see Fabrice and Théo organizing the warriors below. Dominique and Delphine are safely downstairs with Élodie and Miss Lambert, packing snacks for the journey. Fabrice won’t hear us from here.
Damien still hasn’t returned from the cells, though some of his warriors have begun gathering in the courtyard talking with mine.
Bloodnight warriors standing shoulder to shoulder with Darkvale.
I never thought I’d see that sight.
“Florence?” I call when I hear her footsteps reach the landing outside the door.
“Yes, Alpha?” She opens it wider, stopping short when she sees me standing by the window.
“Please, Florence sit.” I gesture toward the bed. After a moment’s hesitation, she does, perching stiffly on the edge.
“I wanted to talk to you.”
“There’s really no need, Alpha.” Her spine straightens, tension settling into her shoulders. I can already see it she’s bracing herself, expecting me to sound like Geneviève.
“But there is.” I cross the room and sit beside her, deliberately setting aside rank and title. This isn’t Alpha to Omega. This is woman to woman. “You need to understand something. Fabrice isn’t rejecting you. Quite the opposite he’s trying to protect you.”
She turns to me, confusion etched across her face. “Protect me?”
“Fabrice is my best friend,” I say quietly. “For a long time, he was the only person I had here. I should have sent him home but I was newly married, far from my father’s pack, and selfishly… I wanted my counsel, my anchor, close.”
I draw in a breath before continuing.
“The day we left, we were accused of terrible things. I needed to get him to safety. He’s always been there for me and I needed to be there for him. To pull him away from Damien, who because of Geneviève’s poisonous words had already attacked him.”
My throat tightens.
“I couldn’t abandon him. Not when he never abandoned me.”
A faint chuckle drifts in from outside, pulling me from the memory for just a second.
“He was there for everything,” I continue softly. “Their birth. Their first nappy. Their first nightmares. In every way that mattered, he was their father.”
I turn to her then.
“But he isn’t their father.”
Her head snaps toward me, eyes widening, a deep frown settling between her brows.