Kaelen POV

*“You broke our family, Kaelen, and now you want me to bleed to fix your broken heir.”*

Her anguished words tore at my sanity for the entire car ride back from the infirmary. I tried to tell myself she was lying, tried to tell myself I had done nothing wrong. But Draegan growled in my mind, his voice filled with truths I did not want to face.

You took her son from her.

I forced the thought down.

When I stormed into my private study at the Pack House, the air was thick with my erratic scent of winter pine and ozone. My mother, Elara, stood by the fireplace, a satisfied gleam in her eyes over the newly signed alliance treaty.

I shattered her victory before she could even speak. "The Combining Ceremony with Cassondra is canceled."

Elara’s face went rigid, the color draining from her cheeks. "Are you out of your mind? You would humiliate Cassondra a second time for that disgraceful Omega? You will isolate this Pack and make us a laughingstock!"

"Liam is dying," I snarled, my Alpha aura crashing down on the room, forcing her to lower her chin. "Seraphina is his only hope. I will not give her a single excuse to refuse cooperation."

"You are making a grave mistake, Kaelen," Elara warned, her voice tight under my pressure.

I turned my back on her and walked out. I didn't care about the political fallout. As I climbed the stairs to my suite, it wasn't my mother's anger haunting me—it was the pure, unadulterated hatred in Seraphina's eyes.

The consequences of my decree arrived the very next morning.

The heavy doors to my private suite flew open. Cassondra stormed in, her suffocating artificial floral perfume burning my nose and instantly putting my senses on edge.

"Is it true?" she shrieked, her face twisted in ugly, unrestrained rage. "You're canceling the ceremony? Because that Omega whore came crawling back? You are pathetic!"

*Draegan* let out a vicious, bloodthirsty snarl in my mind at the disrespect toward our mate. My gaze turned to absolute ice. "Watch your tongue, Cassondra. This decision is about saving my son's life."

"Go rot with your rejected trash," she spat, her chest heaving with venom. "You will pay for this, Kaelen."

She spun on her heel and slammed the door, severing our political ties for good. I felt nothing but a hollow relief.

Hours later, I stood behind the black granite desk in my penthouse office at Steele Group, trying to focus on the border patrol reports. But the moment the heavy oak doors clicked open, the scent of honeysuckle after rain and pure moonlight hit me like a physical blow.

Seraphina stepped into my office uninvited. She stood tall, her posture rigid and her expression an impenetrable mask of ice.

"Have you come to your senses?" I asked, masking my desperation with cold Alpha authority. "Will you donate the marrow, or will you actually stand there and let your own flesh and blood die?"

She met my gaze unflinchingly. "I will save him. But on one condition." She stepped closer, the severed mate-bond humming agonizingly between us. "I want full custody of Liam."

My blood ran cold. The sheer audacity of her demand knocked the breath from my lungs. "You are out of your mind. He is the heir to the Black Moon Pack. You—"

You abandoned him.

The words were on the tip of my tongue. I almost said them. But then, last night's memory slapped me across the face like a physical blow. Seraphina standing in that infirmary, tears streaming down her cheeks, her voice trembling with rage:

"You executed the rejection! You handed me a legal document to sign while I was still bleeding on a hospital bed! You and your vile family ripped him from my arms!"

I swallowed the words back down.

My silence made Seraphina's eyes narrow. "What's wrong, Kaelen?" Her voice was sharp, laced with icy sarcasm. "Not going to accuse me of abandoning him this time? Weren't last night's words enough?"

My jaw tightened. Draegan growled in my mind, a mixture of shame and fury.

"Is it true?" I finally asked, my voice lower than I intended. "About the document? About the way I drove you out?"

Seraphina stared at me as if I had just said something absurd. "You were there, Kaelen. You put the pen in my hand yourself. And now you ask me if it's true?"

The truth slammed into me like a silver blade straight to my chest. For years, I had told myself she left. I told myself she abandoned Liam, abandoned me, abandoned the pack. I had constructed an entire narrative in which I was the victim and she was the betrayer.

But that was a lie.

I drove her out. I was the one who shoved a legal document into her hand hours after she had given birth. I was the one who told her to sign it and get the hell off my territory.

I stared at the woman I had harmed. My throat tightened, suffocated by the weight of my own guilt.

"Custody," I repeated, my voice hoarse. "You want custody."

"I want my son back," Seraphina corrected, her voice low, a deadly and unwavering whisper. "Sign the custody transfer. Restore my rights as his mother and renounce yours. Otherwise, Kaelen, you will lose him forever."

Seraphina POV

I didn't wait for Kaelen to recover from the shock of his own sins. I turned my back on the Alpha of the Black Moon Pack, leaving him suffocating in the ashes of his shattered narrative, and walked straight out of his penthouse office.

My destination was the Pack Infirmary.

The moment I pushed through the heavy glass doors of the Isolation Ward, the sterile stench of bleach burned my nose, but it was the sight of my son that tore my heart to shreds. Liam lay motionless, his tiny chest barely rising beneath the tangle of medical tubes.

The Pack Doctor, a graying man with exhausted eyes, looked up from his charts. "Lady Seraphina. His vitals are dropping. The poison is aggressive. If we don't perform the marrow transplant soon..."

He didn't need to finish. The agonizing beep of the heart monitor said it all. Every maternal instinct in my body screamed at me to jump onto that bed and let them drain my blood right now. But deep within my mind, my inner wolf, *Selene*, let out a low, warning growl.

*Do not yield without the bond,* she warned, her silver fur bristling with ancient memory. *He ripped our pup from our arms once. He will do it again.*

I closed my eyes, forcing the tears back. I had to be ruthless. I couldn't save Liam only to be exiled without him again. I needed an ironclad guarantee.

*Sera,* Dominic's deep voice suddenly echoed in my head through our mind-link. *The Alliance Gala is tonight. It's the perfect public stage. The entire high society will be watching. Corner him there. Go get a dress.*

*I'm on it,* I replied, my resolve hardening into diamond.

An hour later, I stood in the center of Éclat Boutique, the most exclusive luxury shop in the human city. I was running my fingers over the silk of a midnight-blue gown when the cloying, artificial stench of vanilla and sharp floral perfume assaulted my senses.

"Look what the trash dragged in," Vanessa sneered.

I turned slowly. Vanessa and Cassondra stood in the aisle, their faces twisted in ugly, venomous sneers.

"Buying expensive rags with your brother's money to play the Alpha's whore?" Vanessa stepped closer, her eyes flashing with pure malice. "You think canceling my brother's ceremony makes you special? You're still just a dirty Omega."

"You ruined everything!" Cassondra shrieked, her jealousy boiling over. She lunged forward, raising her hand to slap me across the face.

She never made contact.

My body moved on its own. Before my conscious mind could decide, my arm had already lifted. My hand caught Cassondra's wrist midair, my grip tightening like a steel vise until she gasped in pain.

What was this? A surge of shock rose within me. Five years ago, I had been weak and helpless, at the mercy of anyone who wished to harm me. But now, my reflexes were lightning fast, and my strength—though still unstable, still unfamiliar—surged through my veins like a rushing current.

Selene growled in my mind, her silver fur bristling, but her voice carried something I had never heard from her before: pride.

Without thinking, I raised my other hand and backhanded Vanessa across the face.

*Crack.*

The sharp sound echoed through the boutique. Vanessa stumbled back, clutching her reddened face in absolute shock.

"How dare you!" Vanessa screamed, her inner wolf surfacing. She slammed a heavy platinum card onto the nearest glass counter, glaring at the terrified boutique manager. "I am Vanessa Steele! Throw this Omega bitch out onto the street immediately, or I'll have this place shut down!"

The manager trembled, looking between us.

With a maddening calm, I released Cassondra's wrist, letting her stumble backward. I reached into my purse and pulled out a solid, matte-black metal card—the Rhodes Legacy Black Card, the ultimate symbol of Silverwood's financial empire. I placed it gently on the glass.

"I'll take the midnight-blue gown," I told the manager, my voice smooth as ice. "And I'd appreciate it if you cleared the store of... pests. Their artificial perfumes are ruining the silk."

The manager's eyes bulged at the sight of the Black Card. His demeanor instantly shifted. He signaled the security guards. "Ladies, I must ask you to leave. Now."

Vanessa and Cassondra were physically escorted out the glass doors, their humiliated shrieks muffled by the thick glass. I didn't bother correcting Vanessa's delusion about Dominic's money. Let her think what she wanted; she didn't need to know my brother was already happily mated to Clara.

Hours later, the crystal chandeliers of the Alliance Gala cast a starlit glow over the elite crowd. The ballroom was a sea of politics and champagne, but I didn't stay inside. I slipped out onto the private upper terrace, the cool night air biting at my bare shoulders.

I didn't have to wait long.

The heavy, suffocating scent of winter pine and ozone crashed over the white climbing roses. Kaelen stepped out of the shadows. His obsidian eyes were dark, wild, and burning with a toxic mix of suppressed rage and absolute desperation.

In his clenched fist, he held a rolled parchment inscribed with ancient runes—a Pack Covenant.

Kaelen POV

The night air on the private terrace was biting, but it was nothing compared to the ice in Seraphina’s eyes. I stood before her, the heavy parchment of the Pack Covenant clutched in my fist. Every instinct in my body screamed at me to tear it to shreds. Handing over full custody of Liam, the heir to the Black Moon Pack, was the ultimate humiliation.

But the image of my son, pale and dying in that sterile room, crushed my Alpha pride into dust.

I shoved the scroll toward her. "Sign it."

Seraphina took the ancient parchment. Under the watchful eyes of Dominic Rhodes, she unrolled it and signed her name with a maddening calm. There was no hesitation, no flicker of maternal desperation—just a cold, calculated efficiency that made my blood boil.

"Is this all a show to you?" I growled, stepping closer until my winter pine scent clashed violently with her honeysuckle and moonlight. "Are you enjoying this?"

She didn't even look up. "I am doing what is necessary for my son."

*You gave our pup to her! You coward!* Draegan, my inner wolf, roared in agonizing betrayal, clawing at the walls of my mind. I gritted my teeth, taking the signed covenant back. I had secured Liam's salvation, but as I looked at the impenetrable mask of my fated mate, a sickening feeling settled in my gut. I was walking blindly into a trap.

Hours later, the suffocating tension followed me back to my private study at the Pack House. I had barely poured a glass of amber liquid when the doors flew open.

"You actually did it," Vanessa shrieked, her face twisted in ugly disbelief. "You gave the heir to that Omega bitch! You're letting her destroy us!"

My exhaustion snapped into pure, unadulterated rage. "Shut your mouth, Vanessa."

"She's blinding you!" My sister stepped forward, her artificial perfume burning my nose. "You canceled the ceremony with Cassondra, you humiliated our family, and now you're gambling our future on a traitor—"

"Enough!" My Alpha aura exploded outward, a crushing, invisible weight that forced Vanessa to her knees. She gasped, her eyes wide with terror. "I did this to save Liam's life. If you speak ill of the mother of my heir again, I will banish you myself. Get out."

She scrambled to her feet and fled, leaving behind a toxic trail of resentment.

The next morning, I strode into the Pack Infirmary, ready to finally end this nightmare. The marrow transplant would happen today. But the moment I pushed through the doors, the heavy, anxious scent of the Pack Doctor hit me.

"Where is she?" I demanded, my gaze sweeping the empty preparation room.

The doctor swallowed hard, his hands trembling. "Alpha... Lady Seraphina was here at dawn. But she left. She said she couldn't go through with the surgery."

The words didn't compute. "What do you mean she left? Did Cassondra do something?"

"No, Alpha. It was Lady Seraphina herself. She just... walked out."

A deafening silence fell over the room before the absolute inferno of my wrath ignited. She had lied. She had used our dying pup as a bargaining chip to steal my rights, and then abandoned him again.

*She played us with our pup's life! Find her! Tear her apart!* Draegan howled, a feral, bloodthirsty sound.

With a guttural roar, I slammed my fist into the reinforced concrete wall. The wall cracked, dust raining down as my knuckles shattered and instantly began to heal. I spun around, my vision tinted red. I was going to make her pay.

I didn't bother with a car. I shifted and ran, tearing through the forest until I reached the Silverwood Pack's temporary residence on my borders. I ignored the warning growls of their Warriors, storming straight into the main courtyard.

Dominic Rhodes stepped out to meet me, his massive frame radiating a steady cedar and earth scent.

"Where is she?" I snarled, my Alpha command lacing every syllable. "Bring her out, Dominic! Her little game is over!"

I expected him to sneer, to defend her treachery. Instead, his face was a mask of dark, storm-gathering dread. The absolute lack of provocation in his eyes made my heart stutter.

"She's not playing a game, Kaelen," Dominic said, his voice dropping to a lethal, hollow pitch. "Seraphina's missing."

"Missing?" I let out a harsh, bitter laugh. "Right. Another trick."

"Someone called her this morning," Dominic said, his voice tight. "After she left the hospital with her daughter, she was attacked on her way to the apartment. We found her car, abandoned on the side of the road. There was blood. A lot of blood. Not hers."

My blood froze.

"Her daughter?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper.

Dominic's silence was louder than any words.

"We haven't found them yet," he finally said, his eyes turning cold. "Someone was watching her, Kaelen. Someone has been waiting for this opportunity. They left the hospital, were going to pick up some documents, and then whoever it was struck."

The air vanished from my lungs. The inferno of my rage was extinguished in an instant, drowned by an absolute, paralyzing wave of fear.

Liam lay in the hospital, dying. Seraphina was missing. My daughter, the daughter I had never even seen, had disappeared along with her mother, fallen into the hands of an unknown enemy.

"What did you do?" I asked, my voice low and hoarse. "In the five years you were gone, who did you provoke?"

Dominic stared at me, his expression cold. "I provoked no one. But what about you, Kaelen? You have made countless enemies. Perhaps someone has finally decided to use your most vulnerable weakness against you."

Your family.

Those three words drove into my chest like silver blades.

I had never treated them as family. I had driven them away. And now, someone might be paying for that with their lives.