He took the tablet, brows knitting as he examined the data. The mismatch was subtle, easy to overlook-hidden deep in the appendices most accountants wouldn’t bother to check.
“In ten years,” I said quietly, “those two ghosts have collected nearly six hundred thousand dollars.”
Beta Sawyer looked up sharply. “You think it’s internal?”
“I think it’s systematic. Someone in the factory, maybe someone in accounting. Maybe both.”
“We should tell the Alpha.”
“He’s got the summit tomorrow morning. Let me go down to the factory first. Quietly.”
He nodded. “Good call.”
Just as Beta Sawyer and I were talking, the door to the private room behind us opened.
Soft, unhurried footsteps echoed into the hallway.
I didn’t turn, but I felt it.
That sudden shift in the atmosphere.
The kind that makes your skin tighten and your breath catch without knowing why.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse.
A man.
His movement froze the moment he heard us.
His expression flickered-first with tension, then something colder, sharper.
Not fear.
Something closer to calculation.
Celina
The evening gathering finally drew to a close.
Sebastian appeared as if he were completely sober-his eyes sharp and clear, his steps measured and steady. Yet, when he handed us the room key and mentioned settling the bill, Beta Sawyer and I exchanged a knowing glance. Our Alpha was definitely under the influence.
Amara seemed more composed tonight than she had been the previous evening. She moved swiftly to Sebastian’s side, her steps light and graceful, tugging at his arm with a familiarity that set my wolf on edge deep within me.
“Want to come to my place?” she purred softly. “I’ve got that whiskey you like.”
“No.”
Sebastian’s refusal was immediate and clipped-just a single syllable, leaving no room for argument. That was the unmistakable tone of an Alpha: brief, firm, and absolute.
We continued down the corridor, the tension between us lingering like a low hum in the air.
Then it happened.
Sebastian’s boot caught on a raised edge of the carpet. His balance faltered.
Before Beta Sawyer or I could even react, Amara stepped forward, poised as if she’d been waiting for this exact moment. Her arms were slightly extended, her expression carefully controlled.
He was about to fall right into her.
But then-his hand shot backward.
It gripped my wrist.
There was no warning.
One moment I was walking behind him, and the next, I was airborne, yanked forward with such force that my heels barely grazed the floor.
I crashed into Amara. Hard.
She stared at me, eyes wide.
In that look, I saw something raw and fierce-anger, pain, betrayal.
He had pulled me between them.
He had chosen me.
She took a step back. Slowly. Her jaw clenched tight, her spine straight as a rod, hands curled into fists at her sides.
Without a word, she turned and walked away, her heels clicking sharply against the corridor floor like gunshots.
I stood there, frozen.
Breathless, still trying to catch my breath.
Still trying to process what had just happened.
Three days into this job, and I’d just been used as a shield-by an Alpha. To protect against another wolf.
And I had no idea what that truly meant.
Claim
Once we were in the car, a sharp ache began to throb in my knee. Glancing down, I spotted a nasty, purple bruise forming, dotted with tiny specks of blood where I’d collided with Sebastian’s leg. Werewolf bones were practically steel; my fair skin, delicate and prone to bruising, looked especially battered this time.
Sebastian sat beside me, eyes closed, one hand propping up his head. His face was peaceful-almost serene-in the dim glow of the car’s interior, as if he hadn’t just used me as a human shield mere minutes ago. He seemed asleep.
At the hotel, I called his name several times, but there was no response.
Clearly drunk.
Beta Sawyer and a male hotel attendant struggled to help him to his room. All six-foot-three inches of pure Alpha muscle, and yet they were both sweating heavily by the time they managed to get him settled.
“How’s your knee?” Beta Sawyer asked as he reappeared from the bedroom, his sharp gaze instantly noting my injury. “You should ice it.”
His concern felt genuine.
“I’ll ice it in my room,” I replied quietly.
“Go ahead. I’ll handle things here.”
I nodded in agreement. “Okay.”
At the door, I hesitated, then turned back. “You should go with the Alpha to the summit tomorrow.”
“I won’t be coming in the morning. The factory’s on Jurong Island, quite far west. I want to leave early and get back sooner.”
“Fine,” Beta Sawyer agreed. “Call if you need anything.”
I murmured my thanks and left.
Back in my room, I took a hot shower to soothe my aching muscles, then settled into the armchair with an ice pack pressed against my knee. The moment the cold touched the bruise, I hissed in pain.
Yet somehow, amid the throbbing ache, I found myself laughing softly.
The absurdity of the situation hit me all at once.
This trip-meant to be a working distraction from my divorce-was turning into quite the unexpected adventure. Between drunken werewolves, corporate scheming, and being used as a human shield, it was far more eventful than my original plan of a quiet, solitary escape to Iceland’s serene isolation.
The chaos was oddly comforting. It kept my mind from wandering back to Denver and all I’d left behind.
I wondered what was happening there now.
Author
Denver, 9 p.m.
Rain pattered steadily against the windows of Harlow’s law office, the city outside shrouded in darkness and cold. Thick clouds pressed down over the skyline, casting a heavy, suffocating gloom over everything.
Alpha Xavien sat across from her, the very embodiment of aristocratic control-his charcoal-gray suit impeccably tailored, his sharp features unreadable. There was no trace left of the man who had collapsed in anguish the day before, his wolf howling in grief.
Harlow didn’t bother to hide her disdain.
“I thought you’d keep pretending to be heartbroken a little longer,” she said coolly. “But I suppose this is better. The sooner you pull yourself together, the sooner we can finalize the divorce.”
She slid the agreement across the table.
Xavien picked it up, his fingers slow and deliberate as he flipped to the last page, pausing at his own signature dated a month ago-back when he had just returned from Switzerland.
Harlow caught the flicker in his eyes. He was remembering.
Celina had brought him those papers herself-calmly smiling, talking about work. Not once had she flinched.
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