Chapter 3

Ethan's eyes fell on the fang pendant. Something flickered across his face.

He knew what it meant to me.

Selene glanced at it and said nothing.

Instead, she rose onto her toes and pressed her lips to his ear, whispering something only he could hear.

Whatever hesitation had lived in Ethan's eyes vanished.

He stopped looking at me. Without a word, he reached out and seized the pendant and yanked.

The chain bit into my skin. A sharp sting at my throat.

The pendant came away with a smear of my blood. He passed it to Selene without looking back.

She turned it over in her palm. The corner of her mouth lifted.

She dropped it into her pocket, then looked up at me — and her eyes were full of it.

Ethan finally turned. His voice was soft, cold as midwinter.

"Rowan. Your father refused to bring Selene away from the mountains. Because of him, she spent years being abused. Your family owes her this."

My father had done aid work in the outer Pack territories.

He had mentioned a boy named Selene once — said the child had latched onto him.

I stared at Ethan's face, and the pieces snapped into place.

Selene. The girl from the mountains. That was her.

But I remembered what my father had told me — he'd wanted to bring the child home. It was Selene who had said she couldn't leave her parents.

I almost laughed at the lie. I didn't get the chance.

Selene leaned close, and her voice dropped to something only I could hear.

"Rowan. Aren't you curious how Ethan knows all of this?" A small smile.

"I told him. In bed, piece by piece. And you should have seen how much he pitied me. It was so satisfying."

I turned slowly and stared at her.

She let the look land, then softened her eyes just slightly, as if genuinely concerned.

"By the way — I should thank you. The one who locked you in that shelter during the fire?" She paused. "That was me."

"Your father was begging me to open the door. Down on his knees. Like a wounded animal."

The nightmares I'd carried for ten years.

My father's death had never stopped haunting me.

And every time over the years I'd tried to investigate the details of that fire — every time I'd gotten close — something had intervened.

Now I understood why.

They had been together since before I even knew her name.

The last thread holding me together snapped.

I swung without thinking. My fist connected with her jaw.

She went sideways and struck the side of a car with a dull, heavy sound.

She straightened slowly, touched the blood at the corner of her mouth, and said nothing.

Ethan shoved between us, eyes blazing as he turned on me.

Before he could speak, my phone shattered the silence.

"Ms. Ashford!" The surgeon's voice was breaking. "Your mother has gone into shock. If you are not here in three minutes, we will lose her. Where are you?!"