Chapter 130

Nathan

The stillness of the night was suffocating, even long after I finished my midnight walk with Olivia.

As I lay there, tangled in a web of sheets, the weight of the evening’s events pressed on my chest.

Every attempt to close my eyes and find some semblance of rest was thwarted by a flood of thoughts—Olivia’s worried expression, Jen’s aloofness, the disconcerting discovery in her room.

The earlier admission in my father’s study also kept replaying itself again and again. It was supposed to be a simple ruse. Pretend. But with each passing moment, the lines between pretend and reality blurred.

And the worst part? My heart didn't seem to mind.

But the game had changed, and there was a part of me—the wolf, the Alpha, the son—that couldn’t stand by idly while my family spiraled. Olivia’s words resonated within me all night: “I’ll stand by you.”

They were my anchor amid the chaos.

Eventually, the sky began to lighten and I hadn’t slept at all. My pitch black room became cast in a soft blue glow as the sun began its lazy ascent over the distant mountains. Its hesitant appearance only made me more invigorated.

As dawn approached, my resolve solidified. Olivia was right: the time had come to face my father, to confront the tyrant that had controlled our lives for so long.

But first, I needed my mother. Her absence was a gnawing void, and I needed answers.

I grabbed my phone, dialing her number. The familiar ringing began, but it soon transitioned to the cold, impersonal tone of voicemail. I left a quick message for her:

“Mom, it’s Nathan. I really need to talk to you. Where are you? Call me back.”

Hanging up, I furrowed my brow as I stared down at the blank screen on my phone. It wasn’t like her, not at all. My mother, for all of her shortcomings, always answered when I called. Always.

A sense of foreboding settled in my gut.

My mind began to swirl once more with thoughts, memories. There was Gamma Kamran—Olivia’s father. No matter how many years had passed, I never forgot that day…

“Dad, where are you going?” I asked, my eyelids still heavy with sleep. My dad said nothing as he shrugged his jacked on, his face filled with a stony resolve.

My mother’s hands pressed themselves into my shoulders.

“Are you sure this is the right thing to do, Colin?”

“Quiet, woman,” my father snarled as he swung the door open. He took one last look over his shoulder at me and my mother, standing there in our living room. His eyes went cold as he looked at us, and he pointed a finger at my mother. “Don’t get involved.”

Before either of us could stop him, he disappeared. I wrenched free from my mother’s arms, ignoring her calls as I burst out of the house and followed my dad all the way to the Council building.

It was there, an hour later as I crouched breathlessly in the bushes with sweat coating my skin from the wild run, that I saw it.

“Olivia,” I murmured. Her father was carrying her away. She was screaming and crying.

I leaped up out of the bushes, but came to a halt at the corner of the building. I couldn’t reach out to her. My Mindlink with her had been severed, and my father caught me just in time. He didn’t even need to touch me to enact his power of Absolute Obedience. I stood still, like a statue.

After that day, my father would beat me if I ever brought up what happened to Olivia and her father. I quickly learned not to ask, but I learned how to listen. I eavesdropped on private meetings, heard smatterings of conversations. I only ever heard my father refer to them as traitors, as good-for-nothings who disagreed with his methods.

When Jenifer appeared a couple of years later, it was sudden. I found her in the bushes, out behind the house.

“Um… Hello?” I called out, noticing a rustling. When I pulled the branches aside, I found a little girl there, dressed in a tattered white nightgown with tears streaked down her dirty face. She had enormous, empty eyes.

I took her hand and led her home.

My parents argued over it for a week. My mom kept saying that she was an omen, a spy. I never understood what that meant. But my dad… he kept saying that she was an opportunity to rectify what he… did. I still didn’t understand what that meant.

Jenifer and my dad became inseparable over the years. He hardly paid any mind to her at first, but she quickly worked her way into his heart. Her eyes, which were normally devoid of emotion, always seemed to hold something else when she looked at him…

And now, I think I had a good idea as to what that was. Something was off about the relationship between my dad and Jenifer, if the shirt and the portrait were any indication. Even if it was nothing like… that, I at least wondered if maybe my father was planning on usurping me. Removing me as his heir. And if my mother was nowhere to be found, could that mean…?

I began pacing, my thoughts a whirlwind. With each step, my frustration grew. But amidst the tempest, a sudden beacon of clarity emerged. Layla.

I hadn’t talked to her since the failed wedding, and frankly I didn’t really want to see her, but she was my best bet. With her quick wit and her access to records, maybe she could offer some insight. And besides; she owed me.

I pulled my phone out and sent her a quick text: “Layla. I need to ask you something. Can we meet today?”

She responded almost immediately in affirmation. I let out a deep breath that I didn’t know I was holding, and quickly began to get ready to meet with her.

Layla’s pack was known for their meticulous historical record-keeping. They held some of the largest libraries in the region, and I was positive that they would have some files on my own pack. I was convinced that I could start to understand what was happening here, what my father’s words meant all of those years ago when it came to Kamran and Jenifer, if I began with our family history.

I quickly dressed, then jogged downstairs to pour some coffee. Olivia was already at the breakfast table, her face drawn and eyes red-rimmed. She had evidently been fighting her own battles with insomnia last night.

Her golden hair was pulled into a messy bun on top of her head, a few tendrils, still curled from the night before, falling down and framing either side of her face. Her robe slouched lazily off of one shoulder, revealing a prominent collar bone. I quickly looked away before a heat crept into my ears.

“Going somewhere?” she asked over her steaming cup of coffee, noticing my attire. “It’s so early.

“I'm going to see Layla,” I declared.

Her eyes widened. “Layla? Are... are you thinking of getting back together with her?”

I stopped, genuinely taken aback. “What?”