Chapter 525

Olivia

The barrage started innocently enough—a few phone calls here and there from unknown numbers, a few texts, a few social media comments. I would let the calls go to voicemail and never listen to the messages the callers left, not wanting to invite more intrusion into my life.

But within a matter of days, the missed calls were only multiplying rapidly. Before I knew it, I was on the verge of calling my cell phone company to change my number.

Then, the letters began arriving in the mail.

The first day it happened, I found a whole bundle of them stuffed into our mailbox out by the street. I furrowed my brow as I stood there, flipping through the unwarranted deliveries.

“What the hell…” I muttered to myself as I skimmed over a handwritten letter from a young girl claiming to be my ‘biggest fan’. The word ‘trash’ was repeatedly used in reference to Nathan, which was alarming, to say the least.

As I kept reading through the letters later at my kitchen table, I found that, once again, they started innocently at first: many of them simply contained personal questions, asking for details about my marriage and relationship with Nathan or begging for an inside scoop on the drama.

But the others… The others held thinly veiled threats, warnings that I should steer clear of that ‘strange woman’ unless I wanted serious consequences.

There were insults, too, calling me a washed-up housewife who was losing her husband. That was when I finally drew the line and shoved the pile of letters into the trash, unable to bring myself to keep reading.

I tried to brush what was happening off at first, not wanting to give the harassment any more power than it deserved. Nathan and I had been bombarded by this level of invasive attention before—it all came part and parcel with the territory of being an Alpha and a Luna in the public eye.

We had weathered worse storms, and we would weather this one, too.

Except this time, he wasn’t here beside me. He wasn’t home to keep watch over our front door, and without my Ancient Wolf powers at my disposal, I was once again starting to feel…

Helpless.

As the days passed, the messages and the calls grew bolder, more insistent. It wasn’t limited to anonymity, either; and that made it all the more terrifying, that people felt comfortable enough to confront me on the street. Especially when my kids were with me.

It was one sunny afternoon when it happened; I was pushing the twins in their stroller through the park, enjoying a Saturday during spring, when a cluster of people suddenly swarmed me on the path.

“Mrs. Ford! Mrs. Ford, is it true about the affair?”

“Are you staying with Alpha Nathan out of duty or love?”

Their voices struck me to my core. Normally, I would have been used to the publicity that came along with being a Luna; hell, I often enjoyed talking to my neighbors and packmates, and it was rare that I felt displeased with the attention.

But this was different.

Swallowing, I quickly turned on my heel without a word and began to rush away, pushing the twins in their stroller in front of me.

“Luna Olivia!” they called after me. “Where are you going?!”

“Don’t you think the pack deserves to know the truth?” someone shouted after me.

“Your husband is cheating on you! Have some self respect!”

By the time I reached the car with the twins, my heart was pounding a mile a minute in my chest and my hands were shaking so fast I could barely even get the twins into their car seats. What should have been an idyllic outing with my children had turned into an ambush, all because of that damned photo.

No, not the photo. The stranger. Dan. This sex trafficking ring. The photo was just the icing on the cake, the cherry on top.

…

Later that night, an incessant pounding at the front door jolted me awake. With my pulse thrumming with dread, I pulled on a robe and crept down the hall, the hammering at the door growing more and more insistent by the second.

As I rounded the corner, two shadowy silhouettes on the other side of the door caught my eye. I gasped softly, hiding back in the shadows.

“We know you’re in there, Olivia! Were the rumors true about Nathan cheating?” a voice called through the door.

“Open up!” another voice called out. “We just want to talk!”

Upstairs, I heard Elliot and Aurora beginning to stir, frightening by the pounding and the shouting. The park was one thing, but this… this was dangerous.

Without hesitating, I quickly slipped my phone out of my pocket and dialed the police. An eternity seemed to pass before flashing police lights finally bathed the front lawn in an eerie glow.

The mob of reporters dispersed, but not before I glimpsed their twisted grins of glee through the windows. They had gotten what they wanted—a reaction to stoke the flames.

I loathed feeling so helpless and weak in my own home, a place that was supposed to be a sanctuary. If only Nathan was by my side… if only I had full control of my powers already, then I could protect myself and the twins without issue.

“Don’t worry, you two,” I murmured as I rocked Elliot and Aurora back to sleep. “I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

But my brave words rang hollow, even to my own ears. Without Nathan’s strength to back me up, and without my enhanced abilities fully developed, what could I really do against intruders? How far would people go for their curiosities—or their hatred?

As I climbed back into bed that night, I soon realized that sleep was going to elude me. So, with a sigh, I picked up the book that Layla had given me off of the bedside table and I began to read.

For what felt like hours, I pored over that old book until my fingers were covered with dust. I must have flipped through the ritual a hundred times, committing it to memory.

The thought of stealing Freya’s wolf away from her still felt like a punishment, but we needed her. I needed her.

Without Nathan by my side, I felt utterly helpless—and that was just in the midst of drama involving a cheating scandal. What would it be like if actual, tangible danger knocked on our doorstep instead of reporters?

And what if Nathan or the police couldn’t be there to help? I could just sit about, hoping that my Ancient Wolf powers would suddenly show themselves.

No, I needed to harness them. After all, I had already lost one child; if something ever happened to Elliot or Aurora too, I couldn’t bear to keep on living.

But as I read, there was one thing that stood out to me—one roadblock that gave me pause. This ritual wasn’t just a simple spell or an incantation. It required materials; materials that wouldn’t be so easy to obtain.

Most notably, a lock of Freya’s fur.

I shuddered at the thought of returning to that cave, of returning to the feral Freya to cut a piece of her fur. It was dangerous and terrifying, and not a task that I could take lightly.

But it might just be necessary.