Chapter 116

Vivian

Who the hell did he think he was?

Who the hell did any of them think they were?

Who the hell was I right now? This wasn't me. This wasn't Vivian Brightclaw.

Every door was slamming in my face. Every man I’d given time, charm, pleasure, influence were all running for cover now. None of them cared that I held sway in Brightclaw, that I was the daughter of an Alpha, practically royalty.

None of them seem to care that I was still Vivian Brightclaw and what that would mean for them as sued as all of this blew over.

No matter what, Dominic said, he would never let anyone think that I wasn't his daughter.

He'd caved because he had to.

So to hell with it.

I was going to get into that apartment. Future be damned. I'd figure out later. I needed this win, so I went back to my second choice. Filled out the stupid paper application and paid. I had just enough to cover it between all the sales. And then I was heading upstairs to an empty apartment. I couldn't afford the furnished package. But I made some sort of excuse about ordering furniture later to save face.

The phone had mostly survived, though the case was cracked. The screen was cracked. And I definitely couldn't resell it for anything, but at least I wouldn't have to try and buy a new one so soon.

The phone buzzed as I sat in the living room. I was hopeful for a moment, only to see a message from my supervisor.

Are you planning on coming in today, or should we take this as a resignation?

Bitch.

I didn’t respond. Not yet. Not until I figured out what the hell I was doing. And what I could say to make sure I didn't get fired. Working at Dominic's company was the easiest thing for me to do. And though most of the people were acting as though my name didn't carry the same weight that it had before, it got me privileges.

My eyes scanned my apartment. I still needed to get my stuff out of storage, that meant a truck and whatever the shelter said I owed, a moving crew, because I was not moving it myself.

I looked over at the suitcase that was mostly empty. The rest of it was all designer clothes I couldn’t afford to wear or clean, and didn't want to sell. My stomach turned.

If I sold one more bag or pair of shoes, I wouldn’t even be able to look at myself in the mirror. I dug through my purse, needing to take the edge off, just a little. A cigarette would do. Anything.

Nothing.

Then, something tucked in the bottom of my handbag snagged my attention. It was a cream-colored envelope.

I reached for it.

The invitation to the Blackthorn Foundation’s quarterly social soirée. The kind of party where names meant everything, and everyone worth knowing came to flaunt what they had and what they could buy.

I nearly tossed it aside.

Then I froze. If I wasn't wrong, Tyler’s father always attended. It had nothing to do with Brightclaw, it wasn't even in the capital. Tyler's father would be there, and he owed me. A lot.

A slow, wicked smile curved my lips. Maybe my luck hadn’t run out yet. If there was anything I knew, it was that Tyler's father prized my connection to Brightclaw more than anything, prized his own connection to Brightclaw just as much, and given that everything that had happened, he was probably as desperate as I was to ensure that that connection remained intact in some way.

Tyler might not figure out quickly how to get back at his father, how to completely clean up his image, but going against me in court went a long way towards it, and it probably wasn't something that Tyler's father could leverage easily. He'd have to find some other way forward, some other way back into the public's graces.

We need each other and the days ahead. And funnily enough, even though Dominic wasn't talking to me, me still being his daughter, and Dominic still not having formally renounced our connection meant that there was a chance, an opportunity, to leverage exactly who I had been in order to get back to that person.

Tyler's father was the first step on that journey. The easiest step.

Renee

It had been hours since I'd woken up the second time, naked, wrapped in a blanket at Dominic's jacket. Neil hadn't even stirred when I got up, and though I was a little achy, I felt a lot better. If that was what shifting was supposed to be like, I wasn't sure that I wanted to shift. I wasn't sure how to feel about all the years I was supposed to be able to shift and couldn't, in this life or the past one. I remember once thinking that it was cruel that I had been given so little in life and still hadn't been able to shift, that the one thing I was supposed to be able to do as a werewolf, I couldn't.

Sometimes I'd wondered if it was punishment for something I'd done or something I hadn't done yet. Philip had a way of making me believe that it was all my fault. That I was never going to shift. That I was never meant to. That I was too weak. Looking back, it felt even more ridiculous how much Philip had tried to fill my head with ideas that I was just too weak to do much of anything. But be a wife to whoever he chose.

"You're awake. You should probably get cleaned up."

I nodded, looking up at Neil's mother then down at Neile. " What about him?"

"He'll be up soon enough."

To my surprise, Neil let me go easily. He didn't open his eyes or even shift around as if he knew exactly where I was going. And had no worries about it. How was that possible, given that he was clearly fast asleep? I didn't know, and I had a feeling that finding out wasn't going to happen anytime soon.

Neil's mother was kind enough to direct me upstairs to a room I. with an adjoining bathroom and give me towels. The water came out hot, burning away the cold that still lingered.

It had been ages since I'd taken a bath. I didn’t notice it at first, the way the air shifted around me as I slipped into the tub. The way the water clung to my skin just a little too tightly. I'd been tired, exhausted. I figured this odd sensitivity had something to do wih the fact that I was still recovering from the shift.

Neil’s magic was still threaded through every inch of me like warm silk, but the heat of it was starting to fade. I let out a long breath and sank deeper into the water, grateful for the lavender scent of the soap. My muscles loosened. My mind slowed.

Until it didn’t.

It started with a wave of nausea. Sudden, unexpected. The kind that clawed its way up my throat like a beast breaking free. My head spun. My vision blurred.

Then I was somewhere else entirely. Familiar and haunting. Water was everywhere. My lungs burned. Cold slicedg through my limbs like ice daggers. My arms flailed as I sank below the surface, and I couldn’t find up or down. I screamed but no sound came out.

Above me, shadows hovered. Movement. A woman’s voice—my mother’s—panicked and desperate. And then, a man's face in shadow.

Just a silhouette. Broad. Imposing. A blur of motion and sound as he reached toward me.

Then, I heard her scream. I heard waters sloshing. I could breathe. I could move, but my body was still too heavy.

Then nothing.

I gasped, water flooding my throat, and jolted up in the tub. But the edge of the porcelain slipped against my damp arm, and I went under again, choking on a mouthful of water.

I started to panic.

My limbs thrashed. The nausea surged again. My wolf screamed inside of me to shift, to live.

Someone help.

Hands around my neck, pushing me deeper. I kicked and fought, but I got no where.

Fabric dance to my face patterned familiar. A tie. I grabbed it and yanked. Pulled. Fought.

Not like this. I wasn't going to die like this.

And the water turned cold, and I could hear the roar of the wind around me as I fell. The sound of the water being turned by turbines. The yacht. The despair. The betrayal.

Not like this. Not when I was so close. I couldn't die like this. But I couldn't push up. I couldn't find anything to grab. The tie that had been in my hand turned to air. A memory.

Then, something slammed open through the haze. Strong hands scooped under me and lifted. I gasped for breath, sputtering, choking.

“Renee?” It was Dominic's voice.