Isla's POV
"Mommy, I'm hungry."
Lyra's small voice pulls me back from the edge of fear. We've been going for six hours straight, and the sun is high now. My hands ache from holding the steering wheel so tight.
I pull into a diner parking lot, kill the engine, and just sit there shaking. We escaped. We actually escaped. Dante was chasing us and we got away because of that strange silver car and the woman who called me granddaughter.
Granddaughter. The word keeps ringing in my head.
"Mommy?" Lyra unbuckles herself, crawls into the front seat and into my lap. "Why are you crying?"
I didn't know I was. I wipe my face quickly. "I'm okay, baby. Just tired."
"Is Daddy coming to find us?"
The question makes my chest hurt. The mate link is stretched so thin now it feels like it might snap any second. Part of me hopes it does. The other part is scared of what happens when it breaks completely.
"I don't know," I answer honestly. Because I've lied enough. To myself, to her, assuming everything was fine when it wasn't. "But right now, it's just us. Is that scary?"
Lyra thinks about it seriously. She's always been an old soul in a little body. "A little bit. But also good. You smile more when Daddy's not around." Oh. Oh god. My seven-year-old daughter noticed that I'm happy when my own mate isn't near me.
"Come on." I force brightness into my words. "Let's get you some pancakes."
Inside the diner, Lyra devours her food while I push eggs around my plate. My stomach is twisted in knots. Every time the door opens, I jump, expecting Dante to walk through it.
But he doesn't. We're safe. For now.
"Mommy?" Lyra's voice goes quiet. "Where's Kieran?"
There it is. The question I've been dreading.
"Kieran is with Daddy," I say carefully. Each word feels like eating glass.
"Why didn't we bring him?"
Because he doesn't want me anymore. Because he calls another woman Mommy. Because seeing him refuse me was worse than any pain I've ever felt.
"It's complicated, sweetheart."
"He's mean to you now," Lyra says matter-of-factly. "Ever since Miss Serena started coming. He used to love your bedtime songs. Now he says they're stupid." Her little face scrunches up. "I don't like Miss Serena. She smells wrong."
Out of the words of babes. Even my daughter's wolf could sense something evil about that woman.
"We'll figure it out," I promise, though I have no idea how. "But right now, we need to keep going. We're going somewhere safe."
"Where?"
Good question. I have no plan beyond run. Run until Dante can't find us. Run until the bond stops hurting. Run until—
My phone buzzes. New number. The same one from last night.
I answer with shaking hands. "Hello?"
"You made good time." That strong female voice again. "You're in Riverside, yes? At Betty's Diner?"
I look around wildly. "How do you—"
"I'm across the street. At the cafe. Come. Bring the child. It's time we spoke properly, Isla."
The call stops.
I pay quickly, grab Lyra's hand, and cross the street. My heart is racing. This could be a trick. This could be—
The woman sits at an outdoor table, and I stop breathing.
She's beautiful in an otherworldly way. Silver hair that shines like moonlight. Eyes that are actually violet—not blue or gray but true purple. And the power rolling off her makes my knees weak.
This is an Alpha. No, something more than an Alpha. Something old.
"Sit, child." She points to the chair across from her. "You look ready to bolt, but I promise you're safer with me than anywhere else in this world."
"Who are you?" My voice comes out stronger than I feel.
"I am Elder Moira Morven." She smiles, and it changes her face from intimidating to warm. "Your grandma. Your mother's mother. And the reason you could walk away from an Alpha's order."
My legs give out. I sit hard in the chair. Lyra climbs into my lap, looking at the woman with wide eyes.
"That's impossible. My mother died when I was three. She was nobody. An orphan. I have no family—"
"Your mother was heir to the Morven Pack, one of the three original breeds." Moira's voice is gentle but firm. " She ran away at seventeen to marry a person she loved—your father. I let her go because she needed to choose her own path. When they died in that car crash, I searched for you. But you were already gone, hidden in the foster system."
The world is tipping. "I was in foster homes until I was eighteen. Nobody came for me. Nobody wanted—"
"I searched for fifteen years." Pain flashes in those violet eyes. "By the time I found you, you'd already married Dante Blackthorn. So I watched. Waited. Hoped he would be worthy of you." Her face hardens. "He wasn't."
"Why tell me now?" My hands are shaking again. "Why not before? Why let me suffer—"
"Because you wouldn't have believed me before." Moira reaches across the table, covers my hand with hers. Her touch sends warmth through me, power I've never felt. "You loved him too much. You would have picked him over your heritage, your power, your birthright. But now? Now you've picked yourself. Finally."
Lyra pipes up suddenly. "Are you really our grandma?"
Moira's smile is bright. "I am, little one. Which makes you a Morven princess. Did you know that?"
Lyra's eyes go big. "Like in the stories?"
"Better than the stories." Moira winks. Then her face turns serious as she looks at me. "Isla, you need to come home. To the Morven farm. There's so much you need to learn about who you are, what you can do. And you need protection." "From Dante?"
"From everything. The mate link break will drive him mad. He'll come for you, and not gently." She pulls out a business card. "But more importantly, you need to know the truth about what was done to you. About why your son doesn't remember you. About the witch who's been poisoning your mate for years."
My blood turns cold. "Witch?"
"Serena Vale isn't just Dante's lover. She's a dark witch who's been using blood magic on your family." Moira's voice goes hard as stone. "On your mate. On your son. Even on you, trying to break your heart enough that you'd just... give up and disappear."
"She wanted me dead?"
"Worse. She wanted you erased. Forgotten. Like you never existed." Moira stands. "Come with me. Let me show you who you really are. Let me teach you to fight back."
I look at Lyra in my lap. At the road stretching away behind us. At the life I'm running from.
Then I look at this woman—my grandmother—offering me something I've never had.
A family. Power. A chance to be more than Dante's rejected mate.
"Okay," I whisper. "We'll come."
Moira's smile is fierce. "Good. Because there's one more thing you need to know before we leave." She leans close, and her next words freeze my blood. "You're pregnant, Isla. About six weeks along. I can feel it—it's a gift our bloodline has. And that child growing inside you? It's not just any baby. It's got Morven blood and Blackthorn blood mixed together. It's going to be incredibly powerful."
My hand flies to my stomach. Pregnant. I'm pregnant. "Does Dante know?" The question comes out frightened.
"Not yet. But Serena does. Her magic would have told her immediately." Moira's face turns grim. "Which means she's going to try to kill you before that child is born. Because a baby with your bloodline risks everything she's built."
I'm standing now, clutching Lyra. "We need to leave. Right now. If she knows—"
"She's already sent someone." Moira's eyes flash to the street behind me. "Three dogs. They've been following you since the lunch. Professional hunts, from the smell of them."
I spin around. Three guys across the street, watching us. They're trying to look relaxed, but their eyes are predator-sharp.
"What do we do?" My voice shakes.
Moira stands quietly, drops money on the table. "We show them what happens when someone threatens a Morven." She looks at me, and power blazes in her violet eyes. "It's time you learned what you really are, granddaughter. Time you stopped running and started fighting back."
She raises one hand, and the three hunters suddenly drop to their knees, holding their heads and screaming.
"That's just a taste," Moira says softly. "Imagine what you could do with training."
I stare at my grandmother—this powerful, scary woman who just dropped three grown wolves with a gesture.
And for the first time since I left, I don't feel afraid.
I feel scary.