KADE POV
I'm losing my mind.
That's the only explanation for why I keep finding reasons to be wherever she is. The library. The training grounds. The corridors she walks through at specific times each day. I've memorized her schedule like a predator memorizes the patterns of its prey.
Except I'm not hunting her anymore.
I tell myself it's strategy. I need to understand if she's a threat. I need to know what she's planning. I need to be aware of her movements in case she tries to run or contact Riverside or do something that proves she's as dangerous as I've been telling myself she is.
That's all lies.
The truth is simpler and more complicated at the same time. The truth is that I can't stop watching her.
Three days ago, I found her in the library studying maps. Not escape routes. Strategic maps of Northwood's borders and patrol placements and the kind of details that would take someone weeks to understand. She was tracing her finger along a line showing where the weakest point in our defenses sits.
My weaknesses.
She sat perfectly still for hours, and I stood in the shadows watching her absorb information like her life depended on it. Her eyes moved across the parchment with absolute focus. Her lips moved silently as she read. Her hand occasionally reached for notes she was taking in the margins.
She's not planning escape. She's planning survival.
That realization should have made me want to stop her. Instead it made me want to pull up a chair and help her understand the information faster.
Yesterday, I watched her in the servants' quarters talking to Marta. The older woman who's been with the pack for years. Elira sat with her hands folded and her voice soft and she asked questions that were designed to extract information without seeming like she was extracting anything at all.
How long has Marta been here? What does she think of the pack? Which council members are most loyal to me? Which ones have doubts?
Marta answered because Elira asked like she cared about the answers. Like Marta's opinions mattered. Like she was having a genuine conversation instead of conducting an interrogation.
And I realized that Elira watches people the way I watch her.
She listens more than she speaks. She notices things. She's cataloging everyone in this pack with the precision of a strategist preparing for war.
This morning, I watched her in the training grounds with Sienna.
They were working with swords and Sienna was brutal with her corrections. Every mistake earned a sharp word or a demonstration of proper form. But Elira didn't flinch. She didn't ask for mercy. She just adjusted and tried again.
The determination on her face was something else entirely. Something that made my chest tighten with an emotion I can't name.
She's not the soft girl from Riverside anymore.
She's becoming something dangerous.
She's becoming the kind of Luna that Northwood needs. The kind of woman who can stand beside an Alpha and not break. The kind of wife who can understand the complexities of pack politics and navigate them without getting destroyed.
The realization terrifies me because it means she's not planning to run.
It means she's staying.
It means she's becoming part of my world whether I want her to or not.
And the worst part is that I want her to stay.
This evening, I find myself walking toward the garden without any conscious decision to do so. My feet just carry me there like they know where she'll be. Like some part of me has already memorized the way she moves through this compound.
She's sitting at the stone bench near the frozen fountain.
The sun is setting and the light turns everything golden. She's reading a book and her face is tilted toward the fading light. She looks peaceful in a way I've never seen her look peaceful.
She looks like she belongs here.
I should leave. I should turn around and go back inside before this becomes something I can't take back. Before being near her becomes a necessity instead of an obsession.
I sit down beside her before I can stop myself.
She doesn't flinch. She doesn't move away. She just keeps reading like I haven't just shattered the careful distance I've been trying to maintain between us.
The book she's reading is about Northwood's founding. About the first Alpha who built this territory from nothing. About the wars and the losses and the choices that made this pack what it is.
She's reading my history.
I don't know what to say so I don't say anything. We sit together in silence and it feels like conversation. It feels like communication on a level that words could only complicate.
The silence stretches between us like something alive and breathing. Like it has weight and presence and meaning.
I can feel the bond between us even though we're not touching. I can sense her presence in my mind the way I've come to expect. The slight flutter of her emotion when she notices me watching her. The careful control she maintains so I can't see too deep into her thoughts.
She's building walls.
Smart walls that protect her from me while she figures out how to survive what I've put her into.
The sun dips lower and the temperature drops and she doesn't leave. She just keeps reading and I just keep sitting and we exist in this moment that feels stolen from somewhere else. Somewhere where I'm not an Alpha with a vendetta and she's not the daughter of the family I was supposed to destroy.
Somewhere where we could just be two people who found each other and decided to stay.
A voice cuts through the moment like a blade.
"Well, well."
Viktor emerges from the shadows of the garden like something poisonous crawling out from under a rock.
His expression is sharp and his eyes are hungry and I know in that single moment that he's discovered something he's been waiting to find.
Evidence.
Proof that I'm compromised.
Elira stands immediately, moving away from me with the grace of someone who's practiced separation under pressure. She closes her book and folds her hands and becomes the perfect Luna in the span of a heartbeat.
But it's too late.
Viktor has seen what he needed to see.
He's seen the Alpha sitting in the garden with his bride at sunset. He's seen the way I was looking at her. He's seen the silence between us that means something. He's seen the proof that I'm no longer the man he's been working with for ten years.
"The Alpha and Luna enjoying the evening," Viktor says, his voice smooth as poison. "How touching."
There's a threat beneath those words. A warning. A promise that this moment is going to cost me something.
Elira inclines her head respectfully toward Viktor. Her expression is neutral. Her hands are steady. She's learned how to survive around predators.
"I was just returning to my chambers," she says quietly. She moves past Viktor without waiting for permission. She doesn't look back at me. She doesn't acknowledge that anything happened between us in this garden.
But we both know it did.
Viktor watches her go with an expression that makes me want to kill him.
When she's out of earshot, he turns to me and smiles.
It's not a kind smile.
"You're losing control," he says simply.
"No, I'm not."
"You were sitting with her. In the garden. At sunset." He steps closer. "You were looking at her like she's something worth protecting instead of something worth eliminating."
I stand because sitting makes me feel vulnerable. "I'm keeping her close so she doesn't become a problem."
"That's a lie and we both know it." Viktor's eyes go cold. "You're in love with her. The plan is falling apart because you're weak enough to care about a Riverside girl."
The accusation sits between us.
I don't deny it because denying it won't matter. He's already made up his mind about what he saw. He's already decided that I'm compromised. He's already planning how to use this against me.
"The plan is exactly what it's always been," I say coldly. "Nothing has changed."
"Everything has changed." Viktor moves closer and his scarred face is suddenly all I can see. "And you and I both know that the council won't accept an Alpha who's lost his edge. They won't accept a man who chooses love over revenge."
He walks past me and I realize with growing horror that this moment in the garden has just set something in motion that I can't stop.
Viktor is going to push now. He's going to accelerate the timeline. He's going to force me to choose between Elira and my pack.
And no matter what I choose, everything is going to burn.
Somewhere in the compound, Elira is walking toward her chambers knowing exactly what just happened. Knowing that Viktor discovered us. Knowing that the game just changed in ways that neither of us can control anymore.
And I'm standing alone in the garden realizing that the careful balance I've been trying to maintain is about to collapse completely.
I wanted to keep her safe by keeping her close.
Instead I've just painted a target on her back.
Viktor knows now.
And Viktor doesn't forgive weakness.