Chapter 119
Chapter 119
Gideon’s POV
I was totally shocked. My hands froze, the papers falling out of them. “You… what?”
I must have misheard, because there was no way that Raven was truly talking about leave me, my pack, and Leo behind. Not if she was really Claire.
For the first time in a while, I started to have some doubts about Raven’s true identity. And it was shocking.
“I’m resigning,” Raven said flatly. “I will stay for a few days to help the bodyguards train, but then I am leaving. Nova will be coming with me.”
My heart broke already, missing the little girl, but of course if Raven was leaving, she would want to take her daughter with
her.
It made sense, and yet… at the same time, none of this made sense.
“Why would you do this?” I asked, trying to stay calm, while panic was rising up within me. Just when I had felt like I finally had everything moving towards a satisfying conclusion, Raven walked in here and pulled the rug right out from under me.
“I thought I’d be able to stay here longer, but my duties require me to return to my home pack sooner than I expected,” she said. She wasn’t looking at me as she spoke, inst4ead speaking straight to the ground.
“Ivan mustn’t need you that desperately, if he was willing to let you go the first time,” I said. I hid the desperation from my voice, keeping my tone carefully neutral. Inside, however, my panic was real, with my heart racing.
I felt like, if I allowed Raven to get away here, I would never see her again. I wasn’t sure how I knew that, but I could feel it with absolute certainty. I was losing her.
“He wasn’t anticipating these circumstances,” she replied. “I can’t disclose the reasons why.”
“Pack politics?”
“Private pack matters.”
I hummed in acknowledgement. “What if I increased your salary? I would pay you whatever you want. You could live like a Queen while you are here.” I would do nothing less for the woman I had hurt so long ago, assuming Raven was Claire. If she wasn’t, she had still protected Leo enough to be worthy of whatever wealth I had to offer her.
She shook her head. “No,” she said.
I swallowed hard. If money wouldn’t tempt her, I needed a different tactic.
“Leo will miss you terribly.”
“Leo is welcome to visit me in Ivan’s pack whenever he wishes. Ivan would never stop him from coming to see me,” she said.
“And… what if I miss you?” I asked.
Finally, she lifted her eyes to mine. For a moment, I thought I saw a flash of some kind of emotion there – hurt maybe, or hope, or perhaps both – but in an instant and a blink, it was gone again.
“You could request a right to visit with Ivan,” she said. “He might let you, now and then.”
I hated everything about this. “You can’t go, Raven. I forbid it. I need you here.”
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Chapter 119
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Whatever softness she had been feeling for me entirely diminished now. She looked at me with hardness in her eyes once
more.
“Do you intend to arrest me? Because that is the only way you will be able to keep me here.”
“No,” I said. But Gods, if the thought didn’t cross my mind for a moment, wildly. I wanted her to say so badly. If she left, if she hid from me, I would never be able to make things right.
Assuming she was Claire, which I still didn’t know for sure.
“I wouldn’t do that,” I said with some regret, but it was true. Raven had always been good to my family. Even if she wasn’t Claire, keeping her somewhere she didn’t want to be didn’t sit right with me. If she was Claire, then that was even worse. Hadn’t I already hurt her enough?
There was nothing I could do then. She was going to leave and I couldn’t stop her.
The only thing I could hope for now was clarification and understanding.
“Are you leaving because of me?” I asked her.
She paused for a beat. Maybe a beat too long. “No,” she said finally. “I have other reasons why I need to return home.”
“Reasons you can’t disclose to me,” I said.
“Correct,” she replied.
Inside, I was miserable, but I kept up a cool outer façade. Since I didn’t have a choice in this.matter, it would do me no good to lose my dignity. Better she remember me as a strong Alpha than a weakling who begged.
“Thank you for staying long enough to assist in finding proper protection for Leo,” I said. Cold. Detached. If she wanted to be a stranger to me, then I had to treat her as such.
“I’m doing it for him,” she said. “Not for you.”
Ouch.
“It still benefits me, and I’m grateful for that.”
With that, she nodded. “If we are done here?”
There was nothing more to say. “Yes. I’m going to need your resignation in writing before you go. But right now, I have nothing for you. You are dismissed.”
Claire’s POV.
I knew I had made the right choice. It had been the only choice I could make to protect Nova. Yet, as I walked out of Gideon’s office, I couldn’t help but feel like I was making a terrible mistake. It was as if I already knew this was something I was going to regret every day for the rest of my life. But that didn’t change anything for me. I still had to do it.
I’d already lost Leo. I wasn’t going to lose Nova too.
The first thing I knew I was going to have to do now was tell Leo, as soon as I possibly could. I knew he wasn’t likely to understand, especially because he was so young. But I would rather tell him now while we still had some time left, then spring it on him at the last minute, giving him no time to process.
I found Leo and Nova taking a break. After running around so much, they’d worn themselves out. Nova was asleep on the couch, but Leo was sitting on the floor drinking from a comically–large glass of water. Softly, I urged him away a bit, so we could speak without waking Nova. There was another sitting room across the hallway from this one. We went there now and sat beside each other on the couch.
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Chapter 119
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“What is it?” Leo asked, looking up at me with wide eyes. My face was hidden, so he shouldn’t have been able to discern my mood. Yet he still looked at me like he knew bad news was coming.
“Nova and I are going to have to go home soon,” I said.
“For how long?”
“…I don’t think we’ll be back this time.”
Leo’s eyes went wide as saucers. “You aren’t coming back?”
“You can come visit anytime you want,” I said quickly.
“Will you come visit me here?” he asked.
“I… No, I’m sorry. Nova and I won’t be returning to this pack once we’ve gone.”
Tears welled in Leo’s eyes. “Well, I’ll come with you then.”
Oh, Gods, how I wish he could. If I could have both of my children with me permanently, I would be healed. But Gideon would never allow it, and life here was all Leo ever knew. He was being raised to be an Alpha. How could I take that right away from him?
I wanted to be selfish, but I couldn’t be.
“You have to stay,” I said. “Your father would miss you too much. You don’t want to make him sad.”
“No…” Leo said. “But what if I’m sad?”
I wished I had an answer for him, because I was sure to feel sad too.
AD
