Chapter 52
+25 Points
I looked at the empty glass near the bedside table. My hand still trembled slightly. I had mixed the sleeping powder a strong human sedative into his wine glass. It worked fast on a normal person and it was going to take a while for a wolf especially and Alpha but he was drunk.
I just drugged the man I love.
A wave of crushing guilt hit me, cold and sharp. I had to push it away. If I let myself think about the cruelty of this act, I would stop, and if I stopped, I would stay.
You have to go, Faith. This is the only way.
I moved quickly and silently, adrenaline erasing my exhaustion. I didn’t take much. A few changes of clothes and the sturdy boots I kept hidden under the bed.
The next part was the hardest, and the most shameful.
I slipped out of the bedroom and padded down the hall to Astor’s private office. My heart pounded against my ribs like a trapped bird.
I went straight to the large, hidden safe behind the painting of his great–grandfather. I remembered the code. He had shown it to me carelessly one bored afternoon.
His mother’s birthday.
The tumbler clicked.
I pulled the heavy steel door open. My eyes immediately went to the stacked bundles of cash inside. It felt wrong, monstrous, to take it.
But I forced myself to reach inside. This wasn’t stealing. This was payment.
For three years, I had been the perfect Luna. I smiled when I was tired, I organized every event flawlessly, and I stood beside him, strong and supportive, even when he was cold and terrible to
- me.
This money was the wages I was never paid for selling my life to his pack.
I grabbed two thick wads of cash and tucked them deep inside my backpack.
As I was about to close the safe, something else caught my eye. Tucked away next to the important pack documents, inside a small, worn wooden box, were things that didn’t belong with land deeds and financial reports.
I pulled the box out. My fingers fumbled with the lid.
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*25 Points
Inside, resting on a bed of soft, red velvet, were a few senseless, sentimental items: a dried, brown
rose from the bouquet he’d given me the morning after our mating ceremony, it’s funny because I always believed that he wasn’t the one who bought me those flowers because of how much he
was against our relationship.
I also found folded–up ticket stub from the human movie theater we visited because his father
believed we were not spending enough time together and a small, smooth stone I had picked up by the river and given him on the day he took me hiking.
My breath hitched.
He kept them. He kept the memory of the real us.
My eyes burned with tears I refused to shed. It broke me, just a little, because maybe he truly did
love me the regretful man who had promised forever a few daysago.
It wasn’t enough anymore. Nothing he had or felt was enough to keep me from myself.
I closed the wooden box, pushed it back gently, and slammed the heavy safe door shut.
Back in the bedroom, the moonlight streamed through the window, kissing Astor’s face. He looked
so vulnerable, like the man I fell in love at first sight, not the demanding Alpha who chose to believe
everybody but me.
I sat down at his huge mahogany desk and pulled out a sheet of paper.
I wrote quickly. I didn’t apologize for leaving, but I did explain why I had to go. It was a goodbye,
clean and final.
I went back to the bed. I tucked the letter under his pillow, where he would find it first thing when
he woke up–or whenever the drug finally wore off.
I looked at his face one last time, memorizing the sharp line of his jaw and the relaxed curl of his
thick lashes.
I leaned down and pressed my lips against his, a deep, mournful kiss that ended everything
between us.
“I love you, Astor,” I whispered to his unconscious state.
Then, I turned my back on the Pack House bedroom forever.
The front door clicked shut behind me, a sound that felt deafening in the sleeping quiet of the early morning. I stood still for one agonizing second, waiting for the howl of an alarm, for the rush of
pack warriors.
Nothing. Just the chirp of crickets.
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A tall, dark shadow detached itself from the edge of the porch, making me jump. It was Alpha Kyle. The relief was instant, followed by a fresh spike of anxiety.
He moved toward me, his face grim.
“What took you so long, Faith?” he hissed, his voice low and strained. “We had to leave two hours
ago! My Beta has been waiting.”
I didn’t answer right away. I pulled my backpack higher on my shoulder, feeling the weight of the
stolen money pressing into my back.
“Kyle,” I whispered, holding his gaze. “Why are you willing to do this? You know very well that Astor
will no longer be allies with you, he will never forgive this.‘
Kyle’s eyes were hard, fixed on the darkness of the woods beyond the yard. “I will tell you why when
we get to my pack borders. Right now, we move.”
He didn’t wait for my agreement. He simply started walking quickly toward the thick boundary of
trees, and I followed, my boots crunching softly on the gravel path.
Every second felt exposed. I was worried sick that the pack warriors guarding the perimeter would
spot me before I reached safety.
“The patrol schedule,” Kyle said, sensing my fear without looking back. “I studied it. The shift change happened twenty minutes ago. We have a clear window for the next hour. Nobody is going
to find you.”
His confidence barely eased my worry. How did he know the schedule so well?
We didn’t walk far before we plunged into the deep shadows of the woods. The air was colder here, smelling of damp earth and pine needles. We moved silently, like ghosts.
Finally, deep enough that the Pack House was only a distant, pale blur, we found him. Kyle’s Beta, Elias, was waiting far away from the house, but still technically on our pack territory. He was lean
and tense, his eyes sweeping the darkness constantly.
The fact that Kyle and his Beta knew so much about our pack’s routines, our patrols, and our schedules sent a shiver of dread down my spine. Could they be planning a real attack later?
No. Astor is the Alpha. He won’t let that happen. He will protect his pack. I clung to that thought,
even as I ran away from him.
“Elias will take you,” Kyle said, stopping abruptly. “You will travel with him to my territory. I need to
stay behind for a couple of days.”
I nodded, pretending to be fine with his plan.
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“Okay,” I agreed, my voice flat.
+25 Points
But my mind was already racing, forming a new, secret path. I knew I couldn’t trust Kyle completely, and I definitely didn’t trust his Beta. The moment we crossed the border, I was going to ditch Elias and run. Solo. I wasn’t running to another pack; I was running away from this life.
I turned my head for one last look. Through the trees, I could see the tall, proud outline of the home I had called mine for too long.
I didn’t regret leaving. I didn’t regret the plan, the drugs, or the theft. I only regretted that I couldn’t say a proper goodbye to the man I loved, the one I had shared so much life with.
But this silent, messy, broken escape was what was best for the two of us. It had to be.
I turned my back fully on the pack house and followed Elias deeper into the darkness, towards a
freedom I wasn’t sure I could truly find.
