Chapter 1
I spent six years inside a top-secret laboratory.
No name, only a code number, until the Council finally approved my request to return.
When my car came to a stop outside my husband Derek’s company headquarters, the monitor on my wrist suddenly buzzed.
Anna’s wolf-soul readings were abnormal: Her fear level was spiking.
I shoved the door open.
My daughter, who was supposed to be in class, stood before a woman.
The woman was holding a little boy by the hand.
“Kneel.”
I watched her bark it out.
She even lifted her hand. Then, the next second, her palm landed on my daughter’s face.
A sharp, crispy sound.
I saw Anna’s knees bend, inch by inch.
Dust smeared onto the hem of her school uniform skirt.
Rage detonated in my chest. I charged over and slapped the woman across the face.
For one heartbeat, time froze.
“Auntie, run!”
Anna snapped back to herself, her face chalk-white.
“That’s my dad’s assistant, Ruby. If you hit her, she won’t let you go…”
I fought to keep my temper leashed, pain twisting in my heart.
“An assistant thinks she gets to make you kneel?”
Anna’s eyes turned red, but she didn’t explain. She only tried to push me away.
“Please. Go. Now.”
Ruby got back up and blocked my path.
“You bitch. You’re not going anywhere.”
She sneered, arrogance dripping off her.
“In Dragon Blood Pack, Derek is the king. You hit me, you’re challenging Derek!”
Just a Beta threw her weight around because someone was her backup.
I thought, disgust curling in my gut.
I took a deep breath and dialed the number I hadn’t called in six years.
The receiver carried background noise—low voices in discussion, paper shuffling.
He was in a meeting.
“Your assistant says if I hit her, I’m challenging you. Fine. Today, I’ll make sure you lose face.”
Silence on the other end for two seconds.
I heard the faint pause in his breathing and two taps on a tabletop.
“I don’t care what backwater you crawled out of, you nameless Rogue, and I don’t care how you got my number.”
Derek’s voice came through, iced over.
“Just for that threat alone, no one can save you.”
Behind him, a woman’s voice murmured, soft and amused.
It was quiet, but I heard it.
The next second, the line went dead.
I stood there holding my phone, stunned.
It wasn’t that Derek couldn’t recognize my voice. It wasn’t that he didn’t recognize my number.
With another woman listening, he chose his response.
That brief pause, those two seconds, was his answer.
When he hung up on me, Ruby’s smile turned blinding.
As if that split-second flicker of unease when I dialed had never happened.
“Bitch, I thought you were somebody.”
She leaned in close.
“Turns out you’re just a clown who come from nowhere.”
My fists clenched until my knuckles ached.
Yeah. Six whole years, I’d vanished without a trace.
Stuck in a place satellites couldn’t even lock onto, doing the same experiments day after day after day.
Derek changing was something I’d expected.
But when I left, he promised he would take care of our daughter.
The little girl I remembered always smiling was now thin as paper.
Her eyes were timid, like a skittish pup.
“Come on. I’m taking you home.”
I took Anna’s hand, determined to get her out of here first.
Everything I’d owed her these six years, I would make up for it, no matter what it cost.
“Leaving?”
Ruby stepped in front of me.
“What, you trying to imprison me and take away my freedom?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Freedom?”
“Freedom? In Dragon Blood Pack you want to talk to me about freedom? Even the air you’re breathing right now belongs to Alpha Derek!”
She shouted aggressively.
My expression hardened.
To compensate for what I’d given, the Council had supported Derek in secret more times than he’d ever know.
They’d raised him from Gamma to Alpha of Dragon Blood Pack.
And this was what that favor had bred, wolves drunk on borrowed power.
Suddenly, Anna wrenched free from my hand and dropped to her knees with a thud.
“Ruby, she didn’t mean it. I’ll apologize for her…”
My heart seized.
The wolf in my chest roared.
It caught the stink of Anna’s fear.
Ruby curled her lip. Before she could speak, the little boy beside her rolled his eyes, scheming.
“Wanna apologize? Fine.” He pointed at the toy plane on the ground. “Lick it clean, and I’ll let her go.”
Anna’s face changed.
“Jack, I, I’m your sister. How can you make me…?”
She didn’t finish.
“Ugh!”
The boy cut her off.
“You’re just Dad and some dead woman’s bastard. I’m the only kid Dad and Mom have. So are you licking it or not?”
Anna looked at me once.
“I’ll do it.”
She lowered her head, stuck out her tongue and leaned toward the little plane coated in dust.
