Chapter 2

Kendra's POV

"Chase." I say his name in my head, and every breath tastes like blood.

My blood boils over, bones cracking and stretching, and I shoot up taller. Claws punch out from my fingertips, glinting cold.

I kick straight through the floor-to-ceiling window.

"Who's there?" Garrett spins around.

I walk into the room over broken glass, eyes locked on Ivy curled up on the couch, on Chase and Garrett standing in front of her.

"Ken... Kendra?" The color drains out of Chase's face the second he sees me. He takes a half step back, panic flashing in his eyes.

"Traitors don't get to live." My voice comes out ragged. I lunge straight at Garrett, claws tearing through the air toward his throat.

I'm not giving any of them a chance to talk their way out of this. Everyone in this lodge is going to join Irene in death tonight.

Garrett's the Alpha of Crescent Moon Pack, and he's fast. Right before my claws open his throat, he lets out a roar, muscles bulging, thick gray-brown fur sweeping over his body in an instant. He crosses his arms in front of his chest and takes the hit head-on.

Claw meets bone with a crack sharp enough to ring in my ears.

"Kendra! Have you lost your mind? I'm the Alpha, you don't get to touch me!" Garrett glares at me, trying to use every ounce of Alpha authority he's got to bring me to heel.

"Alpha? You don't deserve the title." I laugh, cold. Three years in the Royal Pack, living on the edge of death every single day. My instincts aren't anything these pampered nobodies can match anymore.

I use the force of his block to twist my body midair, and my left leg comes down like a whip, slamming into his side.

Bone snaps, loud. Garrett's massive body flies backward and crashes into the liquor cabinet, bottles shattering everywhere, blood mixing with the spilled alcohol on the floor. He grabs at his caved-in side, screaming.

That body he's always been so proud of just folded under one hit from me.

"Garrett!" Ivy shrieks, white as a sheet, cowering behind the couch.

I don't spare that useless Alpha another glance. I turn, slow, and fix my eyes on Chase.

He flinches, but pulls himself together fast. That same look comes over his face, the one I used to know so well, wounded and sincere. He starts walking toward me. "Kendra, calm down. Let me explain, this isn't what you think. Irene's already gone, nothing's going to change that. If you kill him now, the whole pack is coming after you."

"Explain?" I tilt my head at him. "Explain how you looked the other way just to keep her happy? Or explain how you stood there and watched them rip her heart out?"

Something twitches in Chase's face. He grits his teeth and keeps going. "Kendra, I did it for the pack! Irene kept making calls on her own, she even wanted Ivy gone. Ivy's weak, she'd die without the pack's protection! I was just trying to protect someone who couldn't protect herself. What's wrong with that? Why can't you understand where I was coming from?"

"Understand you?" I laugh so hard tears sting my eyes.

This is the man I loved for years. The man who told me, under the stars, that I was the only thing that ever saved him.

"Chase, you make me sick." I take a step closer. "If I hadn't taken that frost bear's killing blow for you three years ago, do you really think you'd be standing here talking to me about the good of the pack right now?"

Chase's face twists with humiliation.

"Fine, if you won't listen to reason, don't blame me for what happens next." He snarls, his body swelling, and he circles behind me, claws slashing for my back.

I scoff, already turning to counter him, when my heart seizes. Pain shoots down my spine, sharp enough to steal my breath.

It's the old wound, from the day I saved Chase. It never fully healed, not even through everything the Royal Trials put me through, and now, with the rage and the fighting, it tears open again.

For one second, I slow down.

That's all Chase needs. He catches the opening and slams a fist straight into the old wound on my back. I choke, blood spraying from my mouth, and my body pitches forward.

Before I can get up, Chase locks my arms behind me and drives his knee into my spine, pinning me to the floor.

"Get off me! You animal!" I fight him with everything I have.

"You did this to yourself, Kendra." Chase is breathing hard. He pulls a set of silver chains from his belt and clamps them around my wrists.