Chapter 3
The car door swung open from the inside.
Damian sat in the back seat, head down, thumbing through a folder. A cigarette burned down toward the filter between his knuckles, left unsmoked.
The rich scent of cedar rolled out, dry, warm, like a sun-drenched winter forest.
It was nothing like William's sharp fir scent.
Selena froze beside the car. "Damian? What are you doing here?"
Her pitch rose a fraction, barely noticeable, but enough to betray her nerves.
Damian turned a page. "William sent me for the pickup."
"He sent me too," Selena replied.
"Then you can head home."
He didn't bother with any extra words.
Selena pressed her lips together, her nude gloss washing out under the streetlamp. She threw a glance between Damian and me, looking like she had choked down stale coffee.
"Well, take care on the way back, Ella," she said.
The sharp clack of her heels faded down the pavement.
She hurried off, her rhythm scattered, completely stripping away her earlier composure.
The car door remained open.
"Get in." Damian's voice drifted from behind the folder, his eyes still elsewhere.
I could count my interactions with Damian in my previous life on one hand.
As the Blackwood family's second son, he spent his years away from Silverpine running a vineyard up north.
He came back once or twice a year for the Council of Elders dinner and the winter solstice rite, keeping to himself and vanishing the second the dinner wrapped, like an unwilling ghost.
Whenever William brought him up, his voice dripped with casual contempt. "Damian grows grapes. Don't expect him to carry the Blackwood name."
Yet when Damian tracked me down in the slums in my previous life, those golden-brown eyes held no indifference.
I never figured out what was behind that look.
*****
I slid into the seat. The door clicked shut, cutting off the wind and the street noise in an instant.
Inside, only the cedar scent and the soft rustle of pages remained.
"What are you reading?" I asked.
Damian snapped the folder closed, flipping it face-down onto his lap.
"Your medical report," he said.
Blood rushed to my head. "Why—"
"Third drawer in William's study. Passcode is his anniversary with Selena."
He finally looked up.
His golden-brown irises burned deep in the dim cabin, glowing like sunlit autumn amber.
"Your liver panels spiked off the charts last year, your spleen showed signs of enlargement, and your transaminase levels were triple the normal threshold," he said.
Every single detail hit the mark with terrifying precision.
William had the pack doctor run that panel six months ago, but I never saw the results because he assured me my health was perfectly fine.
"Meanwhile, the matching parameters on that donor form specify your exact blood type and tissue antigens with no alternates listed," Damian murmured, dropping his voice low. "That means they were targeting your organ from day one."
The engine purred to life as the car eased out onto the main avenue.
Streaks of amber from the streetlamps swept across the glass, carving sharp angles along Damian's jawline.
"Why are you looking into all this?" I asked.
My voice cracked slightly, sounding rougher than I expected.
Damian ground the dying ember out in the built-in ashtray on the door panel.
"Because at the Council of Elders dinner, William plans to drop a bombshell."
He looked out the window. "He intends to strip you of your Luna title in front of the entire pack, claiming you are barren and unable to carry on the bloodline.
"And Selena will be brought into the manor as a 'surrogate candidate.'"
The car slowed to a halt at a red light.
In the distance, Blackwood Manor perched atop the hill, glowing like a fortress from another world.
Damian turned to face me.
It was the first time all night he looked straight into my eyes.
"You have two choices," he said. "You can head to the manor and let them publicly humiliate you at the dinner. Or..."
He pulled a car key from his pocket and set it on the seat between us. "Take this and drive north to where my territory begins."
The traffic light flashed green ahead.
The car stayed put.
The driver sat quietly, waiting for orders from the back.
My fingers touched the edge of the key, the metal icy cold.
Deep within my consciousness, the wolf that had lain dormant for twenty-three years suddenly snapped her eyes open.
'Cedar.' She murmured that single word in my mind before sinking back into the dark.