Chapter 2

Hali Alston POV:

An hour later, I dragged my trembling, aching body back to the Alston family castle. Barak Schaefer was waiting in the living room, his expression dark and furious.

Before I could even speak, he hurled a thick stack of bloodline disownment documents at my face. The paper edges sliced my cheek, scattering white sheets across the floor.

He sneered. "A defiled, wolfless piece of trash dares to come back? Do you still think you deserve the Alston name?"

I stared at the documents on the floor, my hands twisting my coat into a tight ball.

Barak stood at the top of the steps, his thinning hair slicked back and his murky eyes filled with disgust and greed. Three years after my mother died, he'd seized control of the family estate and treated my brother and me like garbage.

"Sign the papers and get out of Emerald Bay," he said, jerking his chin toward the door.

I looked up sharply, tears blurring my vision. "Jermaine is still in the ICU! You promised you'd keep paying for his life-support crystal array if I attended the banquet at the Aurora Territory Hotel!"

Barak snorted, folding his arms across his chest. "That crippled Alpha? I had his breathing tubes pulled at midnight last night. He's nothing but ashes now."

A buzzing filled my head. The blood in my veins turned to ice.

"You lied to me!" I lunged at him, my fingernails reaching for his face. "Jermaine is a war hero! How dare you kill him?"

Barak didn't even blink. He kicked me squarely in the stomach. His ring flashed beneath the chandelier as I flew backward and slammed onto the stone floor, bile and blood surging up my throat.

"Guards!" he barked, straightening his suit.

Two Gamma guards in black uniforms rushed in, twisted my arms behind my back, and dragged me toward the heavy oak doors.

"Throw this shameless thing outside the territory gates!" Barak shouted after us. "If she dares set foot in Emerald Bay again, kill her!"

The guards hauled me down the gravel driveway and flung me through the wrought-iron gates. My knees smashed against the jagged stones, and blood seeped into the torn hem of my clothes.

Thunder cracked overhead, and torrential rain poured down. Freezing water washed over my bruised face, carrying my blood and tears into the mud. I dug my fingers into the wet gravel, my teeth chattering as hatred burned through my chest.

Suddenly, headlights sliced through the curtain of rain. A gray medical sedan screeched to a halt beside the ditch, and the driver's door flew open.

Doyle Herrera, the chief medical officer of the pack clinic and the senior apprentice brother who had always protected me, ran into the storm without an umbrella. He dropped to his knees in the mud and pulled my shivering body into his arms.

"Hali! Hold on!" His voice trembled. "I'm getting you out of here!"

His warm healing aura enveloped my freezing shoulders. I rested my forehead against his rain-soaked coat, and the last of my strength gave out. My fingernails dug into my palms as darkness swallowed me.

That very night, Doyle secretly took me away. We traveled thousands of miles north to a remote border town where nobody knew me.

Six weeks later, inside a tiny examination room at a border clinic, Doyle approached me with a trembling ultrasound sheet in his hand.

"Hali..." His throat tightened, his eyes widening. "You're pregnant. Twins... Their lupine bloodline is terrifyingly strong."

I froze and slowly lowered my gaze, placing my cold hand on my flat stomach. Two tiny heartbeats throbbed beneath my skin. Little by little, the fear faded from my eyes, replaced by the icy resolve of a mother wolf protecting her cubs.

More than five years passed in the blink of an eye.

Bright afternoon sunlight streamed through the glass dome of the Emerald Bay International Airport terminal. The automatic doors slid open before me.

I walked out of the VIP arrival channel in a tailored white trench coat, my silver-white curls resting on my shoulders and my ice-blue eyes hidden behind frameless glasses. A specially prepared herbal tincture sealed away my scent and high-tier aura, making me appear to be an ordinary Healer.

Two five-year-old children walked beside me, drawing stares from everyone around us.

My son, Darrion Alston, wore a miniature black suit. His hands were tucked into his pockets as he tapped away at the tablet mounted on his wrist, his brows furrowed in concentration.

My daughter, Arden Alston, had her soft hair tied into twin pigtails. She held on to the hem of my coat with one hand.

Arden wrinkled her tiny nose, sniffed the air twice, and tugged at my sleeve. "Mommy, there are so many stinky smells here. I don't like it."

I crouched on one knee and straightened the silk bow at her collar. "Don't be afraid, sweetheart. This time, Mommy has come back to reclaim everything that belongs to us."

"Hali!"

I looked up. Doyle hurried toward us in a crisp white lab coat, his warm brown eyes filled with relief and an unspoken longing. He stopped in front of me.

"Five years, Hali," he said softly. "You've finally agreed to come home."

I stood and gave him a brief, polite hug. "Thank you for the recommendation, Senior Brother Doyle. Without you, I wouldn't have been able to join the Central Medical Institute so smoothly as a specially appointed Healer."

Before Doyle could reply, Darrion pushed his tiny sunglasses up the bridge of his nose and looked up expressionlessly.

"Uncle Doyle, I just finished cracking fifty percent of the encryption on the in-vitro fertilization medical file you created for Mommy five years ago. I worked on it during the flight."

The smile froze on Doyle's face. He coughed hard and shot an awkward glance toward the luggage cart, his fists tightening inside his pockets.

I sighed helplessly and ruffled my son's dark hair. "Darrion, don't be rude to your elders. Put your tablet away and get in the car."

We left the terminal and climbed into the black MPV Doyle had been waiting in. As the vehicle merged onto Emerald Bay's central avenue, a massive three-dimensional holographic screen covering the side of a skyscraper lit up ahead.

It was broadcasting a live press conference for the Blackstone Consortium, the corporate empire of the Dark Night Pack.

Arjun Kane stood at the center of the giant screen in a tailored charcoal suit. Even through a digital projection, his broad shoulders and razor-sharp jaw radiated a crushing dominance that made low-ranking wolves on the street instinctively lower their heads.

Standing right beside him was Kamryn Haynes, a diamond tiara glittering in her blonde hair as she clung intimately to his muscular arm.

Through the tinted car window, I stared at the radiant, arrogant woman who had stolen my life. A cold, mocking smile lifted the corner of my lips.

"Enjoy the spotlight while you can, Kamryn," I whispered. "Everything you stole from me will be repaid in blood."