He felt me, the bond carrying my presence and my uncertainty straight to him, giving me away before I could choose my next step.
I freeze in place, spine snapping straight the way it does when you know you’ve been caught red-handed.
Blowing a slow breath, I push the door open.
The room is fuller than I expected, and the sudden attention hits me all at once. Rook and Canaan are here, just as I knew they would be, but pack enforcers join them where they lean over the long glass table. Cerys stands near the far end, arms crossed, her purple faux-hawk sticking up like she’s been taking her nervous energy out on it. Amara is here too, both palms braced on the table.
The glass surface is buried beneath pictures, plans, and territory maps. Lines drawn and redrawn over and over on them. Symbols I don’t understand marked strategically. I don’t need everything explained to understand what I’m looking at. Patrol routes. Wards. Defensive points and spell locations.
My gaze lifts to the far wall and my steps faulter. It’s been converted into a grid of television screens I’m certain weren’t here the last time I stepped foot in this room. Every one of them is on, each streaming live footage from somewhere out in the territory. Hunting cameras, if I had to guess. Equipped with night vision and motion sensors.
Holy shit. This isn’t a meeting room anymore. It’s a command center.
Every set of eyes is on me as I take it in.
Heart skipping, I’m suddenly very aware of myself, of how out of place I must look in this room that smells of tension and too many long, stressful hours.
Without breaking eye contact, Rennick straightens and steps back from the head of the table. Wordlessly, he holds his handout to me, palm up, a silent invitation that quiets the urge I have to turn on my heel and leave.
I cross the room to him and take it.
The second I’m close enough, he folds me into his side, the familiar and comforting weight of his arm coming down around my waist. His head dips and he presses a kiss into my hair, the gesture private even with the room watching.
“There you are,” he murmurs against my head, meant only for me, even though I know every shifter in the room hears it. “Hi, sweet one.”
“Hey,” I tell him back under my breath as my attention bounces between each person standing around the table. “I’m sorry,” I tell them all. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
Didn’t you?the voice in my head whispers because,clearly, it’s not on my side at all.
Amara, already gathering her things, waves me off. “We were just finishing up.” She looks at me a second longer than necessary, all her sharp edges easing just enough for a faint smile to appear. It’s so rare on her face that I don’t know how to react. “I’m relieved to see with my own eyes that you’re doing well, Noa.” Her voice carries that maternal cadence she’s used with me before, and just as it did the first time I heard it, it takes me by surprise, even when it settles warmly inside me.
Then she’s walking to the door, Cerys mock-saluting me as she follows close behind.
The enforcers linger, shifting where they stand. One of them stands noticeably straighter than the others, posture rigid enough to read as militant. His face gives nothing away. I think his name is Mercer, if my memory from the first meeting here is right, though names were traded in a messy blur that day. He could just as easily be a Frank for all I know. Two unfamiliar enforcers flank him.
Rennick’s arm tightens slightly at my waist as he looks at them. “Make sure the new patrol schedules and routes are passed out to all enforcer teams.”
Mercer inclines his head. “Alpha.” When he steps past us, his gaze catches mine and he dips his chin again. “Luna.”
I’m too flustered to offer him an appropriate response, instead, I’m fairly certain I just blink at the man. Once. Then twice. Like a dork. Hearing someone in the pack other than Rennick use the title makes it land differently. Because it’s no longer a hypothetical anymore, no longer am I“the rightful future Luna”. Iamthe Luna and Mercer just recognized me as such.
Pack Luna.
Me.
My wolf, still residing just beneath my skin, lifts her head, tail flicking, and settles into the rightness of it immediately. Me? I’m going to take longer to adjust.
The rest of the enforcers file out after him, boots thudding against the hardwood floors, the door closing softly behind them.
The shift in the room happens fast.
Rennick exhales, the tension draining out of his shoulders now that he doesn’t have to beon. With just Rook and Canaan left, his closest friends, the weight of leadership settles differently in him. He doesn’t shed it entirely—he’s not wired for that—but he’s no longer wearing it as armor.
“How’s it going?” I ask, attention hopping between the three of them. They’re all running on the same edge, exhausted from hours of strategizing but wound tight in the same breath, ready to act at any given second if the call comes.
I feel that familiar instinct to take care of people rise and I’m already wondering when each of them last ate when Rook’s dry laugh cuts through my thoughts.
“Oh, we’re living the dream, beautiful,” he chirps, flashing a wolfish grin in my direction as he stretches his arms over his head. “Nothing spices up a boring weekday like planning for a coven of fucking witches to crash the party. And if they’re anything like your witch friends, we’re all at risk for someminorimpaling.”
