My mother stiffens. The color is completely gone from her face now. She looks like a ghost, haunting me in this field.
Suddenly, the life drains from me, too. All the air leaves my lungs.
My fingers curl into the front of her dress, gripping the fabric hard enough that my nails tear it slightly. “Tell me I’m wrong.” My voice shakes. “Tell me you didn’t know. Tell me you didn’t know Darius and I were fated mates.”
Her expression twists. Guilt. Fear. Shame.
She knew. She knew!
“I’ve spent years protecting you, Violet,” she hisses. “Years. I sent you away so that he wouldn’t cross paths with you. But now, you’re here. And you’ve been with him.”
The laugh that escapes me is bitter. Broken. I release her dress with a huff. “He doesn’t want me, Mom.” I choke out the words. “I rejected him. He wanted to sleep with me, and that was all. He didn’t want me as his mate.”
Relief floods my mother’s face so fast, so completely, that tears actually spring to her eyes.
The sight stuns me.
She’s relieved. Relieved that her daughter rejected her fated mate. Relieved that I’m alone. Unwanted.
“Thank God,” she breathes. Then she’s moving, her hands fluttering. “Okay. Okay, this is good. We can still fix this. I’ll get you a ticket. I’ll send you somewhere far away. Somewhere he’ll never find you. We just need to get you out of here before—”
Lights blaze to life all around us.
Bright. Blinding. Coming from every direction.
My mother’s arm shoots out, grabbing me and yanking me behind her. She tries to plant herself between me and the lights like a shield, but she can’t. They’re everywhere.
I’m in shock. She’s trying to protect me.
My mother. The woman who slapped me whenever I forgot to take my medication. Who shipped me off to another country the moment I became inconvenient. Who couldn’t even look at me most days because I reminded her too much of what she’d lost.
She is putting herself between me and danger.
The realization sends a sharp spike through my chest. No time to examine it, as a sound echoes across the field. The sound of slow, mocking clapping.
“How clever.”
Zion’s voice cuts through the darkness beyond the lights. He emerges from the glare to our left. Tall. Lean. Moving like a predator going in for the kill.
My heart stops.
“I always wondered,” Zion continues, his tone conversational, “why a female would seduce an alpha with two sons when she knew her own daughter was a weakling who would be ostracized in the pack.” He steps closer, and now I can make out his features. That familiar smirk. Those cold, calculating eyes. “And then I had your little pills tested, Violet. Imagine my surprise when I discovered what they were really for. After that, it was just a matter of watching. Waiting. When I saw Anne come to the main house today, I knew she was arranging a meeting. So, I followed your mother here.”
He keeps approaching, rattling an object in his hand. As he gets closer, the lights illuminate what he’s holding.
My pill bottle.
“Now it all makes sense,” he continues.
But I don’t understand. Can’t piece together what he’s saying. I look at my mother, but her eyes are staring straight at Zion, her body rigid.
“Mom?” My voice shakes. “What’s going on?”
Zion tilts his head, studying us like insects under glass. “Two hybrids living under our roof. You two really are clever.”
The word hits me like ice water.
Hybrids.
