My instincts screamed at me to leave. To get out of there immediately before things escalated further. But before I could even take a step back, Adressa moved.
Fast.
She snatched the cup of tea straight out of my hands.
Before I could react, she tilted it and poured it over her own head.
The liquid splashed down her hair, soaking through the strands and dripping over her face, her neck, her blouse. It wasn't hot anymore, the tea long gone cold, but that didn't matter. The effect was exactly what she wanted.
Then, without hesitation, she slammed the ceramic cup onto the ground.
Right at my feet.
It shattered instantly.
The sharp crack echoed through the den as fragments of porcelain exploded outward. Several pieces skidded across the floor, a few slicing lightly into my ankles.
A sharp sting followed, but I barely registered it.
Adressa stood there, drenched, her hair clinging to her face in messy strands, her blouse soaked and sticking to her skin. The white jasmine of her scent had gone sharp, almost too-sweet, the copper underneath rising as she worked herself toward the picture she wanted. She looked utterly disheveled.
Pitiful.
Humiliated.
Perfect.
This she-wolf wasn't just ruthless. She was terrifying.
Before I could move past her, she stepped forward, blocking my path completely.
And then she screamed.
"Selene! What are you doing?! Why would you hurt me like this?!"
Her voice was high, shrill, and filled with raw, trembling emotion.
It carried. Through the front den, past the half-open doors where Nightbane wolves nursed their morning brews, into the back rooms where enforcers and runners kept their heads down and their ears pricked. Within seconds, the whole den began to stir. Doors opened. Chairs scraped. Wolves rushed in from every direction, drawn by the commotion, nostrils flaring to read the air.
But Adressa wasn't done.
Not even close.
She picked up her coffee, her hand trembling just enough to make it look real, and splashed it across her own chest.
The dark liquid spread quickly across the fabric, staining it unevenly.
Then, just like the night before, she lifted her hand to her neck and began scratching. Hard.
Red marks bloomed instantly across her skin, raw and irritated, as if someone had grabbed her violently.
I stood there, watching.
Something inside me finally snapped. My own wolf, who had crouched silent and seething through every second of this, surged once against my ribs.
Enough.
Before I could think it through, before I could stop myself, I stepped forward and slapped her.
Hard.
The sound rang out, sharp and clear.
Everything went silent. The kind of silence that only falls in a den run by wolves who understand violence. The kind where nobody breathes until they know whose side to take.
And that was the exact moment Salvar walked in.
He saw everything.
Or at least, what it looked like.
Me, standing there, upright, composed.
And Adressa, soaked, disheveled, trembling, like a fragile creature that had just been attacked.
There wasn't even a second of hesitation.
His hand came down across my face.
The force sent my head jerking to the side, a sharp sting blooming across my cheek. Black cedar and cold iron flooded my senses, his Alpha aura crashing down over the room like a dropped weight, pressing every lower wolf toward the floor.
"Selene!" he snapped, his voice cold with anger. "If you don't want to be here anymore, then get the hell out."
He didn't wait for a response.
Still visibly furious, he shoved me aside, his shoulder hitting mine hard enough to make me lose my balance. Then, without another glance in my direction, he bent down, scooped Adressa up into his arms.
A perfect bridal carry.
Like a male rescuing someone who needed saving.
And carried her straight into his office. The heavy door slammed shut behind them, and the silver lighter he'd left on the edge of his desk didn't so much as rattle. It just sat there, still.
I staggered back from the force of his shove, my body colliding with the edge of a nearby desk. Pain shot up my spine instantly, sharp and blinding. My vision blurred for a second as tears welled up in my eyes.
But I didn't cry.
I just stood there.
The front-den overseer, who had been hesitating over my severance papers just minutes ago, now stepped forward without a word. His expression had changed completely.
He picked up the document.
Signed it.
Stamped it.
Approved.
No questions asked. No delay.
Salvar didn't even come out. He didn't look at the form. Didn't ask anything. Someone brought it into his office, and while he was busy soothing Adressa, he scribbled his signature across the page without even glancing at it.
Then tossed it aside like it meant nothing.
Like I meant nothing.
The ledger-keepers moved quickly after that.
Too quickly.
Always eager to stay on the good side of whoever held power in the pack's front den, they rushed to process my final pay, efficiency driven not by duty but by their desire to please the Alpha's favorite.
I still had work to finish. A stack of client materials from the border-route accounts that needed to be handed over properly. So I sat down, sorted everything, organized the files carefully, and prepared to send them to Salvar.
But the moment I tried to log into my account, access denied.
I tried again.
Nothing.
My account had already been deleted. Completely wiped.
There was only one wolf who had the authority to do that.
Salvar.
I paused for a second, staring at the screen.
Then I pulled out my communicator.
I sent him a message.
No response.
I called.
The call didn't even go through.
Blocked.
The spirit-link channel.
Blocked.
Everything. Every possible way of reaching him, gone. And beneath it all, the place where his scent should have lingered in my memory had gone cold, as if even that thread had been cut clean. My wolf made no sound at all. She had simply gone still, the way a creature goes still when it understands the den it trusted is no longer its own.
I stood there for a moment, completely still.
Stunned.
But only for a moment.
Then I exhaled slowly.
I smoothed the edge of my skirt until the crease was sharper than anything I could bring myself to say.
Picked up my bag. Packed the last of my things. Cleared every trace of myself from what I could still access in the system.
And walked out.
No hesitation.
No looking back.
Past the wolves who wouldn't meet my eyes. Past the corridor where an enforcer held the door open for me with the careful neutrality of a male who had already chosen whose name to forget. Past the front entrance of the Nightbane den, where the awning cast its shadow over the path like a territory line.
I didn't go home.
I went straight to the airfield.
