Chapter 158 AURORA

“You can’t trust me, Aurora,” Dane whispered. “Don’t ever trust me.”

Then I watched the soul of the man I loved disappear out of his own eyes.

It was so strange. One moment he was fully present, the next moment he was the new version of himself. The strange version. The dangerous version.

Goddess help me if I didn’t want this version of him, too.

“Dane?” I whispered.

He blinked and shook his head. When his eyes fell on me, his brow furrowed. Then he turned on his heel and walked away.

I stared for a moment, shocked. By the time I strode after him, he had already disappeared into the press of people in the ballroom.

“Dane, wait!” I tried to keep my voice contained. I wasn’t trying to start a scene. “There are negotiations to be made. That was the whole point of the gala!”

He stopped and turned just as I ran up to him. His eyes blazed gold, and he said, “There will be no negotiations. There will only be surrender or death. Your choice, Luna.”

Then he was gone again, leaving me feeling like my heart had been ripped out of my chest.

I stood there, in the middle of the press of people. At first, I don’t think most of them realized what had happened or who we were. Then, as they did, they started to pull away from me with murmurs of, “Luna!” and “Pardon me, Luna.”

Whispers began. Flashbacks to the last gala hit me, and my stomach twisted. I straightened my spine and looked around with a cool expression on my face. That was all it took. The wolves around me – part of my pack or not – fell silent.

Dane and his shadow wolves walked out the door.

My fists clenched. I knew the other Alphas would be seeking me out soon, looking for an explanation as to why the man who was the whole point of the gala had just left.

“Aurora?”

I turned to see Dane’s sister, Piper, approaching me.

Piper was here with her fiancé, the Alpha of the Cave Springs Pack, Warrick Princeton. He was slightly older than me – well into his 30s – and handsome in a gruff, military way, with buzzed short brown hair and a square jaw.

Except at the moment, I didn’t see him. I just saw the woman I now considered my younger sister and a red mark that was quickly darkening to a bruise on her face.

“Piper!” I went to her and took her hands. Some of the heaviness of Dane’s presence lifted as my concern shifted to her. “What happened to you?”

Piper lifted a hand to her cheek. Her eyes shone as if with unshed tears. “Was that Dane? I – please don’t tell me I missed him!”

The heaviness returned. “Yes. I’m sorry. He…I didn’t think he would leave so easily. The Nameless must want something from us. That must be why he agreed to send Dane here. But Dane didn’t even have time to say what that is.”

Instead, he had come back to me just long enough to kiss me and beg me not to trust him. Goddess, I didn’t know if I would ever recover from that moment.

“Oh.” Piper looked so downcast; I thought her unshed tears must be for missing Dane.

I squeezed her fingers, then pulled her into a hug. “We’ll get him back,” I whispered. “I promise.”

She shivered and held onto me for a second before letting go. I touched her cheek gently, and she winced.

“What is this?” I asked.

Piper’s cheeks turned a shade of rose red that matched her dress. It looked so much nicer on her than Lilliana’s bloody scarlet dress had looked on her – though I might have been biased.

Piper lifted her fingers to her cheek and said, “Champagne cork. A stupid mistake. I heard Dane was here and…”

There was something off about her words. I thought about reaching out to her through the pack bond, but Piper was so private.

“You should go after him,” Piper said. “He can’t just leave!”

I looked after Dane, then nodded. At the very least, I could make sure none of his shadow wolves lingered once he left.

I gave Piper’s hand a final squeeze, then walked away.

PIPER

I watched Aurora go and lifted my hand to my cheek again. The skin was tender, and I pulled it away.

I shivered and looked around the crowd, but I think Warrick had been angry enough that he’d left, especially once he saw me running for Aurora.

I tilted my head down and quietly scooted through the crowd. I needed to find a powder room and fix my makeup so the bruise wouldn’t show.

It was so stupid that the marriage I had arranged for myself was already going this badly, when Warrick and I weren’t even married yet, just engaged.

He was a brute, and I knew it. I thought a few months ago I could tame him. Now I wasn’t so sure…and it might be too late.

I had only approached him about an alliance in the first place because I knew Aurora needed the Cave Springs Pack on her side. Their territory bordered ours, and Warrick was militant enough that he could be a huge asset…or a huge threat if he allied with the Nameless.

I thought I was doing something smart. I didn’t know Warrick was a monster.

I closed my eyes and thought briefly of lilac eyes, dark hair, and an easy smile flitting over scarred lips.

Evander…

But he wasn’t interested in me. He never even stayed around, anymore, always gone on some mission or another.

Near the doors of the ballroom, whispering started.

“Look at him.”

“What happened?”

“I’ve never seen a wolf with so many scars.”

My stomach did a flip.

As if my thoughts had conjured him, Evander stood there. He moved right for me through all the whispers, took my face gently in his hands and said in a low, gruff voice, “Piper. Who did this to you?”