Chapter 18 - Declan
The door to my office burst open. My head shot up, body tensing as I waited for an attack. I relaxed when I saw Chris, Will, and Jackson at the door, but then I saw the identical grim expressions on their faces. Jackson’s eyes blazed in anger, as if he was looking for someone’s throat to rip out and would go after the first person who gave him even the slightest excuse.
“What is it?” I demanded. “Is someone hurt?” They had come in without knocking or warning, meaning it was something big, which also usually meant something bad. My mind immediately went to Mira, my wolf panicking that she had somehow been injured, though I knew how irrational that thought was.
“Not exactly,” Will said. He glanced at Jackson, still bristling with rage, before he stepped further into the office. He clutched a file in his hand.
“Dragging it out isn’t going to make it any better,” I growled. I held out my hand. “What is it?”
Will hesitated, this time looking over to Chris.
“He’s going to have to know eventually,” Chris told him. To me, he added, “Just prepare yourself.”
“You guys aren’t exactly giving me a whole lot of confidence with all this,” I said. “Tell me now.”
Taking a deep breath, Will stepped forward and plopped the file in my hand. “We’ve been digging into that murder, like you asked.”
I tensed, hand on the lip of the folder to flip it open as I regarded Will. “Am I about to see something that implicates Mira?” I asked.
“Kind of the exact opposite, actually,” Will responded. “It’s definitely not her.”
My shoulders relaxed. “Then what the hell are you guys so nervous about?”
“Because we think we know who did it,” Chris said.
“And why,” Jackson growled. His hands had lengthened to claws, and he appeared ready to tear someone to shreds.
I glanced at Will, one eyebrow raised. If what they were telling me was true and someone had framed Mira, I couldn’t blame Jackson for being livid. But I needed level-headedness right now, not rage.
“This will explain things.” Will dropped the file on my desk. “Better if you read it yourself instead of listening to us.”
I opened the file. I scanned the first page, then stiffened. Halfway down the page, I restarted, rereading the paper, half-convinced I had misread. There was no way what I was reading was true. But there it was, in black and white.
I pulled my attention away from the file and regarded the others. They all looked as though they expected me to explode at any second. For good reason. It was taking all my willpower to remain calm.
“How certain are you about this?” I asked.
“I’m positive.” Will nodded to the pages in front of me. “The rest of the papers provide the evidence.”
I nodded, staring back down at the file as the rage began to boil inside me. Jackson’s anger suddenly made perfect sense. I was feeling that same fury. But I forced myself to keep my cool. Because the information Will had just presented me necessitated it.
“If you’re wrong,” I said, “you’d start a war. And if you’re right, then we’ve got a bigger problem on our hands than we thought.”
“We know,” Chris said. “We checked it a dozen times. We wouldn’t be showing you this if we weren’t positive.”
“Harrison is the one who killed the other shifter,” Will said.
“The bastard did it to force her hand,” Jackson spat. “He did this so she would marry him. He knew that she would have to say yes if he framed her. ”
I didn’t say anything for a long moment. Instead, I focused on the file in front of me. I scrutinized every page and every detail, not because I didn’t believe my team—I knew how capable they were—but because if there was even a shred of doubt to anyone else that they were wrong, the backlash would be enormous. The evidence had to be ironclad.
On top of that, focusing on the file made it easier to contain the anger still growing inside me. I was livid. My wolf was snarling, flexing his claws, howling in rage, wanting to go right this minute and find Harrison and tear him to shreds. He wasn’t alone. It was taking all my strength not to succumb to my baser instincts. But we had to handle this delicately. Running in and challenging Harrison to a fight, alpha to alpha, wasn’t going to do any good.
“What are you waiting for?” Jackson snarled. “We should be going and killing the asshole right now. We’ve got everything we need.”
“We have to move slowly,” I cautioned.
“Like hell,” Jackson snapped. “We should—”
“We have to go about this the right way,” I growled at Jackson, cutting him off. “Believe me, I’m just as pissed as you are. We’re going to go after him, but this just became a lot more complicated.”
A dull throb had formed at my temple. I let out a low growl as I massaged my forehead, my thoughts swimming and refusing to settle. I wasn’t going to be able to come up with anything solid or rational right now.
“I need time to think,” I said. “And before we do anything, Mira deserves to know what happened. I’ll tell her,” I said, cutting Jackson off before he could offer.
He shot me a frustrated look. When I met his gaze, his jaw clenched, but he gave a short, reluctant nod of concession.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “Harrison’s going to pay for this one way or the other. We’re going to expose him, and make sure he gets what’s coming to him.” I stood, gathering the papers and tucking them in the file. “But first, I’m going to tell Mira.”
***
I found her in the living room, watching TV. She had a pensive look on her face, as though the TV was supposed to be a distraction that wasn’t doing its job. She didn’t notice me at first until I cleared my throat. Her eyes widened as her head spun toward me.
“Oh!” She jumped to her feet.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” I said, musing that I had given her quite the fright. I hadn’t seen her this nervous or jumpy since she had first arrived at the mansion.
“You’re fine,” she stammered. “I just wasn’t expecting you to come back so early. Is there something wrong?”
If I hadn’t been so preoccupied, I might have noted she was being as jumpy as when she was hiding what had happened with her old pack. I might have noticed the slightly wild, caught-prey look in her eyes. But as it stood, I didn’t notice anything was wrong.
“I’ve got news for you,” I said.
She frowned, her back going rigid. “What type of news?” she asked warily.
“The type of news you’ll want to sit down for,” I answered.
She gave a short jerk of a nod, then walked over to the couch and sat. “What’s going on?” she asked as I came to sit next to her.
There was no way of sugarcoating what was happening or what I had done. Best to just rip the band-aid off. “I’ve had the team do some research into the murder,” I said.
She immediately stiffened, face blanching. “You what?”
“I could tell something was wrong with the whole thing, so I wanted to do a little mini-investigation.” I held out the file. “This proves you didn’t do it.”
Relief washed over her entire body, and she beamed. “That’s amazing!” she said. “We can hand it over to Harrison, and—”
I held up my hand, and she fell silent. “Read this.” I handed over the file. “You’ll see the complication pretty quickly.”
She sat down, opening the file and beginning to read. I watched as the confusion in her expression mutated to shock and then horror. Her hand flew to her mouth.
“Oh my God,” she said, her voice little more than a hoarse whisper, muffled even further by her hand. Then, “Oh my God.”
She flipped through the pages, her face growing paler every moment. I waited in silence, letting her read through everything and allowing her to process it on her own. When she got to the end, she remained silent, staring down at the last page without really seeing it.
“Are you all right?” I asked when she remained silent for some time.
Blinking, she glanced back up, as though being dragged back down to reality. She took a deep breath, then glanced back at the file resting in her lap.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “It’s a lot to process.”
“In a way, this is a good thing,” I pointed out. When she gave me a bewildered look, one eyebrow arched in disbelief, I explained. “This is enough to depose Harrison. If we bring this to your old pack, with the evidence we’ve found, they’re not going to be able to ignore it, especially if you have the Gold Wolves supporting your story.”
I thought she would look relieved. Instead, she appeared more frightened than anything else.
“I don’t know.” She picked at the edge of the folder, brow furrowed. “There’s no guarantee they’ll actually listen. What if it makes it even worse?”
I reached out and took her hand. She stiffened for a moment, then relaxed, not pulling away.
“If they don’t believe us, then we’ll go to the Wolf’s Council,” I said. “And trust me, the council will take our side. We’ve done too much good for them to do anything else.”
She bit her lip, her leg jittering up and down as she deliberated. “I think we should just let it be,” she said.
I stared, wondering if I had heard her correctly. “What?”
“I appreciate what you’re trying to do,” she said, not looking at me. “Really, I do. It was really kind. But you’re just going to make things worse. I don’t want to bring the council into this.”
My mouth had dropped open. How could she be serious? “You’re just going to let a murderer keep coming after you?” I demanded. “You’re going to let a murderer keep running a pack?”
She flinched at the second statement but kept her head high as she met my gaze, her eyes resolute. “I don’t want to cause more trouble than I already have,” she said. “Eventually, Harrison will realize that what he’s doing isn’t going to work, and he’ll give up. Then, we can all go back to our normal lives. I don’t want to bring the whole pack into it and potentially risk a war. You know he’s going to say you fabricated all the evidence.”
“We can prove that we didn’t,” I countered. But she was still shaking her head.
“It’s best to just let things play out and take their own course instead of interfering,” she argued. “They’ll work themselves out in the end.”
“Like they did when you had to flee your old pack?” I pointed out.
She winced, and I could see a flash of anger as her back stiffened at the accusation. I had struck a nerve.
“That was different,” she said. “Interfering is only going to make things worse than they already are.”
“You’re being absurd,” I snarled, getting to my feet. “That mentality isn’t going to change anything, and you have to know deep down that it’s complete and utter bullshit.”
She jutted out her chin. “I don’t want to get any more involved. The matter’s settled. Harrison isn’t going to come after me. If we start waving this around, then he’s going to come back. It’s best to just let things be. My old pack will figure out the truth on their own eventually. They’ll take care of it themselves, and we can go about our own lives. That has to be the better solution.”
“It’s not over,” I insisted. “Harrison came to my office. It’s not going to change until we do something.”
Her mouth dropped open, fright filling her eyes as her body tensed. I had hoped I would be able to keep this information from her to avoid exactly this interaction.
I crouched so I was at eye level with her, taking both of her hands in mine. Her scent brushed over me. Something smelled different about it than usual, just a faint trace. Probably anger or nerves. Not important at the moment. I pushed the thought from my head.
“I know you’re scared,” I said. “And that’s completely understandable. But confronting Harrison is the best way out of this. You have to trust me on this.”
“Trust you…” she said the words slowly, as though rolling them around on her tongue to try them out.
“Yes,” I said. “Trust me.”
Her eyes locked on mine and narrowed. She pulled her hands from mine and stood, walking away before rounding on me again, her jaw tight.
“The last time I trusted you, you broke my heart,” she hissed. She sounded as though she was injecting all the vitriol she could muster into each word. “I trusted you, confided in you, and you rejected me in front of everyone.”
“That was different,” I said, but the words came out hollow and insincere.
She snorted, shaking her head. “Not in the grand scheme of things. It proved I couldn’t rely on you. And why should I trust you now?” she demanded. “It isn’t like you’ve given me much reason to.”
“Much reason?” I echoed. “I protected you when he came to grab you. I could have just handed you over and been done with it. Or maybe how about the fact that I trusted you when you told me you didn’t kill anyone. That isn’t enough reason for you?”
“What about all that?” She gestured at the file. “You went around investigating behind my back. You didn’t think I would want to know? You don’t think that’s its own breach of trust?”
I opened my mouth, then closed it, trying to come up with a reasonable response. “That’s different. I didn’t want you to worry about it or get your hopes up.”
“Unbelievable,” she scoffed. “You still meddled in my life without asking me if I even wanted you to. You know, I thought you had changed.”
I growled. “Are you serious? After all I’ve done to help you, you’re just going to do nothing?”
“I never asked for your help,” she snapped, getting to her feet. “I didn’t want to get married, or be your mate. You made that decision for me.”
“I did because that was the only way to protect you,” I growled back at her. “How the hell do you not see that?”
“You only did it so Dani would have a nanny,” she said.
“Is that really what you think?” I demanded, barely able to believe the words. “Do you think I would go through all this just because I didn’t want to hire a new nanny?”
“Then why?” she fired back, her eyes blazing.
I wanted to tell her the reason why, but the words, as always, stuck in my throat. “I shouldn’t have to explain it to you,” was all I managed to get out. “But if you don’t want my help, then fine.”
“In that case, I might as well just leave,” she said.
The words felt like a sledgehammer to the stomach. My wolf howled his disagreement, not wanting to let Mira out of his sight. In my head, I wanted to beg her to stay, to tell her I wanted her to stay here, that I cared about her, and that was why I had done all of this. I had done it for her, to protect her.
But I didn’t know how to say any of that. I couldn’t admit those feelings. I was supposed to be stone. Telling her the truth would only show that I was weak. I wasn’t going to admit how much I cared for her, not after she had just said she wanted to leave. So I did the only thing I could think to do in the moment.
“Fine,” I snapped. “Go, then.”
I spun on my heels and stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind me.