Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Luca’s POV
I slammed my gloved fist into the dummy’s jaw, savoring the sharp burst of pain that shot through my knuckles and up my arm.
My muscles burned. Sweat slicked my forehead, dripping into my eyes, blurring my vision.
But I didn’t need to see. I knew exactly where the target was—its jaw, its gut—like the back of my own hand.
I landed a second strike. Then another. And another. Each hit faster, harder, more precise than the last.
This was the one place I let go. The only place I allowed myself to unleash the fury I kept buried beneath the controlled silences.
I started Krav Maga five years ago. After Leila’s betrayal.
It cut deep. Deeper than I ever admitted.
Left me with a fury I couldn’t contain, no matter how many boardrooms I dominated or how many zeros padded my bank account.
So, I came here. Every morning. Every goddamn day.
And I hit things until my body hurt more than my heart did, until the ache in my fists dulled the grief pulsing through my wolf.
Eventually, it became less frequent—four times a week, then two. Sometimes less. Before she walked back into my life, I hadn’t been here in over a week.
But seeing her again…
It cracked something open. The same ache. The same rage. But now it wasn’t just about pain.
It was about control.
Because the wolf inside me—my wolf—was losing it. Pacing. Prowling. Howling to claim what it still believed was ours. Urging me to go to her, to touch her, to forgive her. Like the years of betrayal meant nothing.
This…this was the only thing keeping me sane.
“Whoa, man. If that dummy could talk, it’d be screaming for mercy,” came Charles’ voice as he walked into the gym, his bag slung over one shoulder and a garment bag clutched in the other.
I drove my fist into the dummy’s gut. Hard.
Charles let out a low whistle. “Okay, yeah. You definitely have a personal vendetta.”
“You’re late,” I said without looking at him.
“Apparently calling a high-end designer to rush a delivery now gets you flagged as a prank caller. Who knew?” He dropped the garment bag carefully onto the bench. “Besides, didn’t you say the shoot’s at three p.m.? We’ve still got about thirty minutes.”
The photoshoot. To announce the marriage between Elena and I.
There wasn’t supposed to be one. My plan had been simple: pay the city’s biggest media outlet to run an exclusive on the engagement, feed them doctored shots of Elena and me together—glamorous, clean, fabricated. End of story.
But Elena had other plans.
She wanted a spectacle. A grand announcement the whole damn city would choke on. And with Sterling suddenly dragging his feet on logistics, I needed to give him a reason to believe this marriage was more than a power arrangement. I needed to prove I was all in.
Which meant getting dressed. Standing in front of a camera. And pretending to be happy.
The thought alone made me slam my fist into the dummy’s neck, damn near taking its head off. I’d rather be anywhere but in that suit beside Elena, pretending she meant something to me. Pretending this was real.
“Wow, Luca.” Charles began strapping on his gloves just as I paused to take a swig of water. “I’m guessing your little visit to Leila’s house didn’t go too well.”
My wolf stirred. Just her name jolted it awake—like a thousand volts of lightning to the spine.
I tossed the empty bottle into the corner and exhaled hard, chest heaving.
“Want to go hand to hand?”
“Oh, hell no. Not when you’re like this. You’ll take my head clean off in the name of Krav Maga. Or worse—knock out a few teeth. And have you seen me lately? I’m too old to grow new ones.”
“Don’t be a chicken.”
“I’d rather be a chicken with a full set of teeth, thanks. Besides, where’s Tate? I thought you usually do this with him. At least he can take a hit and not whine for two weeks.”
Tate was the gym’s owner and my personal instructor. The closest thing I had to a friend outside of Charles.
“He’s out of town. Which means it’s just you and me. Didn’t you run your mouth last time about turning me and pinning me down?”
“Yeah. Last time, you weren’t…like this.”
I rolled my shoulders, bounced lightly on the balls of my feet. Let out a slow breath. “Trust me, Charles—I’ve never been more in control. Let’s go a few rounds.”
He gave in. I knew if I stroked his ego the right way, he’d bite. Charles always had a chip on his shoulder when it came to me and Krav Maga. He’d been training here longer—ten years, if I remembered right. But in under five, I’d caught up. Maybe even surpassed him.
That didn’t sit well with him.
“So…” he said, taking his stance and circling me. He threw a punch that I dodged without effort. “What happened at Leila’s place? She shove the Labubu in your face?”
That would’ve been better.
I threw a sharp jab toward his chest. He ducked and swept his leg low to trip me, but I jumped back just in time.
I landed hard, the jolt of pain shooting up my legs. Good. I welcomed it.
“She has a son,” I said, jaw locked tight.
Charles’ eyes widened, and in that split second of surprise, I landed a punch square in his gut.
“Okay—time out.” He dropped to one knee with a groan, clutching his side. “She has a what?”
“A son,” I repeated, more quietly this time.
“She’s married?”
“No. She’s not.”
“So…how did she get a son?”
“That’s what I would like to know, too.”
Charles regarded me for a moment in silence. “Does it bother you that she has one?”
Yes.
It fucking bothered me that she could let another man touch her.
That someone else got to feel her moan under him, got to bury himself in the body I used to worship with my hands, my mouth, my whole damn soul.
When I couldn’t even look at another woman without seeing her.
Her curves. That perfect ass I used to trace with my hands like it was mine. Because it was.
But that wasn’t what twisted me up inside.
What truly bothered me was the connection.
The moment I saw the kid, my wolf surged—like it recognized him before I did. Every time his scent resurfaced in my memory, it gripped me. Deep. Primal. And familiar. Too damn familiar. His scent was a blend of mine and hers.
The resemblance clawed at me—his hair, his eyes, even the cadence of his voice. Instinct screamed what logic tried to deny. He was mine.
But Leila had said otherwise.
And once upon a time, I would’ve believed anything that came out of her mouth. After what happened five years ago, I’d trained myself not to believe a damn word.
I unwrapped the gloves from my wrists and dropped onto the bench with a heavy breath. “He has my eyes. And my hair color.”
Charles shot me a look—pity, maybe. Like he thought I was losing my mind and understood why.
I cut it down with a glare.
“Call me paranoid,” I muttered, “but something doesn’t add up.”
“How old is the boy?”
“He can’t be a day older than four.”
Charles paused, processing. “That’s right around when you two broke up. You said she cheated on you. Could the kid be from that affair?”
My jaw clenched.
I’d replayed the photos of Leila in another man’s bed in my head more times than I cared to admit. But even that didn’t explain the pull I felt toward that boy. The…knowing.
It was like I’d known him my whole life.
“I don’t know, Charles.” I raked a hand through my hair and exhaled. “I don’t know anything about her anymore. I don’t even recognize the Leila I knew. She’s changed so much. And if she did have my kid and kept it from me this long—” I shook my head. “That’s betrayal on another level.”
I stared past Charles, my jaw clenched. “I’m getting a DNA test.”
He looked at me sharply. “You really want to go down that road? The Leila I knew would never agree to it.”
“I don’t need her permission.”
Charles regarded me for a second. “Luca, think about what this means. You’ve got a wedding in three weeks—”
“I need to know,” I cut in. “If he’s mine, I’m not walking away from that.”
He hesitated, then exhaled. “You’ll need something of his. A strand of hair. A toothbrush. Anything.”
There was no way I’d get into her house to grab a toothbrush.
But if I could get close enough… close enough to the boy, a single strand of hair would be all I needed.
Usually, humans would need five to ten strands of hair.
for parentage sampling. However, for werewolf shifters, due our enhanced genetic markers, just a single strand is sufficient.
The alarm on my watch beeped. It was time for that dreadful photoshoot.
I stood, gym bag in one hand, the garment bag in the other. “Get me everything you can find on the boy. Try the name Ollie Carter. Look under that.” I said, assuming he bore Leila’s last name since there was no sign of a father figure or any man in her life.
“Got it,” Charles replied without missing a beat.
I headed to the locker room, showered quickly, and changed into the three-piece suit Charles had picked up from my designer. Navy blue, sharply cut, hand-stitched—another piece in this farce. Then I slid behind the wheel of my car and drove to the studio.
By the time I arrived, Elena was already there, draped in a silk gown that sparkled beneath the ring lights.
A stylist fussed over her makeup like she was royalty, while the crew adjusted gold-lined backdrops, positioned chandeliers low enough to catch the light just right, and laid a carpet of pale rose petals along the floor.
Subtlety was dead here.
I suppressed a groan. This was going to be pure torture.
“I don’t have all day, Elena,” I said as I brushed past her entourage. “Let’s get this over with.”
She turned slightly, her lips curling into a glossy smile. “Charming as always.”
Then, more casually, “So…how did the meeting with Leila go?”
I glanced at her, but didn’t stop walking.
“She didn’t give you a hard time, did she?” Elena pressed. “She can be a bit slow-witted sometimes. You know she doesn’t really understand our world.”