Chapter 7
Dane
The door closes behind Nova with a soft click. Every eye in the lodge turns to me, waiting. My silence is a vacuum they’re all rushing to fill with their own conclusions.
Kari crosses her arms. “So that’s it? She walks in here, accuses half the pack of being manipulated, then just walks out?”
“She has a point,” Ben says, voice low. His eyes meet mine across the room. “Phil was working angles. I felt it too.”
Marcus scoffs. “Of course you’d side with the outsider.”
Ben doesn’t take the bait, but I catch the slight tightening of his jaw.
Kari seizes the opening. “So she gets to walk around freely? Sit in on our meetings? Tell us how broken we are?”
“She’s providing intel we need.” I scan the faces watching me. “Until Phil is dealt with, she stays.”
“And after?” Kari demands.
“After is after.” My voice carries the edge that ends discussions. “Right now, we focus on the threat we know about.”
Callum shifts his weight, a subtle tell I’ve learned to read. “The pack’s uneasy, Dane. Having her here, giving her access—“
“Noted.” I don’t need to explain myself. My authority isn’t up for debate.
I move toward the door. “Secure the perimeter. Double the night patrol. If Phil left any surprises, I want them found.”
Outside, the night air hits my face with a cold slap. Nova’s already cutting across the compound toward her cabin, stride purposeful, not looking back. Smart. Distance is good right now.
But I don’t head for the perimeter. I stand there watching her go, her scent still in my lungs.
Everything about her is a test. And every test feels personal, not tactical.
That’s the real problem.
I turn my back on the lodge, but I don’t escape the pressure. Kari and Callum’s footsteps crunch through the frozen grass behind me, persistent as vultures.
Kari doesn’t wait for preamble.
“You’re playing with fire,” she says, her voice pitched low but hard. “That woman walks in here, points fingers, and suddenly she’s calling the shots?”
I keep my eyes fixed on the treeline. “Drop it, Kari.”
“She’s right,” Callum adds, his bulk shifting beside me. “Half the pack is talking. You’re protecting her. You made that really clear in there.”
The words hit like a match to gasoline. Something snaps inside me—a restraint I’ve been holding since Nova walked onto my territory. I turn on both of them with the full weight of Alpha energy flooding my voice.
“Say that again. Either of you. To my face. And I’ll remind you what a challenge looks like.”
The words hang between us like ice crystals. Kari’s eyes widen, then drop to the ground. Her posture shifts from confrontation to submission in an instant. Callum takes half a step back, throat working silently, his amber eyes dimming as he breaks eye contact.
“I didn’t mean—“ Callum starts, then stops. His shoulders tense, but he knows better than to push when I’m like this.
Kari remains frozen, barely breathing.
“She stays,” I say, my voice low and final. “That’s not a request. That’s not up for debate. That’s how it is.”
Ben has paused thirty yards away, Nova beside him. They both watch the standoff, neither moving.
Kari’s jaw clenches. “I wasn’t challenging—“
“Sounded like it.” My voice doesn’t rise, but the pressure behind it doubles. “You think I’ve lost control? That I can’t see what’s happening in my own pack?”
“No, Alpha.” The formality tastes like surrender in the air.
“Then do your job. Secure the perimeter. Report back at dawn.” I turn to Callum. “You too. Eastern boundary, all the way to the river. Now.”
They both hesitate for a fraction of a second—just enough to register the rebellion—before they peel away, disappearing into separate corners of darkness.
I breathe in the cold air, feeling my pulse hammer against my ribs. That display wasn’t planned. Wasn’t necessary. Wasn’t even about them.
I walk toward the comms shack, needing distance from the lodge and the watching eyes. My boots sink into half-frozen mud. The night wraps around me like a shield, familiar terrain where I should feel steady.
I don’t.
Nova’s scent lingers in the air—pine and magic and something unmistakably female. My wolf stirs, wanting to track it back to its source. Wanting to find her cabin window and look in. Wanting things an Alpha can’t afford.
I clench my fists and stare at the dark outline of the perimeter cabin. No lights visible yet. Just the knowledge that she’s there, and I’m here, and somehow the distance isn’t enough.
I’m the Alpha. I’m in control.
But the tightness in my chest says otherwise.
The comms shack stands like a shadow at the edge of the perimeter, a box of darkness wrapped in deeper dark. I should walk away. Check the northern boundary.
Instead, I stand rooted. Watching nothing.
My fingers flex. The woods fill with sound—wind through pine, small creatures scuttling in dead leaves, some owl’s hunting cry.
But all I hear is Nova’s voice in the lodge.
The way she sliced through the bullshit when Phil showed up.
The cut of her scent—pine, static, challenge—when she stood too close.
“Focus,” I mutter.
Then I hear her voice: faint, steady. Coming from the shack.
I freeze.
I locked that building myself. Checked every panel. No one but her should be inside.
I step closer. Her voice grows clearer, low but precise.
”—third energy signature matches the second,“ she says, quiet and clipped, like she’s logging intel. “Pressure zone pulsing off-center. No origin point yet.”
I stop just short of the door.
She’s not on our comms. Not speaking to anyone. Just talking—aloud. Not frantic. Focused. Like she’s forcing the pieces to fit by giving them sound.
I should storm in. Demand answers. Make her explain herself.
But something about her voice stops me.
“I can’t confirm intent,” she mutters. “But this is targeted. Someone knew what they were doing when they picked this ground.”
I exhale. My wolf presses forward, still suspicious. But it’s not betrayal I smell—it’s exhaustion. Focus. Her own damn pulse is ticking faster, like she’s trying to outrun it.
She’s chasing a pattern we can’t see. And doing it alone.
I reach for the door.
Then stop.
If I go in now—if I corner her when she’s raw, stripped down, like this—it won’t be about the intel. It won’t be about strategy.
It’ll be about her.
The pull between us. The wrongness of it. The inevitability.
So I back away. One step. Then another.
My wolf growls in protest. He wants to push closer. Wants to press his nose to the door and breathe her in. Wants to circle.
And that’s when I know what this is.
I’m not patrolling.
I’m circling her.
And circling is always the move before the pounce.