Chapter 9 #2
“Some will. The ones who followed out of fear will be relieved.” He picked at a piece of bark on the log. “Others will need convincing. A new Pakhan has a window, maybe a few weeks, to consolidate power before the old guard regroups. The elders backing me helps. But it won’t be bloodless.”
“What happens to Max’s supporters after?”
“That depends on me.” Viktor’s voice was calm, almost clinical. The voice of a man who had already thought through every possibility. “A new Pakhan can choose mercy or vengeance. Max chose vengeance when he ordered your deaths. I could do the same to the wolves who followed him.”
“Will you?”
He considered the question, his scarred hands resting on his knees.
“Some followed orders because they believed Max was right. Others followed because they were afraid of what would happen if they refused. I’ll deal with each according to what they did and why they did it.
” His gaze found mine, hard and direct. “The enforcers who came for you at the last safe house chose to hunt a bonded mate. That choice has consequences.”
The cold certainty in his voice should have frightened me. Instead, I found it comforting. Viktor was not pretending everything would be gentle and easy. He was telling me the truth about what it meant to live in this world. What it cost. What it required.
“What are your odds?” I asked.
“Better than they were a week ago. Worse than I’d like.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only honest one.” He met my eyes without flinching.
“Max is older than me. Slower. His reflexes aren’t what they were ten years ago.
But he’s held power for twenty years, and you don’t survive that long by being weak.
He knows how to win ugly. Knows tricks I’ve never seen.
I need to be faster, smarter, and luckier than he is.
All three. Missing any one could get me killed. ”
Viktor’s expression did not change. “If I lose, Raphael will want to fight. To avenge me. To throw himself at Max and die trying.” His eyes found mine, steady and serious. “Your job is to make sure he doesn’t. Get him to run. Disappear with him. Whatever it takes.”
The weight of that settled on my shoulders. Not just surviving. Keeping Raphael alive when every instinct in him would scream to stay and fight.
“He won’t want to leave you,” I said.
“No. He won’t.” Viktor’s mouth curved, but there was no humor in it. “That’s why I’m telling you, not him. You’re the only one who can reach him when he’s like that. The bond. Use it.”
I thought about Raphael. About the guilt he carried, the belief that everyone he loved got destroyed. If Viktor died, that guilt would turn to rage. He would want blood. And I would have to be the one to pull him back from the edge.
“He’s lucky to have you,” I said quietly.
“We’re lucky to have each other.” Viktor stood, brushing dirt and bark from his pants. “Your job isn’t to wait, Lena. It’s to be ready. Whatever happens in three days, be ready to move. Be ready to survive. That’s how you help.”
He walked back toward the cabin, leaving me alone with the cold and the silence and the weight of everything he had said.
Evening came slowly.
The cabin felt smaller as darkness fell, the walls pressing close, the ceiling too low.
Dmitri had retreated to one of the bedrooms to rest, his body still demanding extra sleep as it healed.
Viktor sat cross-legged on the floor near the window, eyes closed, breathing slow and measured.
Meditating, maybe. Or running through the fight in his mind, visualizing every strike and counter.
His stillness was unnatural, the kind of calm that came before violence.
Raphael was beside me on the cabin’s small couch, his arm around my shoulders, his warmth seeping into my side.
His worry flowed through our connection.
As did his love. His fear for Viktor that he would not voice aloud.
He was watching his brother prepare to risk everything, and there was nothing he could do to help except what he had already done. Train him. Support him. Trust him.
But my mind was somewhere else.
I was thinking about contingencies.
If Viktor lost. If Max won and the kill order stayed active. If we had to run forever. Where would we go?
The hotel was out of the question. That would be the first place Max’s wolves would look.
They knew about it. They had been watching it.
But I had resources beyond the hotel. Money in accounts Max did not know about, savings from my father’s estate that I had never touched.
Clara, who could be trusted to help without asking too many questions, who would wire money or arrange documents or do whatever I needed.
I had cleaned up my father’s messes. This was just another mess. Bigger. More permanent. But not unsolvable.
Where would wolves not think to look? Europe, maybe. Somewhere rural, isolated. A small village in the mountains where strangers were noticed but not questioned. Or further. South America. Remote islands in the Pacific. Places where pack territory did not extend, where wolf politics meant nothing.
I did not know the geography of their world. I did not know which countries had packs and which did not. But I could learn. I could research. I could ask Viktor, carefully, without revealing what I was planning. I could be ready.
Raphael’s hand found mine. His thumb traced slow circles on my palm, the same absent comfort he always offered. He had no idea what I was thinking.
I did not tell him.
Not because I was hiding. But because saying it aloud would make it real. Would mean admitting that Viktor might lose, that all of this might fail, that we might spend the rest of our lives as fugitives. And I was not ready to put that fear into words. Not yet. Maybe not ever, if Viktor won.
But I could think it. I could plan. I could be ready.
That was my job now. Viktor had said so himself. Be ready to move. Be ready to survive.
I watched Viktor’s absolute stillness, his breathing so slow it barely moved his chest, and I hoped with everything in me that I would never have to use the plans taking shape in my mind.
Three days.
Raphael pulled me closer, and I let myself lean into him. His heartbeat was steady against my shoulder. His scent surrounded me, cedar and warmth and the particular smell that meant safety. His love was a warm presence in my chest, familiar and certain.
Whatever happened, I would not be helpless. I would not be passive. I would have a plan.
And if Viktor won, I would burn that plan and never think of it again.
But if he did not, I would be ready.