ADRIAN
Meetings were supposed to make sense.
Numbers. Territory lines. Patrol shifts. Trade routes. Council votes.
All of it usually clicked into place in my head like it always had. I had been Alpha of this pack long enough to know how to shut off everything else and focus.
Tonight, I couldn’t.
I sat at the head of the long table in the council room, hands folded, shoulders straight, face calm. The fire burned low in the hearth. Midnight crept closer with every ticking second of the old clock on the wall.
00:00.
The exact moment the day changed.
And all I could think about was Sloane Sinclair.
Lucas cleared his throat. “Alpha, the western border patrol—”
“Rotate them,” I said without looking up.
Lucas paused. “…Rotate them how?”
I lifted my eyes slowly. “Switch them with the s
