CHAPTER 4
1019 Words
JADE'S POV
"Three months," Cynthia said again, like she enjoyed the way the words landed.
The world tilted under my feet. I gripped the door of my car just to stay upright, my knuckles turning white.
Rafe hadn't moved. He was staring at Cynthia like she'd just spoken a foreign language.
"That's not happening," he said finally, his voice flat.
Cynthia's smile didn't waver. She climbed out of the SUV in heels that probably cost more than my monthly rent, smoothing down her coat as she walked toward us.
"The council signed it last week," she said. "Your alpha and my father shook hands on it, Rafe. A bond between the Colton pack and the Cross family. Good for business, good for the pack, good for everyone." Her eyes flicked to me. "Everyone except, I suppose, whoever you were about to kiss in this parking garage."
"We weren't kissing," I said quickly, my face burning.
"Of course you weren't." Cynthia's tone said the opposite. She stepped closer, close enough that I caught the sharp scent of her perfume, something expensive and cold. "Jade Langford. I've heard so much about you."
"From who?" I asked, even though I already knew.
"My father talks about you sometimes," she said lightly. "He says you're very dedicated. Very loyal." Her gaze dropped, just for a second, to my hands, then back up to my face. "He also says your mother is still at Grace Memorial. Room 412, isn't it? Such a lovely view of the parking lot."
My stomach dropped straight through the floor.
"How do you-"
"My father funds half that hospital," Cynthia said, cutting me off sweetly. "Did you know that? Some very generous donations over the years. Especially toward, what is it called, the experimental treatment program. The one your mother's been on for, what, eight months now?"
I couldn't breathe.
Rafe's head turned sharply toward me. "Jade. What is she talking about?"
"Nothing," I said, my voice cracking. "It's nothing."
"It's not nothing." Cynthia laughed softly. "It's everything, actually. Without my father's donation, that whole program shuts down. And without that program, well." She shrugged, like she was talking about the weather. "I'm sure her doctors have explained what happens then."
"Stop," I whispered.
"I'm only making conversation," Cynthia said, all sugar. "But maybe you should think about that, the next time you're standing this close to my fiance in an empty parking garage. Things have a way of... falling apart. When people forget what they owe."
She turned to Rafe and pressed a light kiss to his cheek. He flinched away from it like it burned, but she didn't seem to notice, or didn't care.
"See you at the gala Friday, darling," she said. "Wear the navy suit. It photographs better."
Then she walked back to the SUV, climbed in, and the window slid shut. The car pulled away, leaving Rafe and me standing in the cold, empty garage, both of us staring after it.
For a long moment, neither of us said anything.
"Your mother," Rafe said finally. "Is she sick?"
"Don't," I said. My voice came out small and broken, nothing like I wanted it to sound. "Please don't ask me about my mother right now."
"Jade-"
"You're engaged," I said, turning on him, anger flooding in to cover the panic, because anger was easier. "To her. To Declan Cross's daughter. The same Declan Cross who apparently controls whether my mother gets to keep breathing. Do you understand what that means? Do you understand what just happened here?"
"I didn't know about the engagement until thirty seconds ago," he snapped. "You think I want this? You think I'd choose her over... over whatever the hell that was between us back there?"
"It doesn't matter what you'd choose!" My voice cracked again, and this time I couldn't stop the tears that came with it. "It never matters what we'd choose. People like Declan Cross decide, and the rest of us just... we just live with it."
Rafe stepped toward me, and I should have stepped back, but I didn't. I couldn't. The pull between us was still there, humming under my skin, and even with everything Cynthia had just said, even with my whole world crashing down around me, some stupid, traitorous part of me wanted him closer.
"Tell me what he has on you," Rafe said quietly. "All of it. Tonight. I can fix this, Jade. I have money, I have the pack, I have-"
"You can't fix this." I wiped my face with the back of my hand, furious at myself for crying in front of him twice in one night. "Nobody can fix this. He's spent two years making sure of that."
My phone rang.
I jumped, fumbling it out of my pocket, my hands shaking so badly I almost dropped it. I didn't recognize the number, but the area code made my blood run cold.
Grace Memorial Hospital.
"Hello?" My voice came out as barely a whisper.
"Ms. Langford?" a woman's voice said. Tired. Careful. The kind of careful that nurses used when they had to say things people didn't want to hear. "This is Nurse Patel, from the third floor. I'm sorry to call so late."
"Is she okay?" The words tumbled out before I could stop them. "Is my mom okay?"
There was a pause. The kind of pause that lasted a lifetime.
"Your mother's vitals dropped about twenty minutes ago," the nurse said gently. "Dr. Okafor is with her now. She's asking for you, Jade. I think you should come as soon as you can."
The phone slipped from my fingers and hit the concrete with a crack.
I didn't even feel myself fall to my knees.
"Jade!" Rafe was suddenly there, his hands on my shoulders, his voice sharp with alarm. "Jade, what happened? Talk to me!"
But I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe. All I could see was Cynthia's smile, all I could hear was her voice saying things have a way of falling apart, like she'd known this exact phone call was coming.
Like she'd planned it.
- Writer
