Ava’s POV
The manor had been unusually quiet all morning, as if even the walls sensed that something weighty had shifted. I could still smell the faint hint of burning cedar in the air — the scent that always clung to my father after he’d attended a council meeting.
I had been avoiding him all day.
Not because I feared him — though he was a man capable of inspiring it — but because I’d grown used to the way his words cut deeper when he’d just returned from those gatherings. Meetings with alphas and leaders always put him in a mood: sharper, more calculating.
When I finally heard the heavy sound of his boots in the corridor, I slipped into the nearest drawing room, pressing myself into the shadowed alcove behind the curtain. I didn’t mean to listen. Not at first.
But I heard his voice.
