Terms of Surrender

Total Immersion: Tess

The thick stack of Apex Land Ventures’ public filings laid before me, serving as tangible proof that Darian was not only a werewolf, but a governing werewolf whose existence revolved around corporate espionage and territorial conquest. The absurdity of it all was still a background hum, but it was currently drowned out by the satisfying crunch of financial data.

I was lost in my work before he even settled in the armchair. I didn’t need to look at him to know he was watching. His presence was a constant, heavy weight in the room, but it no longer registered as a personal threat.

My pen flew across the pages, tagging, highlighting, and calculating debt-to-equity ratios. This was my native language. Here, on the balance sheets of a company whose name sounded like a cartoon villain, I was in control.

My earlier research combined with the public filings confirmed Steelclaw’s corporate facade, and the numbers confirmed their tactics.

They were strong, but undisciplined. They prioritized speed and brute-force acquisition over sustainable financing. Typical of an organization that believed money was something to be seized rather than managed. They were so focused on mass growth, that they weren’t seeing their own flaws.

Darian’s low voice cut through the silence. “You’ll be up all night. You should take a break. The analysis will be better if you rest.”

I barely paused my work. “Do you think the Steelclaw Pack will rest?” My retort was a simple rhetorical question that wasn’t meant to wound, just to remind him of the contract’s terms. “I require silence, please.” The delayed addition of the “please” was a necessary concession to the man in the armchair. Not the Alpha.

I was fully aware of his continued, fixed stare. He was fulfilling his part: protection and availability. His presence was a byproduct of my work, like a secured server. The scent of pomegranate and spice was a fixed point in the room, constant but easily filtered out. He was guarding the assets, and right now, I was the most valuable one.

Hours passed. I mentally addressed his greatest claim, the one crack on his supernatural explanation for my kidnapping: the Mate Bond. He feels something, I mused, reviewing a section on asset-backed securities. Desire, possession, maybe even that “calming effect” he described.

I felt none of it. No strange pull, no inexplicable hum. No biological link that whispered “mate.”

If the bond was real, it was one-sided. This was my greatest leverage. He claimed to be biologically reliant on me for his sanity, but I was emotionally and biologically independent of him. My only ties were to the data, and my only motivation was self-preservation through competence.

Finally, I found it. The needle in the haystack! Apex’s major land package acquisition was tied to a risky, short-term balloon payment loan, collateralized almost entirely against the Steelclaw Pack’s main city assets. It was a classic, fatal miscalculation. The weakness was a single point of failure. If Darian hit their financing, the entire corporate facade would collapse.

I took a moment to stretch. Fresh shadows were washing over the study as the sky outside shifted from black to the pale grey of dawn. My given deadline was minutes away.

I neatly separated the damning summary sheet from the stack and organized my notes. I slowly pushed the chair back and rose. Darian was still in the armchair, his eyes open, watching. It was time to wake the Alpha and deliver the next move in the pack war. But first, I had a demand of my own. “Before I give you this, I need your promise…I need you to swear that my compliance and my assistance means safety for my family. I’m not asking to contact them. I simply need to know that no matter what, no harm comes to them.”