The First Assignment
1265 Words
Bastián held me against the wall for one more beat, long enough to make the threat settle into the air between us. His forearm stayed firm across my collarbone, his hand braced beside my head, and the room felt too warm, too small, too aware of the two of us standing there.
I did not fight him.
I would not give him that.
His eyes searched mine for a sign that I had cracked. I kept my face blank and my breathing even, though the pressure of his body near mine made every nerve in my skin feel awake. The Bond pulsed once under my chest, slow and dangerous, like it had just learned the shape of him.
At last, he stepped back, just enough for me to breathe without his weight pressing me to the wall.
“Sit,” he said.
I looked at him for half a second, then moved to the chair in front of his desk because standing there any longer would have turned this into a challenge. He watched me lower myself into the seat, then turned away and crossed the study with the same controlled calm he used for everything. He picked up the whiskey glass, did not drink from it, then set it down again.
That was when I knew he had made a decision.
He leaned one hand on the edge of the desk and looked at me across the room. “You said you were good at tracking.”
“I am.”
“And you can read movement, borders, and trail work.”
“Yes.”
“You said you notice what other wolves miss.”
I held his stare. “I did.”
Something faint shifted in his expression, I felt the room change around that. He reached into a drawer, pulled out a thin folder and tossed it onto the desk between us.
I did not reach for it right away.
“What is this?” I asked.
“Your first assignment.”
I looked at the folder, then back at him. “You hired me five minutes ago.”
“You are still here.” His tone stayed flat. “That means I have not decided you are useless.”
Awwww… how charming!
I kept that thought to myself and opened the folder. The first page was a photograph of Ximena Castellanos.
My own face stared back at me from the paper, dark hair, pale skin, the same hard mouth I had spent my life trying to keep still. It was not a flattering image. It was a bloodline record shot, old enough to be recent, clear enough to be dangerous.
My fingers paused on the edge of the page.
Bastián was watching me carefully. “You know her.”
It was not a question.
I lifted my eyes with practiced calm. “Of course I know the name.”
“You should.” His voice stayed even. “She is the daughter of Rodrigo Castellanos.”
The room went silent.
I kept my face still and turned another page even though the paper suddenly felt too thin beneath my fingers. It held territory notes, last known sightings, a timeline of false reports, a few grainy security stills from roads, borders, and a dockside warehouse.
He had been hunting me.
All this time.
I read the notes without changing my expression, though inside, everything in me had gone sharp and cold. He did not believe I was dead. That was the first hard truth. The second was worse.
He was not looking for proof… He was looking for her… For me.
“I do not understand,” I said carefully.
He folded his arms. “Ximena Castellanos disappeared after the bond event, her father claimed she was dead while the rest of the pack accepted the story because they needed it to be true.”
“And you do not.”
“I know a staged death when I see one.”
The words landed like a blade sliding under skin.
I looked back down at the folder, the trail reports were organized with brutal precision, each one showing a different angle of the same question. Burned road, missing body, no confirmed remains, one witness swore she fled the coastline, while another claimed a car went over the cliff, but no recovery had been made.
He had already taken apart my death and found the loopholes.
My pulse stayed steady only because I forced it to.
“Why tell me this?” I asked.
“Because I need someone outside my inner circle.” He stepped closer to the desk and rested both hands on it. “Someone with no loyalty to the Castellanos, someone I can put on a trail without giving away what I am tracking.”
I looked up. “You want me to find her.”
“Yes.”
The answer came without hesitation.
I let a small silence sit there. “Why me?”
His gaze sharpened a fraction. “Because you are careful, you listen, you look like someone people underestimate, and because if she is alive, she will be guarded by the kind of wolves who trust their own scent too much.”
I did not answer.
He went on, voice lower now. “Ximena Castellanos is not dead. I do not care what story her father fed the world, I do not care what bodies were never found, I do not care what lies he wrapped around the truth.”
The room seemed to tighten around his words.
“I have spent too many years watching Castellanos' mistakes turn into strategies,” he said. “If she is alive, then she is planning something, and I intend to know what before she makes her move.”
I kept my face still, but inside, a thousand sharp thoughts collided. He thought I was a missing piece. He thought I was a ghost on the run. He thought he was sending a stranger to hunt me down.
That almost made me laugh.
Bastián’s eyes stayed on mine as if he could hear every thought I did not speak. “You will start with the coastal roads,” he said. “Then the service stations, the border contacts, the pack-forger network. I want a trail, not guesses.”
“And if I find nothing?”
“You will find something.”
His voice left no room for argument.
I shut the folder slowly and rested my hand on top of it. “And when I do?”
He was quiet for one beat too long.
Then he said, “You bring her to me.”
My throat stayed still, but my skin did not.
He took one step nearer, and the Bond gave a low, uneasy hum beneath my chest. His gaze had gone colder, more focused, the kind of look a wolf wore when it had finally decided how to kill.
“Do not try to protect her,” he said. “Do not try to be clever with me. If Ximena Castellanos is alive, I want the first face she sees to be mine.”
I looked up at him, and for the first time since I had walked into this estate, I understood exactly how dangerous this man was, not because he wanted the truth, but because he wanted control of it.
His mouth barely moved when he spoke again, and the final words hit like a sentence already passed.
“Find her, Salomé. I want to be the one who finishes her.”
- Writer
