**Chapter 19: Career Spark**
The world outside the pack was finally catching up to the new me.
Three weeks after the Caldwell raid, my old life sent a polite knock on the door.
An email from the dean of the School of Visual & Performing Arts.
Subject line: “Reconsideration of Scholarship Status – Urgent.”
I read it twice in the kitchen while Victor made coffee, shirtless, hair still damp from the shower we’d just wrecked.
They wanted me back.
Full scholarship restored.
Solo exhibition slot in the spring showcase.
A letter of apology from the board for “misjudging my absence under extenuating circumstances.”
Victor leaned over my shoulder, reading silently.
“Say the word,” he rumbled, lips brushing my mating mark, “and I’ll have their entire endowment transferred to Black
