By the time I reached the packhouse, my patience was already hanging by a thread. The argument with Ronan, the glowing eyes in the trees, the committee’s ambush with their glittered torture devices, my father’s constant avoidance of every real conversation. It was too much. Too loud inside my own head. My wolf paced with an edge of unease she had not shown in years.
I pushed open the front door, ready to stomp straight to my room.
And then I stopped dead in the hallway.
A woman was slipping out of my father’s bedroom.
Another one.
Tall. Painted. Wearing a dress too thin for winter. She pulled her coat around her shoulders, hair tousled in a way that told the whole story as clearly as a billboard.
My blood heated so fast I felt dizzy. It shot up my spine like a spark catching dry kind
