The Alpha's Dark Solstice Claim

Chapter 4 - Seven Years Later.

Marybeth

I DIDN’T COME BACK to Alder Ridge because I missed it. I came back because my father summoned me. When the Alpha of the Calloway pack calls, you don’t ignore it. Even if he’s also your father. Especially then.

“The Winter Assembly isn’t ceremonial this year,” he said over the phone. His voice was steady, controlled. The same voice he used when addressing both town council members and wolves who needed reminding of hierarchy.

“Blackridge has been consolidating influence. Succession discussions are accelerating.” Succession. That word had haunted this town since before I was born. Calloway and Blackridge. My family and Rowan’s.

Rival packs stitched into the same small-town map like two fault lines pretending not to grind against each other. There had always been tension. Territory disputes disguised as zoning disagreements.

Security contracts framed as civic responsibility. Holiday truces that smelled more like strategy than peace.

“You don’t need me for that,” I said.

“Yes, I do,” my father replied. “Because if Blackridge presents strength, Calloway cannot appear diminished.” Diminished. Because I had left. Because there was no visible heir in our pack. Because Rowan had grown his influence while I built my life elsewhere.

“And my son?” I asked quietly. I couldn’t hide the fact from my father. As Alpha, he felt it the moment Eli was born. Silence. Brief, but heavy.

“He complicates things,” my father sighed. No softness. No indulgence. Just fact. We couldn’t hide it from the pack forever. I looked across the apartment I had built without Calloway or Blackridge shadowing my every move.

Eli sat on the floor organizing his books into careful stacks, humming under his breath. He didn’t know the weight of his bloodline. I had made sure of that. For seven years, I had raised him outside pack politics.

But blood didn’t dilute with distance. If Rowan saw him … really saw him … instinct would do the rest.

“I’ve reviewed the bylaws,” I told my father. “Blackridge can’t claim him without proof and acknowledgment.” But not wanting to go back wasn’t just about my son. I had my own feelings I never worked through.

“And once he has both?” my father asked the one question I wasn’t prepared to answer. I didn’t answer. Because the truth was … once Rowan Blackridge acknowledged an heir, the town would frame it as legacy, not intrusion.

I had spent seven years preparing for this possibility. I had documentation. Financial independence. Legal protections under human law. I had ensured Eli’s surname tied him to me, not to a pack. But none of that erased instinct.

And Rowan was Alpha of his pack, where I was just the alpha’s daughter. Rowan was fully established. Politically secure. More dangerous than he had been at twenty-three. Driving back into Alder Ridge a couple of days later, felt like crossing into a memory I had deliberately buried.

The Calloway crest still marked the southern end of town. Subtle. Hidden in decorative ironwork and historical plaques that humans admired without understanding. Blackridge influence marked the north. Security signage. Patrol routes. Municipal sponsorships.

Two powers. One town. Still circling. I parked outside my childhood home, the old Calloway house that sat just outside the formal pack boundary line. My father met us on the porch. He looked older. Harder. He looked at Eli carefully.

“So,” he said quietly, “that’s him.”

“Yes.” I nodded. Eli looked between us, sensing something heavier than a family reunion.

“Hi,” he said politely.

“You’ll stay close to your mother.” My father nodded once. It wasn’t warmth. It was instruction. The Winter Assembly took place in the town square under strings of white lights. Humans thought it was civic unity.

Wolves knew it was territory measured in glances. Calloway members clustered near the south end. Blackridge near the north. The air smelled like pine and tension. I kept Eli’s hand firmly in mine.

“Remember,” I murmured, “you stay beside me.” He nodded. Then Rowan stepped into view. Seven years hadn’t softened him. They had refined him. His posture carried authority without effort now. His presence pulled attention without demand.

He spoke with a council member while scanning the perimeter automatically. A businessman to humans. An Alpha to anyone who knew how to look. He hadn’t seen us yet. My heart didn’t race. That part of me had matured.

But something deeper … Something older … Shifted in recognition. For years, I had imagined this moment. Would he look angry? Would he look betrayed? Would he try to take control immediately? Would he even care?

Instead … He simply looked. His gaze lifted casually, scanning the crowd. Then they found Eli. And stopped. The change was microscopic. A tightening of the shoulders. A pause in breath. The way instinct outran reason.

Recognition didn’t creep in. It struck. Eli shifted slightly, leaning to my side. Rowan’s eyes flicked at me then, slow and deliberate. There was no accusation there. No outrage. Just understanding. He knew.

I saw the exact second it happened. His wolf recognized blood. And for the first time since stepping back into Alder Ridge, my confidence wavered. Because I hadn’t prepared for that look. Not anger. Not triumph.

Something almost … reverent. My father stepped beside me, sensing the shift.

“He sees it,” he murmured.

“Yes.” My voice was barely a whisper. I never imagined the moment would be this intense. I imagined it was going to be difficult to navigate, but not this intense.

“Be careful,” my father added. As if I wasn’t already calculating every possible outcome. Rowan didn’t approach. He didn’t call attention. He didn’t make a scene. He watched. And that restraint told me more than aggression would have.

He was thinking. Planning. Weighing consequences. Across the square, two rival Alphas assessed each other without words. Except this time, I stood between them. And so did a child neither pack had anticipated.

Later that night, after Eli fell asleep in the room that used to be mine, I sat at the desk and opened the notebook I hadn’t used in years. I wrote one line: “He knows.” Then I added another: “He didn’t react publicly. That means strategy.”

For seven years, I had lived without Rowan’s shadow over my decisions. Now, it stretched long again. Not because I feared him. But because I understood him. Rowan Blackridge did not make emotional moves.

He made structural ones. And if he decided acknowledging his son strengthened Blackridge … He would. Across town, under the same winter sky, I knew he was doing the same calculations. Calloway heir. Blackridge heir.

One child. Two rival packs. And a history neither of us had ever truly buried. The real war wouldn’t be loud. It would begin with a conversation. And I had a feeling that conversation was coming sooner than either pack was prepared for.

Later, after the ceremony, the house was quiet, but my mind wasn’t. I stood at the bedroom doorway longer than necessary, watching Eli sleep in the same room I had once claimed as mine. The walls were still the same pale cream.

The window still looked out over the southern edge of town, where Calloway territory blurred into neutral ground. Beyond that … Blackridge. I stepped into the hallway and closed the door softly behind me.

For seven years, I had told myself that what happened between Rowan and me had been heat and timing and proximity. Rival bloodlines. Youth. A truce night charged with too much tension and too much alcohol. It had been easier to reduce it to that.

Easier to believe I had loved the danger, not the man. But when he looked at Eli tonight, something inside me had answered. Not fear. Not regret. Recognition. I had known Rowan before that night. Known the way he carried responsibility like a weight, he never resented.

Known the way he observed before acting. Known the quiet restraint that made him more dangerous than any wolf who barked loudly. I had fallen for him long before I admitted it to myself. Not because he was Alpha.

But because he didn’t wield it carelessly. And when I left all those years ago, it wasn’t just pride that drove me. It wasn’t only fear of being sidelined or reduced to leverage between rival packs. It was survival.

If I had stayed, I would have wanted him. If I had wanted him, I would have forgiven things I shouldn’t. And if I had forgiven him, I would have given him power over me in ways that had nothing to do with pack law.

Seven years had given me independence. Perspective. Strength that didn’t hinge on anyone else’s acknowledgment. But tonight, when his gaze met mine across the square, that strength wavered for half a second.

Because there had been something there. Not accusation. Not calculation. Something raw. And that was more dangerous than anger ever could have been. I leaned back against the hallway wall and closed my eyes briefly.

If Rowan decided to claim Eli, I would fight. If he tried to use my son to strengthen Blackridge’s position against Calloway, I would destroy that strategy before it began. But the real threat wasn’t political.

It was personal. Because if he looked at me the way he had tonight again … If he remembered the night, we crossed a line neither pack could afford … I wasn’t sure whether I was strong enough to feel nothing.

And that uncertainty frightened me more than rivalry ever had. Outside, somewhere beyond the Calloway boundary, I felt it. His awareness. Shifted. Focused. He wouldn’t wait long. And neither would I.