Chapter 489
Duncan Whitaker sat in the driver’s seat, his knuckles white on the steering wheel, watching me through the rearview mirror with eyes that swam with a devastating mixture of loyalty and grief.
I closed my eyes, the phantom pain of our severed mate-bond tearing at my chest. I couldn’t hold her. I couldn’t tell her the truth. But I could pave her path with gold from the shadows.
I opened the mind-link, my psychic voice a weak, gravelly echo of the Alpha King I used to be.
“The grant for the ancient Pack treaty restoration—double it,” I commanded Duncan. “Pay it from my personal accounts, not the Pack’s. And Duncan… make sure the daily nutrient deliveries continue. She needs her strength.”
Duncan swallowed hard, his mental voice trembling. “Yes, my King. It will be done.”
I kept my eyes closed as the SUV carried me back to my sterile, dying fortress, leaving my heart behind beneath the old oak tree.
The rest of my shift passed in a blur of nervous energy. Every time I glanced toward the archive’s frosted windows, my mind conjured the image of that black, unmarked SUV lurking in the shadows. By the time the sun finally dipped below the horizon, casting long, bruised purple shadows across the asphalt, I wanted nothing more than to reach the subway and disappear into the anonymity of the city.
But as I crossed the university parking lot, my escape was abruptly cut off.
A glaring cherry-red Ferrari sat illegally parked across the fire lane, its sleek metal catching the last of the dying sunlight. Leaning against the hood, radiating an arrogant, suffocating presence that made every instinct in me scream, was Braydon Hyde.
“Going somewhere, Addie?” he asked, his lips curling into a predatory smirk.
I didn’t break my stride, veering left to bypass him. “I have nothing to say to you, Braydon. Leave me alone.”
He moved with supernatural speed, stepping directly into my path. “I wouldn’t walk away—not when I hold the deed to Alaric and Elara Everett’s entire legacy in the palm of my hand.”
I froze. The air in my lungs turned to ice. “What are you talking about? The Everett Trust is protected by a holding company.”
“Was protected,” Braydon corrected, his eyes gleaming with malicious triumph. “A holding company that I just acquired through a very aggressive, very legal corporate buyout. I own the debt on your parents’ lands now, Adella. All of it. And I can default it tomorrow, letting the bank auction off their memory to the highest bidder.”
My hands balled into fists, my nails biting into my palms. “Dallas would never let that happen. He swore to protect the estate.”
Braydon let out a harsh, barking laugh. “He’s gotten sloppy, Addie. Too busy dying and sleeping with that mercenary whore to protect what’s yours.”