After My Alpha Traded Me for Territory

Cade came to my quarters after midnight.

I heard his boots on the stone steps before he knocked. Two sharp raps, then silence. I opened the door and found him standing in the hallway, his face tight.

"He wants to see you," Cade said.

"When?"

"Tomorrow night. His hunting lodge. He says he'll settle the debt terms privately."

I studied his expression. Cade was Devon's Beta. He'd watched me scrub floors and serve meals for six years without ever meeting my eyes. But tonight, something flickered across his face. Not pity. Warning.

"Privately," I repeated.

Cade nodded once. "He said to come alone. No witnesses."

The hum in my chest stirred. Faint. Wary.

"Tell him I'll be there," I said.

Cade left without another word.

I closed the door and leaned against it, my hand pressed flat over my ribs. The parchment with my ledger calculations was still tucked in my boot. Fourteen months. Devon knew I was right. And now he wanted me alone in a hunting lodge where no one could hear us.

I should have been afraid. I wasn't. I was tired.

The next evening, I walked the dirt path to Devon's lodge as the sun bled orange across the horizon. The lodge sat at the edge of Ironridge territory, surrounded by dense pines. No patrols. No guards. Just the empty clearing and the smell of woodsmoke curling from the chimney.

Devon opened the door before I knocked.

"Come in," he said.

His voice was calm. Almost gentle. The tone he'd used years ago, back when I still believed the mate bond meant something.

I stepped inside. The lodge was warm. A fire crackled in the hearth. Two cups sat on the low table between the armchairs, steam rising from both.

Devon gestured toward the chairs. "Sit."

I sat. He picked up one of the cups and handed it to me. Cider. The same kind I used to make for us during the first year, before everything turned cold.

"I thought about what you said," Devon began. He settled into the chair across from me, cradling his own cup. "About the ledger."

I waited.

"You were right," he said. "The debt's been paid. Overpaid, actually."

I lifted the cup to my lips but didn't drink yet. I watched his face over the rim. His eyes stayed fixed on the fire. Not on me.

"So I'm free to go," I said.

Devon's jaw tightened. "We need to discuss the terms. Compensation for the extra months. A formal release document. I don't want any confusion later."

His words were smooth. Reasonable. But his scent was wrong. Jasmine and something sharper underneath. Chemical. Bitter.

I took a sip of the cider. It was warm and sweet, just like I remembered. Apple and cinnamon.

Devon finally looked at me. "I want this to be clean, Carmen. No hard feelings. You've served the pack well."

I took another sip. The warmth spread through my chest, down my arms. Pleasant at first. Then too warm. Then burning.

My vision fractured at the edges. The fire blurred into streaks of orange light. The cup slipped from my fingers and hit the floor, cider pooling across the wood.

I tried to stand. My legs wouldn't move. They felt like stone, heavy and dead.

"Devon—"

My voice came out wrong. Slurred. Thick.

He set his cup down and stood. His face was calm. Blank. Like he was watching something inevitable happen, something he'd already decided.

"Wolfsbane," he said quietly. "Concentrated. You won't feel pain. Just sleep."

I tried to push myself up from the chair. My arms buckled. I fell forward, my knees hitting the floor, my palms slapping against the wood. The room tilted. The fire roared in my ears.

Devon walked to the door and opened it. Two Deltas stepped inside. I recognized their boots. Garrett and Soren. Warriors who'd never spoken to me, never looked at me.

"Take her to the Prince's estate," Devon said. "Guest suite. Be careful with her."

Garrett crouched beside me. His hands slid under my arms, lifting me like I weighed nothing. My head lolled back. The ceiling spun above me, wooden beams bleeding into shadow.

I tried to speak. Tried to ask why. But my tongue was heavy, useless.

Devon's face appeared above me. He looked down for a long moment, his expression unreadable.

"It's just business," he said.

Then the world went black.

I woke to darkness and fire.

Not real fire. Fire inside me. Wolfsbane scorching through my veins, burning from the inside out. My muscles refused to move. My lungs pulled in air in shallow, ragged gasps.

I blinked. Once. Twice. Shapes slowly formed in the dark. A high ceiling. Unfamiliar walls. A bed beneath me, soft and foreign.

I turned my head. Pain shot down my neck. On the nightstand beside the bed, a scroll lay unrolled, illuminated by a thin strip of moonlight through the window.

I forced my eyes to focus. Devon's handwriting. His seal pressed into red wax at the bottom.

Blood-Pact Agreement. Ironridge Pack. Silvercrest Coastal Territory.

And halfway down the page, my name.

Carmen Snyder. Collateral.

The fire in my chest surged. Not the wolfsbane. Something else. Something silver and furious that had been sleeping for six years, pressed down under layers of silence and submission.

It clawed at the ceiling Devon had built inside me. Clawed and snarled and refused to stay quiet.

I tried to push myself upright. My arms trembled. My elbows locked. I managed to lift my torso a few inches off the bed before my strength gave out.

Then I saw him.

A silhouette in the doorway. Tall. Still. Amber eyes glowing in the dark like embers.

He held a small glass vial in one hand. The liquid inside caught the moonlight, pale green and faintly luminous.

"Who—" My voice cracked. Came out as a whisper.

The man stepped into the room. His footsteps were silent. His scent rolled over me—dark cedar, crushed pine, ozone. Not pack. Not rogue.

Lycan.

He stopped at the edge of the bed, looking down at me with an expression I couldn't read. Not cold. Not warm. Just absolute.

"You're awake," he said. His voice was deep. Calm. The kind of calm that didn't need to prove itself.

I tried again to sit up. Failed. My body was a cage I couldn't escape.

The silver thing inside me surged again, violent and desperate, and for the first time in my life, I felt it—my wolf. Not a voice. Not a name. Just a raw, primal pulse of rage beneath my skin, trying to claw its way out through the wolfsbane's chemical ceiling.

The man's eyes narrowed slightly. He tilted his head, watching me with an intensity that made my breath catch.

"Interesting," he murmured.

He stepped closer and held up the vial.

"This will purge the poison," he said. "Or I can leave you here and let it burn through on its own. Your choice."

I stared at him. At the vial. At the blood-pact scroll with my name written as collateral for land I'd never seen.

My wolf snarled inside me, silver and soundless.

I opened my mouth, forced the words past my swollen tongue.

"Who are you?"

His amber eyes met mine.

"Atticus Bailey," he said. "Lycan Prince. And you, Carmen Snyder, were just sold to me by your mate."