Chapter Eight: A Knife at My Back

Dawn had already started to tint the horizon with the bruised colors of violet and grey when I stumbled back into the Rivera estate. My cloak was soaked with snow, my gloves frozen with half-dried blood. I pushed them against my skirts before the guards at the gate could notice, but the stench clung to me, copper and shame.

Inside, the great hall crackled with candlelight, heat emanating from the stone hearth. Nothing, though, penetrated to me.

My father sat at the head of the table, a map laid out before him, his black eyes flashing up as soon as I appeared.

"Where were you?" His voice was steel on flint.

My throat tightened. The urge to confess—to beg mercy, to fall to my knees and tell him that I had seen our enemy Alpha and felt my soul tied to his—struggled on the edge of my tongue. But Adrian's face appeared before me, his blood in the snow, his silver eyes when I'd told him he was nobody.

I could not do it again.

"I walked out," I said, putting calm into my tone.

"The storm… it unsettled me."

"Walked," he repeated, the term weighed with disbelief.

I'd started to speak when the door swung open. Hellion scouts entered, snow clinging to their pelts.

"Alpha Rivera," one wheezed, "Killings. Found them. Killed rogues, eastern ridge. Ripped apart."

A murmur passed through the men gathered. My father's eyes contracted, his steel of suspicion glinting like a blade and focused on me.

"Rogues?" he snarled.

"Yes," said the scout. "Fresh kill. But…." He struggled.

"But what?" my father snapped.

"There was another smell. Not rogue. Strong. Dominant. Like—" The scout swallowed. "Like Adrian Kane."

The hall fell quiet.

My heart pounded so hard I was certain that everyone could hear it. The walls seemed to be closing in on me, forcing secrets out of my chest.

"Kane?" my father echoed slowly, his eyes narrowing. "On our property?"

The scout nodded. "The snow covered most of the tracks, but there was still a scent left behind. He was here."

My father's face stiffened, his hand clenched on the map table. "If Kane has entered Rivera territory." His eyes flashed up, knife-bright, and settled on me where I stood.

My knees nearly buckled under the weight of that glance. Did he think? Could he smell the truth off of me—the link, the deception, the kiss still burning on my lips?

"Leave us," he told the scouts.

When the men had stepped outside, the silence stretched until it was nearly unbearable. And then, in a voice as gentle but deadly as venom, my father said:

"You will tell me the truth, Elena. Did you see him?"

The words drained me. My lips opened, and nothing came out. If I told the truth, Adrian would be executed. If I lied once more, my father would trust me.

The bond burned in my chest like a branding iron, as if Adrian himself pleaded me to pick him.

And for the very first time in my life, I didn't know which side of my blood family I was on: daughter of Rivera… or Kane's mate.