CAELAN'S POV

The second I caught the scent of Silver Lake filth crossing my border, I shifted and ran.

My men raced behind me, but I didn't give a damn if they caught up or not. I wanted these bastards to myself.

We burst through the trees just as arrows rained down on something in the distance. I could hear shouting—Silver Lake soldiers giving chase to someone who'd crossed into my territory.

Bold. Stupid. But bold.

My paws hammered against the forest floor, each stride faster and harder than the last. Within seconds, I caught up to the scene.

A wolf—silver-furred and bleeding—collapsed just past the border marker. Arrows stuck out of her body like pins in a cushion.

She shifted involuntarily, too weak to hold the form, and suddenly there was a naked woman lying in the dirt instead.

The Silver Lake soldiers stopped at the border, but three of them were too stupid or too eager. They crossed the line, bows raised, aiming at the fallen woman.

I didn't give them a chance to shoot.

My wolf tore through the first one's throat before he even registered I was there. Hot blood sprayed across my fur as I ripped into the second, my jaws clamping down on his skull until it cracked like an egg. The third tried to run but I was faster, dragging him down and tearing through his spine with savage precision.

Their screams were music. Their blood was justice.

The remaining soldiers on the other side of the border scrambled backward, terror painted across their faces as they watched their companions die.

Smart of them.

I shifted back to human form, my chest heaving, blood dripping from my hands. I turned to the woman lying in the dirt.

Blood pooled beneath her. She was dying. Fast.

Then I caught her scent properly and everything clicked into place.

Moore.

She smelled like Alexander Moore. That same bloodline. That same cursed pack.

I stepped closer, studying her face. I'd only seen pictures before—grainy images from intelligence reports, drawings from scouts who'd glimpsed her on the battlefield.

But now here she was in the flesh.

Amara Moore. The spitting image of her accursed father.

Well, well. If this isn't my lucky fucking day.

Then something happened that had never happened before.

My heart skipped.

Just once. A single, traitorous flutter in my chest that made my wolf stir with interest.

No.

I shoved the feeling down immediately, refusing to acknowledge it. Refusing to even consider what it might mean. She was Moore's daughter. My enemy. Nothing more.

She was barely conscious, her eyes hazy and unfocused as she stared up at me. Blood covered most of her body. Arrows stuck out at brutal angles. The stench of wolfsbane hit my nostrils.

Her own pack had poisoned her and hunted her like an animal.

That land was crawling with vile, disgusting traitors. Though I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. Treachery seemed to run in their blood.

She should be dead already. The wolfsbane alone should have killed her. But somehow she was still breathing, still clinging to life with a stubbornness that almost impressed me.

"My daughter..." she managed to whisper, her voice so weak I almost missed it. "North... have to find..."

Every fiber of my being screamed at me to snap her neck right here and be done with it. One less Moore in the world would make it a better place.

But my wolf reminded me why I couldn't.

She was important. The key I'd been searching for all this time.

Damn it all.

The memory hit me suddenly. Two months ago, I'd been patrolling this same border when I'd picked up the sound of a little girl crying. Wailing, really. Desperate and weak.

We'd found her abandoned in the woods. So tiny. So sick. Covered in strange marks and infected sores that should have killed her already. She couldn't have been more than three years old, left to die like garbage.

It was a miracle she'd survived at all.

Even though the child's scent marked her as Silver Lake, I'd saved her. Hidden her from my men and taken her directly to the pack doctor, Ruth, with orders to keep the girl alive by any means necessary.

The child was still unstable. Still suffering from some condition Ruth couldn't identify despite all her medical knowledge. But the girl lived. I'd made damn sure of it.

That child was the first Silver Lake filth I'd ever saved.

And now her mother was bleeding out at my feet, begging me to help her find a daughter she didn't even know I had.

"I'm afraid today is not the day you die, my little Luna," I muttered as I crouched down and lifted her into my arms.

The daughter of my sworn enemy, cradled against my bare chest like she was something precious instead of the plague she actually was.

Blood soaked into my skin. Her head lolled against my shoulder. That traitorous skip in my heartbeat tried to happen again and I crushed it ruthlessly.

She was leverage. Nothing more.

Usually, I didn't give a damn if Silver Lake scum died in my hands. Hell, I preferred it. But she was different. She was the answer to a problem I'd been trying to solve for months.

I'd be damned if I let her die before I could use her.

My Beta, Ian, arrived with the rest of my men. They snarled when they saw who I was carrying, their eyes bright with bloodlust. They wanted her dead just as badly as I did.

"No one touches her," I ordered. "We're taking her to Ruth. Now."

I knew their hatred for the Silvers burned almost as deeply as mine. But they obeyed without question because they trusted me.

They brought my vehicle around and I climbed in with Amara still in my arms. As my men drove toward the medical facility, I stared down at the unconscious woman.

Her skin was growing paler by the second. It made me uneasy in a way I didn't like. I should just let her die.

But then her last words echoed in my mind. "My son... have to go back... both of them..."

We pulled into my medical facility and my men opened the door for me. I carried the unconscious enemy straight to the VIP wing, moving faster than necessary.

The scent of blood and antiseptic hit me as soon as I entered. Ruth shot to her feet the moment she saw me, her eyes widening when she realized who I was carrying.

"This is—"

"I know exactly who she is," I cut her off. "Save her. Now."

There was no room for debate.

Ruth got to work immediately, moving with the efficiency I'd come to expect from my pack's best doctor.

As she flushed the wolfsbane from Amara's system and treated the arrow wounds, her eyes widened at something on the monitor. She looked up at me with an expression I couldn't quite read.

"Alpha, her blood matches that of the child."

Just as I suspected.

So this was the girl's mother. The woman who'd brought a Silver Lake heir into this world and then had her stolen away, left to die in my territory two months ago.

"You are not to share this information with anyone," I said coldly. "Not even her."

Ruth's pale blue eyes softened with something that looked like pity.

"But she's the child's mother."

"That child was abandoned two months ago," I said, my voice hard as steel. "Left in the woods to die like she was nothing. If it wasn't for me, she would be dead. Amara Moore doesn't deserve to know the truth."

Ruth hesitated, her gaze full of sadness. But she knew better than to argue with me.

"Yes, Alpha."

Good.

I turned to look at the unconscious woman on the stretcher. Amara Moore. The daughter of the man who'd destroyed everything I'd ever cared about.

She was undeserving of a lot of things. Most especially of children. She would never know the truth.

Not until I decided she'd earned it.