“I’m sure he did,” Galvin said lightly. “Nothing makes a man more honest than the weight of your Will bearing down on their throat.”
Wolfe was stone. “So you admit you kept the structure of making deals with the rogues in place.”
Galvin gave a slow shrug. “You’re young, Wolfe. Hungry.Idealistic.” Galvin glanced over the alpha. “That’s not an insult. But sometimes a working system isn’t dismantled because of one loose piece.”
“Corrin wasn’t loose,” I said. “He was a lever, and someone is pulling it.”
His gaze cooled. “You’ll find there are many levers, Rowen. Some of them were built in this Hollow before you were born.”
“And some of us know how tobreakthem.”
Wolfe took a slow breath, then turned to me. “We’re done here.”
I nodded but didn’t move. Not yet. “If I find proof that you’re still involved—if even one more wolf bleeds because of yoursystem?—”
“You’ll what?” Galvin asked softly. “I’m an old man, girl. What will you do?”
I smiled, but there was nothing kind in it. “I’ll show you what my wolf learned frombothof her alphas.”
His face didn’t change. But his pulse did.
Wolfe opened the door. I walked through first this time. We didn’t slam it behind us.
Outside, I took a deep breath.
Well?I asked him through the mindlink.
It’s time to talk to the druid.
Chapter 22
Rowen
“Are you sure this is wise?”
I looked across at Wolfe and didn’t feel too enthused when he gave me his familiar smirk.
“I mean…don’t we need, you know, proof?” I pressed him.
We’d walked across the Hollow, not saying much. Wolfe walked beside me in silence, his energy tight, sharp. My father’s notes tucked under his arm now felt like the least dangerous thing he could be carrying.
It wasn’t proof Wolfe was looking for. It wasleverage.
“They’re going to deny it,” I muttered.
The tic in Wolfe’s jaw twitched. “They won’t. That kind of power doesn’t waste breath on denial.”
Was he right? I didn’t know.
Galvin hadn’t needed to lie—because in his mind, he was still playing the long game. Still the quiet architect behind the dead wolves and broken borders. But what Galvin hadn’t seen—what he refused to see—was that Wolfe wasn’t my father.
He didn’tbuildsystems. Hetore them apart.
Just before we met the turn that would lead us to the druid’s tent, Diesel was waiting—eyes narrowed, stance tense. He didn’t look at me, his attention was on his alpha alone. The bondbetween Wolfe and me pulsed.Wolfe sent a surge of warmth through it, when he felt me brace myself for an encounter with Diesel.
“What is it?” Wolfe asked his beta.
“Attack,” Diesel said. “Another one. North ridge.”
