I think about it.
Really think, for the first time since Ro played that recording and my entire world collapsed around me.
My father wants me dead.
Wantsallof us dead.
He sent us to this academy on a mission that was never meant to succeed—a suicide run disguised as an assassination order. Find the Eastman heir. Kill her. And then conveniently die at the hands of whatever enemies he's already arranged to finish us off.
It's elegant, in a sick way.
Efficient.
The kind of solution my father would appreciate—eliminating multiple problems with a single carefully orchestrated plan.
But he made a mistake.
He underestimated how quickly we'd find her.
How quickly Sage would bond with her.
How quickly she would choose to help us instead of letting us die.
"It'll only take a week for my father to respond," I say slowly, working through the logic as I speak. "Once he realizes we're still alive—that we've found the Eastman heir and she's not dead—he'll send someone to finish the job. Maybe multiple someones. He can't afford to wait, not if there's a chance we've figured out the truth."
Blaze nods.
His expression has shifted from amusement to something more serious—the focused attention of a soldier receiving orders.
"What should we do then?"
I look at Seraphine.
At her small form buried under expensive blankets.
At the pink hair spilling across the pillow.
At the sleeping princess who just offered to play queen in a game neither of us fully understands.
Alliance, she said.
Be your Omega if it means you get to prove to him that he should be afraid of you.
Then we're enemies again.
She's giving me a weapon.
Herself.
The last Eastman heir, the target my father has been hunting for a decade, delivered to him on a silver platter—except not tokill. Toprotect. To claim as pack. To show him that his own son has done what he couldn't: brought the enemy into the fold.
It's the ultimate power move.
The ultimate fuck you.
Look, Father. Look what I have. Look what you failed to destroy. And now she's mine, and there's nothing you can do about it.
A smirk curves my lips.
