Slowly, carefully, Ashley shifted her steps, letting them herd her toward the cliff’s edge. She feigned panic, her movements unsteady, as if she were truly cornered with nowhere left to run. Step by step, she drew them closer, tightening the illusion.

Then... at the last possible second—

She "slipped."

Her body tipped backward, vanishing over the edge before they could react.

It was a gamble.

Below, jagged rocks jutted through the water like teeth. One wrong angle, one misstep, and she would be torn apart on impact, resulting in instant death.

But that risk was part of the plan.

From their perspective, no one could survive that fall.

So she let herself drop, trusting the deception, trusting her luck, for once, hoping it would finally be enough.

The moment she dropped to her supposed "death," both warriors froze, then panic hit hard. They shifted back into their human forms almost instinctively, standing there like idiots, staring into nothing as a cold, creeping dread slid down their spines. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

It had been simple. Dirty, cruel, but simple. Ruin Ashley’s chastity, strip her of her dignity, record it, and drag her to the mating ceremony the next day like she was nothing more than a used prop.

Something to be displayed, humiliated, and owned like a whore so Nathan would feel disgusted with her even more. They had even planned to haul her there like a sack of meat, make sure she couldn’t run, couldn’t fight, couldn’t escape whatever end their Alpha had already decided for her.

And they knew — hell, they always knew — this wasn’t even their Alpha’s idea. It was Maddison. Every bit of it. The setup, the cruelty, the extra humiliation layered on top. They just played along, eager to please the future Luna, hoping it would earn them favor, maybe a better position, or more money, exactly what Maddison dangled in front of them like a bait.

But Maddison wasn’t careless. She kept Nathan distracted, again and again, pulling his attention away so he wouldn’t notice a thing. While he remained blind, they did the dirty work in the shadows.

And now? Now the plan had slipped. And that cold fear in their gut told them something had gone very, very wrong.

While Maddison kept Nathan occupied, running him in circles, feeding him just enough concern to keep him searching blindly for Ashley and her mother, the two warriors were carrying out her orders behind the scenes. Their job was clear: do what Maddison wanted done, break Ashley down completely, and return her by morning.

Not just bring her back, but prepare her, body and mind, for what was waiting at the ceremony. Every time Nathan grew suspicious, Maddison smoothed it over, pacified him, pulled him back under her control as she’d done so many times this past month.

But everything went off-script.

They didn’t just fail, but they lost her. Ashley escaped the lakeside villa, slipped through their hands when she was supposed to be helpless. That alone was bad enough. But pushing her and driving her so far that it ended with her falling to her death? That was something else entirely. Something they couldn’t even begin to explain, let alone survive the consequences of.

And the truth made it worse.

Nathan might’ve seemed indifferent to Ashley now, twisted by Maddison’s influence, but they still grew up together, and there was something Ashley herself didn’t know.

Both packs had kept it from her, deliberately.

Tomorrow, during the coming-of-age ceremony, Nathan planned to reveal it all in front of everyone: that he had already found his fated mate.

Maddison.

It was meant to break Ashley completely. To shatter whatever was left of her after everything they’d already done — her dignity stripped, her body violated, her spirit ground down — only for her to stand there and realize the man she grew up loving had already chosen someone else. That she had been discarded long before she even knew it.

And the way he planned to announce it... It wasn’t just cold, it was calculated cruelty.

Of course, that part had Maddison written all over it, too.

Which was exactly why Ashley had to be there tomorrow. No matter what state she was in. No matter how broken she became.

But now Ashley was gone, swallowed by dark water under the cliff.

The two warriors locked eyes, and this time there was no bravado left, just raw fear gnawing at the edges of their gaze. Slowly, almost unwillingly, they stepped toward the edge and looked down.

Jagged rocks waited below like open jaws, sharp and unforgiving. One look was enough. No one survives a fall like that. Not her. Not anyone.

The realization hit hard, sinking deep into their guts, twisting until it felt like something was clawing its way out of them. This wasn’t just a mistake anymore; this was a death they couldn’t take back, couldn’t cover up, couldn’t fix.

And worse?

They had no idea how the hell they were going to explain this to their Alpha.

...

「Nathan’s POV...」

I was in my office on the top floor, with glass walls, the whole city lay out beneath me, and I was going through a stack of documents when it hit.

Sharp. Sudden. Like something clawed straight into my chest and squeezed.

I froze mid-page.

"What the—"

The pen slipped from my fingers as the pain twisted deeper, spreading through my ribs like it was trying to rip something out of me. My breathing turned uneven, heat rising under my skin while a cold sweat gathered at my temples.

It didn’t make sense. I wasn’t injured. There was no reason for this, no trigger, no warning. Just this suffocating, gnawing feeling that something was wrong.

Terribly wrong.

I pressed a hand against my chest, jaw tightening as I tried to steady myself, but the unease wouldn’t leave. If anything, it grew heavier, like a weight settling deep in my gut.

Earlier, I’d been tearing through the entire pack’s territory looking for Ashley. Every corner. Every room. Nothing. Then Maddison stepped in, looking all calm and composed, as she told me she’d sent Ashley out on errands. Said she’d also moved Ashley’s mother out of the granary dungeon, claiming it was too much, that despite everything that woman had done, she still couldn’t bring herself to be that cruel.

And I believed her.

Maddison said she’d suffered enough for now. That was enough for me to stop digging.

I’d even connected the dots myself. The intruder in the granary dungeon, it had to be Ashley. But when I checked, there was nothing there. No trace. Maddison handled it smoothly, said Ashley must’ve come snooping but found nothing since her mother had already been relocated.

It all lined up too cleanly.

And when I said I’d go find Ashley again, Maddison stopped me with a soft voice and steady eyes. She told me that if I pushed now, if I kept chasing after Ashley right before the mating ceremony, it would only make me look suspicious.

Like I had something to hide. Like I wasn’t fully committed.

Like I’d make Ashley doubt tomorrow.

So I backed off.