[Xander’s POV]
I haven't slept. Dawn breaks over a forest I've spent the night destroying. But I can't stop. Can't rest.
Can't do anything but rage against what I can smell even from here.
Them.
My father's satisfaction—smug and thick, like he's won something. Daphne's confusion mixed with something sweeter, headier. Arousal. Pleasure. And underneath it all, the unmistakable musk of mating.
Of claiming. Of my father inside her, marking her, making her his in ways that go beyond ceremony and vows.
The scent carries on the wind, and it's driving me fucking insane.
My wolf howls inside my chest—a sound of pure anguish and rage. He wants to go back. Wants to tear through the pack house until we find her. Rip my father away from her, claim what's ours. What's always been ours.
But pack law is absolute.
Challenging an Alpha for his chosen Luna means death or exile. Those are the only options. And if I'm dead or exiled, I can't protect her when she finally sees my father's true face.
When she realizes she's traded one cage for another, just with prettier bars and sweeter lies.
So I destroy something instead. Let my wolf's fury tear through everything that isn't pack members, isn't her, isn't the male whose throat I want to rip out despite the blood we share.
My father. The Alpha. The one who's spent years positioning Daphne like a chess piece, and I didn't see it until it was too late.
Something about last night feels wrong.
I pace through the destruction I've created, trying to piece together what doesn't fit.
The heat came on too suddenly—I know what natural heat smells like, and hers had been... off. Too intense, too fast. Like someone had turned a dial past natural and straight into overwhelming.
Natural heat builds over days. Gives warning signs—increased scent production, behavioral changes, a gradual ramp-up of need.
What hit Daphne yesterday was immediate. Violent.
Like someone had injected pure liquid desire straight into her bloodstream and waited for the inevitable. But I have no proof. Just suspicion and rage and the gut-deep certainty that my father orchestrated more than just the ceremony.
The sun climbs higher, and I force myself back toward the pack house.
I can't hide out here forever, no matter how much my wolf snarls at the prospect of seeing them together. Of watching her wear his mark, his scent, his claim.
The pack house is tomb-quiet. Most members are still sleeping off their hangovers, still dreaming of the celebration that was my nightmare. Good. I can't face their knowing looks, their judgment.
I move through the halls on silent feet, heading toward my room, hoping to avoid—
Daphne.
She's in the hallway outside what used to be my father's chambers and is now theirs.
She's wearing one of his shirts—dark green, hanging to mid-thigh on her smaller frame, the sleeves rolled up multiple times. Her light brown hair is a mess of tangles that scream of fingers twisted in it, of being pressed into pillows.
And there, angry red against her throat where everyone can see it—his mark.
His bite. His permanent fucking claim.
My father's scent doesn't just cling to her; it's soaked into her. Saturated her skin, marked her inside and out. Covering the traces of my own scent from yesterday like he's erasing evidence of my touch, my claim, my moment with her in the forest.
Something in my chest cracks.
She freezes when she sees me, those hazel eyes going wide. Guilt flashes across her face, then pain, then something desperate and pleading.
"Xander…"
"Don't." The word comes out rough, broken. I can barely get it past the rage and agony warring in my throat. "Just... don't."
I can't do this. Can't stand here and smell my father all over her and pretend I'm fine.
Can't look at that mark on her neck, the one I should have put there, and act like pack law and duty and his fucking manipulation make any of this acceptable.
"I shouldn't have left you alone." The words tear out of me before I can stop them. "After the forest, after I marked you with my scent, I should have stayed. Should have protected you…"
"You couldn't have..."
"I could have!" The explosion of rage surprises us both.
My fist slams into the wall beside her head—not threatening her, never her, but needing some outlet for the violence screaming through my veins. She flinches when the plaster cracks.
"I'm sorry," she whispers, and fuck she's… apologizing? "I didn't mean to hurt you. The heat was so overwhelming, and he was there, and the ceremony, I thought…"
She's sorry. She's fucking sorry.
After Connor destroyed her self-worth. After my father put her in this position and used her. After every circumstance that led to this hallway, this moment, this unbearable reality.
She's apologizing to me.
The rage boils over, and when I'm angry, I'm cruel.
"Well, you did. Whether you wanted it or not."
The words are poison, meant to wound because I'm drowning and need someone else to hurt too.
"You came to him covered in my scent and fucked him anyway. So congratulations, Daphne—you've successfully fucked every male in our family." My voice drips with mockery that tastes like acid. "Is that what you wanted? To collect us all?"
The sound she makes—small and shattered—cuts through my rage instantly.
She's crying. Silent tears streaming down her face, her whole body trembling like I've physically struck her. And the guilt crashes over me like a tsunami.
I couldn't have thought she'd cry. Couldn't have predicted that my words would break her like this.
But she's already been broken so many times. By Connor. By the pack. By life itself. And now by me, adding my cruelty to the mountain of wounds she carries.
"Fuck." I step toward her, hands reaching out instinctively to comfort, to fix this somehow. "Daphne, I—"
She steps back. Away from me.
Her chin trembles, tears still streaming, and she wraps her arms around herself like she needs protection. From me.
She's looking at me now the same way she used to look at Connor. Wary, hurt and braced for the next blow.
I did that. I put that fear in her eyes.
I want to fix this. But I can't. Can't take back words that are already carving themselves into her memory alongside every other cruel thing I’ve said to her once before.
The realization hits like a physical blow. She doesn't trust me anymore. Why would she? I just proved I'm no different from every other person who's hurt her.
Connor humiliated her publicly, my father manipulated her, and me? I found her at her most vulnerable and used words like weapons, aimed at her softest spots.
"I'm sorry." It tastes like ash, like failure. "I'm so fucking sorry. For all of it. For failing you, for hurting you, for being just another one who—"
I can't finish. Can't stand the way she's holding herself, small and defensive, like she's waiting for me to strike again.
I turn away before my control shatters completely. Before I do something stupid like pull her into my arms at last. Or tell her the truth about the bond I feel between us, forming despite pack law saying it's impossible.
"You deserved so much better than what my family has done to you."
I walk away, leaving her crying in the hallway outside her new chambers. Leaving her wearing my father's shirt and his mark and his scent while my own words echo between us like weapons I can't recall.
My wolf howls in anguish. My hands won't stop shaking.
And I know with bone-deep certainty that this can't continue. Something has to break.
It might be me.