CALLUM’S POV

I hadn’t slept.

Not a single hour. I sat at my desk in the early hours of the morning, staring at nothing in particular while the rest of the pack slept peacefully and completely unaware that their Alpha had done something irreversible last night.

What had I actually done?

For what seemed to be the umpteenth time, I pressed my knuckles against my mouth, jaw tight as the events of last night replayed in my head with a clarity I desperately wished I didn’t have.

Every single detail. Every sound. Every moment where I could have stopped and didn’t.

How did I lose control like that? I wasn’t the kind of person to just...lose control like that.

My wolf stirred restlessly. He didn’t get it, did he? He felt satisfied. I didn’t.

"Are you still thinking about it?" Damon muttered in my head, his voice slightly mocking.

Could he just shut up?

I dragged my hand over my face. "Can you just shut the hell up right now? I’m trying not to lose my head."

He huffed but quieted down, curling up somewhere in the back of my mind with the smugness of someone who had gotten exactly what they wanted. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

That little bastard.

With a painful sigh, I dragged myself to my feet and walked to the window with slow, purposeful steps. Looking out the window, my brows furrowdㅡEverything looked pretty much the same. People littered around the pack grounds, moving happily and talking amongst themselves. For a brief second, it felt like nothing had changed.

Except I had just mated my daughter’s best friend.

Not just mated. Bonded. Permanently. The kind of bond that didn’t dissolve with regret or logic that just came back or the desperate desire to go back in time and make a different call on that patrol route.

I had felt her the moment we came within range of the cabin. Both of us had. The scent hit like something physicalㅡ warm and overwhelming and stripping every rational thought out of my head before I’d even processed what it was. I had sixteen years of control built up. Sixteen years of being the steady one, the one who never fractured, who made the hard call and kept moving. I was an Alpha.

None of it meant a single thing last night.

I remembered the way she looked when the door opened. Keisha. Nine years old the first time I met her, scraped knuckle from the old fence at Nadia’s birthday, holding herself together with a dignity that had no business being on a child’s face. I had watched her grow into a woman from a careful, appropriate distance and never once allowed myself to look at it directly because some things simply were not allowed.

Last night, the bond didn’t ask what was allowed.

It simply took what it needed.

Everything including my sanity.

A knock at the study door pulled me back.

"Come in."

Dane stepped inside, shutting the door quietly behind him. He looked exactly as I felt. Calm and composed. But I could see the storm in his eyes. He was back to his rational self and he knew the weight of everything that happened.

"Alpha Callum." He finally said.

"Close the door."

"It is closed."

I turned from the window. He met my gaze steadily and I could feel it between us now tooㅡ that faint thread of something new that hadn’t been there yesterday. The bond didn’t discriminate. It had locked all three of us in before the night was over and it wasn’t interested in any of our objections.

I exhaled slowly. "Nobody finds out about this."

"Agreed."

"Not a word. Not to anyone in this pack. Not to Nadia." The mere thought of my daughter finding out made something cold settle in my chest.

Dane nodded once, his expression tight with understanding. "I already told her. Keisha. She told me to get out."

I almost laughed but it came out as a huff. "Smart girl."

"She’s going to need time, I think."

"We all need time. Away from her even more." I turned back to the window. "What she needs more is to not be alone in that cabin. Make sure the guard rotates properly and someone checks on her without making it obvious."

Dane was quiet for a beat. "And the bond?"

My brows knitted. So what about it? I pressed my hand against the cold glass of the window, staring out into the distance. I couldn’t see the cabin. I could simply feel her. There was a warm, quiet pull from the direction of the cabin. It was like a compass ㅡ compelling. And I never wanted to search somewhere else.

This was the first time I had felt the mate bond since my wife died eight years ago. And I hated it. It brought out a part of me that I had kept hidden for the last eight years.

Damon stirred in my consciousness but I immediately shut him out, not wanting to deal with anything he had to say.

"We manage it." I turned to Dane.

Dane said nothing for a moment. "Right." He turned to leave.

"Dane?"

He stopped.

"Last night doesn’t change your position here or mine. Or anything about how this pack runs." I kept my voice level and deliberate. "Nothing changes."

He looked at me over his shoulder and his expression did something I couldn’t fully read. "Of course, Alpha."

He left.

I continued to stand at the window, very aware of the bond humming quietly in my chest. Every boundary I had carefully maintained for the last eight years had been dismantled.

Manage it.

That was what I had said to Dane. But it wasn’t that easy, was it? How does one even break a dual bond? We couldn’t break it normally. Which meant we were stuck with each other until we could find a way to put an end to the pull between us.

My wolf snorted at that, knowing how very impossible it would be.

I ignored him and tilted my chin up.

I couldn’t afford another mistake. Not with Keisha.