I had done that to protect her.To protect us both.
And she would never know.
The Pakhan’s ultimatum echoed in my skull, as it had every hour since he had delivered it.His voice, calm and reasonable, like he was discussing the weather instead of my mate’s life.
Kill her or marry her.There is no third option.
I reached for the whiskey again.My fingers brushed the glass, feeling the cold.Still didn’t drink it.
The silence of the manor pressed in around me.Twenty thousand square feet of beautiful prison.Too large for one person.Too empty for two who wouldn’t speak.
I didn’t know how long I stood there, staring at paperwork that meant nothing, before the ache in my back reminded me of another reality I had been ignoring.The wounds from the Pakhan’s punishment throbbed with every heartbeat, a dull fire across my shoulders and ribs that had been easy to suppress while she was watching.
Alone now, I could admit how much it hurt.
The stairs were harder than they should have been.Every step pulled at torn tissue that hadn’t finished healing, muscle and skin that had been shredded by wolf claws five days ago.I gripped the railing tighter than necessary, letting the brass cool my palm, letting the physical anchor distract from the internal howling that grew louder with each floor I climbed.
She was up here.Somewhere above me.The wolf tracked her by scent, by sound, by the magnetic pull that had existed since the moment I had first seen her in the hotel lobby.
The master bathroom was cool and clinical, all white marble and chrome fixtures.I shrugged off my jacket, let it fall to the floor.The shirt underneath was harder.I had to peel it away from where blood had seeped through the bandages during the ceremony, the fabric sticking to the gauze with dried copper.
Every movement pulled.Every breath reminded me of the price I had paid.
The mirror showed me what the Pakhan’s justice looked like.What the price of loving a human cost in flesh and blood.
Four parallel gouges across my left shoulder blade, deep enough to scar.The marks ran from the top of my shoulder almost to my spine, ragged and red and still weeping despite the bandages I had applied this morning.Three more raking down my ribs on the right side, shallower but longer, crossing the old scars from other lessons learned the hard way.
Claw marks, not knife wounds.The enforcers had been in half-shift when they delivered the punishment, human enough to follow orders, wolf enough to tear.
This is the price of attachment,the Pakhan had said, watching from his chair while his wolves held me down.Remember it.
I remembered.The scars made sure of that.
That wasn’t the worst of it.The worst was what the Pakhan had demanded this morning, six hours before I had stood in the courthouse and watched Lena sign away her name.
The message had come at dawn.A single address.A single name.No explanation needed.
I had driven to the warehouse on the outskirts of Huntington Harbor with my back screaming against the leather seat, every pothole a fresh reminder of what the enforcers had done to me.The Pakhan knew I was still healing.Knew every movement cost me.That was the point.
The man inside was named Gregor Sorokin.Mid-level enforcer who had been skimming from protection payments.Forty thousand over eight months, siphoned into an offshore account he thought we could not trace.
Petrov had done the tracing.The Pakhan had assigned the punishment to me.
Sorokin was already bound to a chair when I arrived, his face bloody from the initial collection.He looked up when I walked in, and I watched the fear sharpen when he recognized me.Not just any wolf.The Vor.The Pakhan’s right hand.
“Raphael.”His voice cracked.“I can explain?—”
I hit him before he finished the sentence.My fist connected with his jaw and pain exploded across my ribs, the wounds tearing fresh beneath my shirt.Blood seeped into the bandages.Did not stop.
The second blow split his lip.The third cracked something in his cheek.Each impact sent fire screaming across my back, my body punishing me for the violence even as I delivered it.
That was the Pakhan’s true cruelty.Not just the beating five days ago.Making me work through it.Making me prove I was still useful even when every breath was like swallowing glass.
Sorokin was crying by the time I stepped back.Blood dripped from his chin onto his shirt, his breath coming in wet gasps.
“The money will be returned by end of day,” I said.My voice was steady.My hands were not.“If it isn’t, I come back.And next time I bring tools instead of fists.”
He nodded frantically, words beyond him.