Chapter 4 - The Christmas Morning Ultimatum
At 11:30 on Christmas morning, Crescent Ridge came to Blackwood Estate in force.
Not with soldiers.
With lawyers.
Juliet almost laughed when four black SUVs appeared beyond the gates.
“Very festive,” she said.
Ronan stood beside her in the front hall, wearing a dark sweater and an expression that suggested he preferred soldiers.
“They’re afraid of witnesses,” he said.
“Good.”
Juliet adjusted the borrowed clothes Maya had brought from town. Jeans, boots, a cream sweater, and a long charcoal coat.
No emerald dress.
No trembling hands.
No Bradley.
She looked like herself.
Or perhaps, for the first time, like the woman she might have been if no one had spent sixteen years teaching her to become smaller.
Ronan opened the front door.
Grant Jenkins stood on the porch.
He was fifty-eight, broad, silver-haired, and built like a man who had never needed to explain why he deserved authority. Bradley stood two steps behind him. Stella Mercer was there too, wrapped in white wool, her face unreadable.
Two attorneys remained near the vehicles.
Grant smiled at Juliet.
That smile made her skin crawl.
“Juliet.”
“Grant.”
His smile flickered.
She had always called him Alpha Jenkins.
Ronan noticed.
So did Bradley.
Grant looked toward Ronan.
“This is pack business.”
Ronan leaned one shoulder against the doorframe.
“You’re standing on Blackwood property.”
Grant’s jaw tightened.
“I’m here to retrieve a member of my pack.”
Juliet stepped forward.
“You expelled me.”
“That decision was made under emotional circumstances.”
“Whose emotions?”
Bradley looked down.
Grant ignored the question.
“You’re unwell.”
Juliet smiled.
“Interesting choice of words.”
Grant’s gaze sharpened.
“We need to discuss your medication.”
“There it is.”
A beat of silence.
Stella looked at Grant.
Bradley looked at Juliet.
Ronan said nothing.
He did not need to.
Juliet stepped onto the porch.
“You told me those pills stabilized my wolf.”
“They did.”
“They contained wolfsbane.”
Grant did not blink.
“Under medical supervision.”
“For sixteen years?”
“You had violent episodes as a child.”
Juliet stared.
“I never had violent episodes.”
“You don’t remember everything.”
The old trick.
The confident tone.
The implication that Juliet’s memories were less reliable than his authority.
She had believed it for years.
Not today.
“Maya Chen ran my blood work.”
For the first time, Grant’s expression changed.
Juliet continued.
“My wolf wasn’t unstable. She was chemically suppressed.”
Bradley looked sharply at his father.
“Dad?”
Grant ignored him.
“Dr. Chen has no access to your childhood records.”
“Neither do I. Isn’t that convenient?”
Ronan stepped outside.
Grant’s attorneys moved closer.
Ronan’s gaze slid toward them.
They stopped.
Grant exhaled slowly.
“This conversation is becoming unnecessarily hostile.”
Juliet laughed.
“You threw me into a blizzard less than fourteen hours ago.”
“Bradley made that decision.”
Bradley’s head jerked up.
Juliet stared at Grant.
Coward.
He would sacrifice his own son before accepting blame.
She turned to Bradley.
“Did you?”
Bradley’s face tightened.
“I told them to escort you from the hall.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He hesitated.
“No,” he admitted. “I didn’t tell them to take you beyond the territory line.”
Grant looked at him.
A warning.
Bradley saw it.
Something shifted in his expression.
For the first time, perhaps, Bradley understood that the man he had spent his life obeying would not protect him if truth became inconvenient.
Juliet looked back at Grant.
“You ordered it.”
“I prevented a domestic scandal from becoming a political incident.”
“A political incident?”
Grant’s patience slipped.
“You were destabilizing an alliance worth millions.”
There it was.
Not love.
Not family.
Money.
Juliet almost felt relieved.
“Why did you access the White Pine succession files this morning?”
Grant’s face became blank.
Bradley looked at him again.
Stella’s eyes narrowed.
Ronan folded his arms.
“We receive security notifications from the regional archive,” he said. “Your login was recorded.”
Grant’s attorneys exchanged a glance.
“I have administrative authority.”
“Not over sealed succession files,” Ronan said.
Grant’s gaze hardened.
Juliet stepped closer.
“My father was Alpha of White Pine.”
Grant said nothing.
“My mother was Luna.”
Silence.
“You told me they were ordinary pack members.”
“You were a child.”
“I was their daughter.”
The wind moved through the pines.
Juliet felt something rise inside her.
Not rage exactly.
Authority.
Her wolf was awake now, listening.
“So I’ll ask once,” she said. “Why did you lie?”
Grant’s eyes flashed.
Dominance rolled off him.
It hit Juliet like a warm gust.
Nothing more.
Grant’s expression changed.
He pushed harder.
Juliet felt the force of an Alpha command press against her mind.
Submit.
Her wolf stood.
No.
The pressure shattered.
Grant staggered half a step.
Everyone saw it.
Bradley’s mouth opened.
Stella went pale.
Ronan’s wolf surged beneath his skin, not in threat toward Juliet but in recognition.
Juliet had not moved.
Grant stared at her as if seeing a nightmare.
“What did you do?” he whispered.
Juliet smiled faintly.
“I stopped taking my vitamins.”
Ronan made a sound suspiciously like a laugh.
Grant’s control snapped.
“You don’t understand what you are.”
“Then explain it.”
“You are not ready to lead anything.”
“I didn’t say I wanted to.”
That answer seemed to confuse him.
Juliet realized why.
Grant understood power only as something to seize.
He could not imagine having it and choosing how to use it.
Grant stepped forward.
“Your father nearly destroyed White Pine.”
Ronan’s expression darkened.
“That’s a lie.”
“You weren’t there.”
“I was.”
Grant turned.
Ronan’s voice became quiet.
“Elias was preparing to withdraw from the regional mining compact. He discovered someone had been falsifying water-quality reports.”
Juliet looked at him.
This was new.
Grant’s face went rigid.
Ronan continued.
“Two weeks later, Elias and Mara were dead.”
Bradley stared at his father.
“Mining reports?”
Grant snapped, “Stay out of this.”
Bradley flinched.
Juliet saw it.
So did Stella.
Then Stella spoke for the first time.
“Mr. Jenkins, my father said the Mercer alliance was about southern transport access.”
Grant turned toward her.
“It is.”
“Then why did he receive revised mineral-rights maps from your office yesterday?”
Silence.
Bradley looked at Stella.
“What?”
Stella crossed her arms.
“I saw the files.”
Grant’s face hardened.
“This is not your concern.”
Stella’s laugh held no humor.
“You announced me as your son’s future mate in front of a hundred people. You made it my concern.”
Juliet stared at her.
Stella met her eyes.
No apology.
Not yet.
But something close to shame.
Grant turned back to Juliet.
“You are coming home.”
“No.”
“That was not a request.”
Ronan moved.
He did not step in front of Juliet.
He stepped beside her.
The distinction mattered.
Grant noticed too.
“Blackwood,” he warned.
Ronan’s eyes turned gold.
“If you issue another command to her on my property, you will leave without your teeth.”
One attorney took a step backward.
Juliet almost smiled.
Grant’s face flushed.
Then he looked at Juliet’s throat.
His eyes locked on something.
Juliet followed his gaze.
A faint silver shape had appeared beneath her skin near her collarbone.
Three narrow lines.
Like pine needles.
Maya had noticed it after the shift.
A birthmark that had become visible as the wolfsbane cleared.
Grant went white.
Juliet saw the fear.
Not uncertainty.
Recognition.
“You’ve seen this before,” she said.
Grant backed away.
“No.”
“On who?”
He turned toward the vehicles.
“Meeting over.”
Juliet followed him down one step.
“On my mother?”
Grant stopped.
That was enough.
Juliet’s heart pounded.
“What did you do to her?”
Bradley stared between them.
“Dad?”
Grant spun around.
His face was no longer controlled.
For one second, Juliet saw the man beneath the Alpha.
Afraid.
Cornered.
Dangerous.
“You have no idea what your mother started,” he said.
Ronan stepped forward.
“What did she start?”
Grant looked at him.
Then back at Juliet.
“A war.”
He got into the SUV.
The vehicles left without another word.
Bradley remained behind.
Grant’s driver honked once.
Bradley did not move.
“Go,” Juliet said.
He looked at her.
“I didn’t know about the wolfsbane.”
Juliet’s face remained still.
“I want to believe that.”
“It’s true.”
“Did you know who my parents were?”
Bradley hesitated.
That hesitation destroyed whatever remained.
Juliet’s chest hollowed.
“How long?”
“I found out last year.”
She stared at him.
“Last year.”
“My father said it didn’t matter.”
“You were sleeping beside me.”
“I didn’t know about the land.”
“You knew he lied to me about my parents.”
Bradley swallowed.
“Yes.”
Juliet nodded slowly.
The pain was quieter than she expected.
Maybe because the worst part had already happened.
Maybe because she had finally stopped hoping he was someone else.
“Go home, Bradley.”
“Juliet—”
“Go.”
Her Alpha command rolled through the air.
Bradley went still.
His wolf obeyed before his pride could resist.
He turned.
He walked to the SUV.
He did not look back.
When the gate closed, Juliet’s legs began shaking.
Ronan reached toward her, then stopped before touching her.
“May I?”
That nearly undid her.
She nodded.
Ronan wrapped his coat around her shoulders though she was already wearing one.
For a moment, Juliet let herself lean into his chest.
His heartbeat was slow beneath her ear.
Steady.
Safe.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what?”
“That the truth keeps arriving in pieces sharp enough to cut you.”
Juliet closed her eyes.
“Then help me find all of it.”
Ronan’s arms tightened slightly.
“All of it?”
She pulled back and looked at him.
“No more protecting me from ugly things.”
His expression became serious.
“All right.”
“Even if it involves my parents.”
“Yes.”
“Even if it involves you.”
Ronan went still.
Juliet noticed.
Her stomach tightened.
“What?”
He looked toward the mountain.
“There is something I haven’t told you.”
Of course there was.
Juliet stepped away.
“What?”
Ronan’s voice was low.
“The night your parents died, they were driving here.”
Juliet stopped breathing.
“To Blackwood Estate?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Ronan looked at her.
“Because my father had evidence Grant Jenkins was stealing from White Pine.”
Juliet’s heart pounded.
“And?”
“And someone inside Blackwood told Grant they were coming.”
The cold returned.
Not from the snow.
“Who?”
May you like
Ronan’s jaw tightened.
“My older brother.”
