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Chapter 12 - The Predator’s Eyes

Even with his face altered beyond recognition, I knew those eyes. I would know them if they were reduced to ash and scattered by the wind.

He was a master of masks. That night, he had stood tall and broad-shouldered, a wolf with dominance radiating off his frame. Now he crouched low, his spine bent, his skin weathered to resemble an elder whose strength had withered with time. But I wasn't fooled. Beneath the disguise, his scent burned into me.

The sight of him here, in the middle of the pack's gathering, cracked open memories I had buried deep. Pain, raw and searing, spread across my back as if his claws had just torn through me again. The night he ended me still echoed inside my bones.

He hadn't hesitated then. He hadn't even growled. He had slipped behind me, silent as shadow, and ripped me apart from behind. No remorse. No falter. A predator who had practiced cruelty until it became instinct.

I'd never wronged anyone, never twisted pack law for my own gain. Who would want me dead?

But this wolf this shadow hid his true scent so well. Was he a rogue killer? A mercenary wolf who lived outside the laws of any pack?

And if he had already destroyed me once, why had he returned? Who did his hunger seek now?

My first instinct was to run. Every muscle in my body screamed for it. But I froze. Run? From what? I was already dead. Fear felt useless, yet it pulsed inside me anyway.

Caleb brushed a hand over the stranger's shoulder, dismissive, as if nothing was wrong. "It's fine," he murmured.

But those eyes those merciless, empty eyes never left me. They pierced through me the same way they had right before his claws sank into my flesh.

Even though I'd already crossed death's threshold, my body betrayed me, stiff and trembling. Could he see me? Could his predator's gaze pierce the veil between the living and the lost?

The question had barely taken shape when Caleb's voice broke through my terror. "Uncle Carter."

I blinked, realizing the man's gaze wasn't fixed on me at all. It burned past me, locked on Carter, who sat hunched in his chair like an alpha brought low but still dangerous.

Relief slithered into me, loosening my rigid spine, though unease still gnawed at my belly.

Carter's sharp attention shifted to Caleb, and the predator padded forward, silent, controlled. He passed so close I could almost feel the brush of his aura against mine, a wave of killing intent that made the hair at my nape rise.

Instinct took over. I stepped between him and Carter, arms out as though I could shield the crippled elder with my body. My wolf snarled inside me, protective, even if it was pointless.

But the predator slipped by, offering nothing more than the chill of his presence.

Damian wheeled Carter forward until they stopped directly before Caleb. Carter's eyes, cold and venomous as an old alpha stripped of his crown but not his fury, narrowed at him. I saw Caleb's shoulders tighten under that stare.

"As far as I know," Carter said, voice like a blade drawn across stone, "Isabel has been missing since the bonding ritual. And yet here you stand, parading yourself through a gathering as if nothing matters."

I hadn't expected it. Not from my family, not from my husband, but from Carter a wolf with no blood tie to me. He was the one demanding answers.

"Isabel's no pup," Caleb scoffed, tone dismissive, though unease flickered under his words. "She runs where she pleases. She's always been wild. When she's finished with her tantrum, she'll return."

His careless words clashed with Carter's unflinching weight.

"What if something truly has happened to her?"

For a heartbeat, fear cracked Caleb's mask. Panic flashed in his eyes before he smothered it. But before he could speak, Serena's voice cut through, sharp and poisonous.

"Uncle Carter, a wolf like Isabel could never fall into danger. She left for Cloudville long ago."

Caleb's head whipped toward her, shock breaking his calm. "What did you just say?"

"Today," Serena continued smoothly, "relatives told me she'd asked them to find her a den there. About a moon ago."

Her lie spun truth around it. I had spoken often about Cloudville the flower-lined roads, the emerald mountains that rose like guardians, the snow-tipped peaks where the air sang cold and pure. I had dreamed aloud of making it mine.

And half a moon ago, I had booked my flight.

I had planned it carefully. On the night of the bond, I would expose Caleb and Serena's betrayal before the entire pack. My revenge would shatter the Sanders and Bolton alliance, and then I would vanish into Cloudville, leaving them to choke on the ruins.

Serena's voice slid through the hall like honeyed venom. "I checked. She booked a flight on the fifteenth to Cloudville."

Caleb's face snapped from worry into a hard, stinging anger. "No wonder. She simply left without a word."

"Don't be so harsh, Caleb," Serena cooed, prim and practiced. "Isabel's always been flighty. She drifts where she pleases. We're used to it."

If he had bothered to follow the scent trail at all, he would've found the ticket was a plan, not a departure. I had reserved a way out, yes, but I never boarded the flight. I had stayed, waiting for the right night to expose them both. How pathetic that he swallowed Serena's lie whole.

Across the room, Carter's lips tugged into a small, flat smile that didn't reach his eyes. He watched us with a predator's patience, and when he spoke, his voice was cold as river ice. "Let's hope you don't regret it."

My blood ran cold at his words. Why warn him? Did Carter know something I didn't? My spirit prickled like fur raised to a storm. Caleb's expression flickered caught between pride and unease but before he could demand clarity, Damian steered Carter away in the wheelchair, the wheels whispering like a snake across stone. Serena instantly pivoted, clinging to Caleb's arm. "The auction's starting. Come on, let's take our seats."

I kept scanning the crowd, dragging my eyes across faces, hunting for the man whose eyes had ended me. The hall shimmered with wealth and praise; collectors murmured like a pack scenting fresh kill. But there, in the darker edge of the room, a shadow moved unlike any of the rest lean, hunched, and patient, watching Caleb with a gaze that made the skin along my spine tighten.

He favored the darkness; he seemed to shrink from the light. When he lifted his head, I caught the same eyes the ones that had looked into me before and spat out death. They were bloodshot, merciless, ice-cold. My gut clenched as if a fang had found bone.

Why was he here? Had he come to finish what he'd started? Or did the hunt take more than one night for him? The questions thrummed like an anxious heartbeat in my chest. I had been dead once what more could frighten me? Yet terror wrapped around me tighter than grief ever had. His stare pierced the thin veil of my existence, and for a moment I wondered if the killer could sense me at all.

Caleb's voice broke through the fog. "Three million." He tapped his paddle without hesitation, eager, believing the canvas belonged to Serena. She flushed, nestling against him like a wolf claiming territory. The crowd leaned in; whispers fanned out like eager pups. Praise rained on Serena how sincere, how undeserved. If they knew what crawled behind that sisterly mask, would they howl in anger or simply turn away?

A new voice cut the air low, deliberate. "Five million." I looked. Carter raised his paddle with slow, deliberate calm. The room shifted, a ripple of surprise tangling the air. Why was he bidding? He wasn't here for simple admiration. His presence felt like a test, a move on a chessboard played by claws rather than hands.

Caleb's response was quick and brittle. "Eight million." He pushed the bid higher, trying to outpace whatever game Carter was playing. A few eyes flicked between them like wolves gauging dominance.

Then Carter's voice dropped like a slab of winter night. "Eighty million."

Silence slammed the room. Mouths parted; breath hitched. Eighty million an obscene number thrown like a gauntlet. The auctioneer faltered. Even the most seasoned collectors sat stunned. Caleb's face went white under his tan, a raw flush of humiliation rising in his throat.

The next two canvases each one a piece I'd painted in secret, each one steeped in my nights of bleeding and mending fell into Carter's hands for the same obscene price. He wasn't just buying art. He was making a declaration, a burn on the ledger meant to scorch someone else's pride.

When Carter rose to leave, the room bent to watch him. Caleb lunged forward, face thunderous. He grabbed the car door, words clipped and brittle. "Uncle Carter two hundred million for three paintings? If Grandfather sees this "

Carter's eyelids lifted in a disdainful sliver. "Do you think I'm a fool like you?" His voice was a blade. Caleb's protest died in the face of that cold look. He hadn't yet taken the reins of the Boltons' den; his wealth was power with limits, and Carter had just shown him where those limits lay.

Caleb's voice shook with wounded pride. "Do you mean to humiliate me?"

Carter's hatred was slow and certain. "This time," he said, "I won't let it go."

The words landed like a prophecy. Heat and terror rose in my chest. Carter's purchase was more than a tantrum of wealth it was a stake driven into the ground. He had bought my canvases, not to possess them, but to mark territory, to shift the game. I watched Caleb, watched Serena lean into him, watched the crowd murmur over stolen beauty. A plan I'd forged in secret had been stolen, twisted, and turned into someone else's weapon.

My spirit howled low and hungry. The hunt had changed. The pack's rules had been bent. This was no longer about exposing lovers in the act it was about survival, about clawing back what they'd taken from me.

 

 

 

 

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