Kruze and Zarek looked at each other.
"Sorry?" Zarek said.
"I said I'm leaving." Daciana picked up her bag. "I don't know what alpha bully testosterone competition you two have going on but you've got the wrong girl. So."
Then Kruze laughed. Zarek started half a second later and suddenly they were both just standing there losing it like she'd said something genuinely hilarious.
"Okay," Zarek said, wiping his eye. "Okay okay. You can go."
"Thank you."
"Absolutely." He waved at the door. "Please. Go ahead."
She walked toward it but they moved faster. Kruze hit the door and locked it, and Zarek dropped the key in his pants, adjusted himself with zero shame.
"You were saying?"
She stared. At him. At where the key very obviously was.
"That's disgusting."
"Little bit." He tilted his head. "You're welcome to come get it though."
"I'd rather chew glass."
"Offer stands."
She turned to Kruze. He was leaning against the door with his arms crossed, a black band on his right wrist, thumb pressing against it slowly.
She hated that.
Daciana glanced at Smitty, still snoring in the corner.
Plan B.
"TEACHER SMITTY!" Her voice cracked on purpose. "Wake up! I'm reporting this to the board—"
Smitty jolted, coffee spilling across his desk. He blinked at the twins, mouth opening to yell.
"Smitty." Kruze's tone was pure ice. "Condo on Fifth. The one your wife thinks is storage."
Smitty's face drained white in seconds.
"Sit. Down."
Smitty sat. Hands over his face. "I'm a plant. Not here."
"Wise," Zarek said cheerfully.
"So." Kruze's voice was calm. Bored almost. "Let's try this again."
"Fine," she said. "What do you want."
Kruze pushed off the door. "Personal Slave or Assistant. One year. You handle whatever we need while we complete our program."
"No."
Zarek blinked. Looked at Kruze. Looked back at her. "I'm sorry, did she just—"
"No," she said again. "Find someone else."
"Daciana." Her name in Kruze's mouth was weird. "You were in that library. Watching. Which means you're either with us or you're erased. Completely. And nobody in this school or your tiny little pack asks a single question about where you went."
The room went very quiet.
She looked at Zarek.
His smile hadn't moved. Still empty behind the eyes.
"One year," Kruze said. "We complete the program. You go home. Simple."
She met Kruze's eyes, refusing to blink first. "One year. We finish the program. You walk away clean."
"And if I don't?"
Kruze's thumb pressed the black band on his right wrist—slow, like he was counting down her options. "Then we don't need to discuss what happens next."
Her wolf snarled inside her chest, claws scraping at the edges of control, but she forced her voice steady. "I want a one favor."
Zarek laughed low, the sound vibrating too close. "Bold little spy."
Kruze studied her for a long beat, eyes unreadable. " Fine.You have my word as Westmont."
She nodded once. "Deal."
Zarek leaned in, breath warm against her ear. "Don't get comfy, little spy. Tonight's just the start."
he added. "You haven't heard what tonight actually involves."
"Your first job," Zarek said, "is a hand candy."
Daciana stared at him. "I'm sorry."
"Tonight. Our brother's bachelor party." He checked his phone. "Strip club. Frat boys. You're going as Rodrigo's plus one."
"I'm going as—"
"Hand candy," Kruze said. "Keep up."
She looked between them. "You want me to be arm decoration for your brother at a strip club."
"We were supposed to book entertainment." Zarek shrugged. "We forgot. We were busy chasing a spy around the library."
"I wasn't—"
"We were busy," Kruze said flatly. "Now we're not. Problem solved."
She stared at them.
In her head she was screaming YES. One step inside the Westmont inner circle. One step closer to their father. One step closer to everything she'd spent eight months planning.
But wait.
Rodrigo.
The chapel. Earlier. His hands on her face and his mouth on hers and the way he'd kissed her like he already knew her and then walked away to go marry someone else.
THAT Rodrigo.
Getting MARRIED Rodrigo.
The moon goddess had genuinely excellent taste in revenge plots.
"Fine," she said.
Zarek blinked. "That's it? No argument?"
"Did you want one?"
"A little bit honestly."
"We leave in an hour," Kruze said. "Don't be late."
........................…
Sable was pacing when she got back to the room. Jayden was sitting on the bed with his arms crossed and the specific face he made when he'd been worried for a long time and was now converting it into anger.
"THREE HOURS," Sable said.
"I know—"
"You went to detention with the Westmont twins and disappeared for THREE HOURS—"
"I'm fine—"
"We thought they'd—" Sable stopped. "Considering what they did to Lily. And to your bro—"
"Don't," Daciana said.
Sable's mouth closed.
Jayden looked at her. Everyone who loved her knew that tone.
"I'm fine," she said Quieter. "I promise. I'm fine."
Jayden stood up and crossed the room and hugged her. Just pulled her in without asking, arms tight, chin on her head. She let him. Just for a second. Just long enough to breathe.
"Don't go anywhere with them without me," he said into her hair.
"Jayden—"
"I mean it."
She pulled back. Looked at him. "Aren't you with Violet?"
"That's not—" He stepped back. "That's not what I said."
"Right." She nodded once. "Okay."
Awkward beat.
Jayden cleared his throat and picked up his phone. "Let me look up this party. See what we're dealing with."
He found the frat group in forty seconds. .
"Alpha Frat Bachelor Party," he read aloud. "Strip club. Strippers will be present. Two hundred dollars per hour." He looked up. "Rich pricks throwing money around when people are actually starving."
Her phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
30 minutes, little wolf. Don't keep us waiting.
She stared at it.
"How did they get my number," she said out loud.
Another message.
That video you recorded? Gone. Don't ever try that again.
She opened her gallery. Checked her files. Checked everywhere.
Gone. Actually gone. She'd been holding her phone the entire time. She'd never put it down. She never let it out of her—
These boys were genuinely dangerous.
Then her mum's name lit up the screen.
She almost didn't open it. She should not have opened it.
It was a photo.
Her mum's face. Left eye swollen completely shut, deep purple, the kind of bruise that took serious force.
Below it:
Stepdad's having a bad week. Lily asked for the yellow dog cartoon four times this morning. You know what that means. Appointment is on Thursday. $340. Do you have anything saved baby?
Daciana looked at that number for a long time. She had nothing.
$340.
Lily watching the yellow dog cartoon because it was the last thing she remembered before the Westmont cover-up stole her health and left her mother with a man who hit her because he had the money that kept Lily alive.
$340.
Strippers will be present. $200 per hour.
The math was simple.
"I'm going as a stripper," she said.
The room went quiet.
"Sorry," Sable said.
"To the party. I'm going as a stripper." She was already moving to her wardrobe. "I need the money. Lily's appointment—"
"I heard you I just—" Sable watched her pull out the outfit. Perfect black. Exactly right. "How do you just HAVE that?"
"I stripped to pay first semester tuition."
"I thought that was a JOKE."
"Sable." She stepped into the heels. Checked the mirror. Adjusted. "I never joke about money."
Jayden was very quiet.
She turned around.
He was looking at her with an expression she didn't have time to deal with right now.
"Don't," she said.
"I didn't say anything."
"You were about to."
He looked at the floor. Looked back up. "At least let me come."
"You can't come to a Westmont bachelor party."
"Then text me when you get there. And when you leave."
"Jayden—"
"Daciana." Just her name. The way he said it. "Please."
She looked at him for one second.
"I'll explain everything when I get back," she said. "I promise."
.....................
She left before either of them could answer.
They put her in a car she couldn't name. Black, low, the kind of vehicle that meant money without trying. No twins. Just her and the driver and a route she didn't recognize.
She changed in the backseat because there was no other option. In the backseat she contorted into the black outfit—lace and thin straps that left almost nothing to imagination.
The fabric dragged over still-sensitive skin, teasing nipples that hadn't calmed since the library, reminding her of the hard chair, the filthy pages, Rodrigo's mouth claiming hers without asking.
Her wolf whined, low and needy, hips shifting involuntarily against the leather seat.
The driver's eyes flicked to the rearview mirror. She caught them in the reflection. He looked away immediately.
Good.
She fixed her hair in the dark window, pulse racing. One night as "entertainment." One night closer to their secrets. One night pretending she didn't still feel Rodrigo's kiss like a brand burning her lips.
The car stopped.
She got out.
Kruze lounged at the bar, smirking. Zarek spotted her first—eyebrows lifting in real, hungry appreciation, tongue tracing his lower lip slow enough to make her skin prickle.
She didn't give either of them the satisfaction of a glance.
The crowd parted. And there he was.
Center table. Jacket off, sleeves rolled to show corded forearms, sitting like the room had been built around him.
He saw her.Then that slow, chapel smile spread—dangerous, knowing, the same one he'd worn right before kissing her senseless.
"Little wolf," Rodrigo said. "You're my entertainment tonight."
She walked straight to him. Stopped close enough that her thighs brushed his knee through the thin lace.
.
"Congratulations," she said, voice steady even as heat pooled low and traitorous. "On the engagement."
She'd rehearsed facing a Westmont for years.
She hadn't rehearsed the way her body lit up under his stare—wet, ready, and absolutely furious about it.