Chapter 256
Third Person’s POV
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Aurora slumped to the cold stone ground, legs trembling, chest heaving, as Silas’s shove sent her sprawling. The icy wind off the river whipped through her hair, carrying the roar of the dark waters below, the same river that had nearly claimed her moments ago. Her lungs burned, her throat raw, and her body shook with adrenaline and lingering terror.
Caelum barely dared to breathe. His amber eyes burned with disbelief, his wolf coiling within him like a storm, sensing the betrayal of every expectation he had clung to for years. She hadn’t saved him. Aurora’s frantic confessions earlier, shouted with desperation and fear, had shattered the fragile truth he had built his trust upon.
No… it wasn’t Aurora who had rescued him in the river that night. That realization clawed through him, a wolfish ache in his chest that made him stagger back a step. Even when he’d heard about the five million transferred to Lee as part of some mysterious transaction, his gut had told him something was off–but he had buried the doubt, refused to confront it.
And now… the words were like cold steel across his ribs. Aurora had not saved him. Not her.
Caelum’s gaze drifted, inevitably, to Freya. She stood at the riverbank like a statue of steel, long hair whipping in the wind, her stance proud, her spine straight and unyielding. The icy determination in her amber eyes made the moonlight glint off her high cheekbones, her sharp jawline, her commanding presence. A warrior through and through.
“Is it… you?” Caelum’s voice was low, strained, almost a growl, but each word trembled with the weight of a man on the edge of revelation. He took a step forward, another, drawn by instincts older than logic, by the wolf’s primal need to find the truth. His muscles tensed; his body wanted to sprint, to leap to her feet, to demand answers.
His rational mind screamed that perhaps it was safer to stop, to leave the past buried in silence. But the wolf within him urged him on, compelling him to confront the truth, to hunt it down like prey until the final answer was laid bare.
Before he could reach her, Kade’s boot connected with his chest, sending him sprawling onto the stone embankment. Pain shot through his ribs, but even lying there, gasping, the wolf inside him bristled with fury.
“Caelum, you have no right to come near Freya!” Kade barked, eyes glinting with the cold logic of a pack enforcer.
Coughing and clutching his bruised chest, Caelum struggled to rise, amber eyes fixed like molten fire on Freya. “Freya… tell me… was it you? The one who saved me that night in the
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Chapter 256
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river–was it you?” His voice wavered, torn between hope and despair, the alpha wolf in him. demanding truth.
Lana let out a derisive chuckle, wolf ears flicking at the tension in the air. “Oh, Caelum, you’re asking now? Not long ago, you swore it was Aurora who saved you, right?” Her words carried a sharp, mocking edge, yet beneath it lingered the wolfish curiosity of one sensing the shifting hierarchy.
Pain contorted Caelum’s face, his jaw tight, his fur bristling as he ignored Lana’s sarcasm. Nothing else mattered. Only the woman before him–the one who had been there, silent and unseen all these years. His chest heaved with betrayal, with longing, with the raw, animalistic ache of knowing that his trust had been placed in the wrong wolf.
“Do I need to answer that?” Freya’s voice cut through the wind, cold and precise. Her wolf prowled beneath her skin, ears alert, fangs barely bared in warning. “Whether I did or didn’t, Aurora was never your savior. Believing otherwise… was always a joke p>
Silas moved to her side, a predator beside his mate, amber eyes scanning, wolf instincts coiled, ready to strike if anyone challenged the pair. “What will you do with her, Freya?” he asked quietly, yet every word held authority, the weight of pack command and lethal intent.
“Hand her over to the authorities,” Freya replied smoothly. “And include all the evidence that could incriminate her. Let the law decide p>
Silas inclined his head, signaling his enforcers. Aurora was hauled to her feet, stumbling against the cold stone as she struggled, her breath catching in sobs. “No! You can’t… I haven’t done anything! Caelum, help me! Please p>
But Caelum stood frozen, muscles tense, golden eyes fixed on her with the weight of revelation pressing down. He could not move, could not speak, could not act–not yet. The wolf within him growled at the injustice, at the helplessness, at the cruel twist of fate. Aurora’s rescue–or lack thereof–had rewritten everything he thought he knew about the past, and now he was forced to reckon with it.
The men hauled Aurora to the waiting vehicle, the engine rumbling like a growl from the depths of a slumbering wolf. Freya’s gaze turned to Lana and Kade.
“You two?” she asked, voice still calm, yet tinged with the lethal precision of a hunter.
“Of course,” Kade replied, nodding toward the figure still restrained. “This one goes to the authorities as well p>
“Very well,” Freya said, the alpha’s aura radiating off her in waves. “To the authorities, then. Together p>
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Chapter 256
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The vehicles moved, tires scraping against stone and asphalt, carrying the captured wolves of misdeeds. Caelum watched as Freya slid into her vehicle alongside Silas. She did not glance back. Her amber eyes were steel, unyielding, a reminder of the distance that now existed between them.
Before stepping in, Silas’s gaze flicked toward Caelum, sharp and warning. No motion, no question, no hesitation–an unspoken decree: do not approach her.
The vehicle rolled away, and Caelum’s hands clenched into fists, the alpha wolf in him roaring at the unfairness, the betrayal, the helplessness. He had once been closest to Freya, once the one she had considered in every choice. Now, even the smallest glance from her was withheld.
He turned his eyes to the river again, dark, relentless, churning like it had that night when his life hung in the balance. The memory came unbidden: a voice, strong and certain, cutting through the despair. “Don’t be afraid… I’ll save you. You’ll be fine, with me here p>
He remembered the warmth, the hope, the promise in that voice, and the promise he had made himself: that if he survived, he would repay her.
And yet… here he was, three years of marriage behind him, standing by as the truth unraveled. The one who had saved him had been here all along, silent, watching, unacknowledged, and he had squandered every moment, every memory, every gesture.
The river roared, the moonlight glinting off its restless surface, and in Caelum’s chest, the wolf howled–not with hunger, not with rage, but with infinite, aching regret.