"There is something you need to know, Your Grace. It’s about the—"

The kitchen door swung open, and her words died in her throat.

Ruby walked in, her eyes on Ishita. Ishita, who had been holding the container with both hands and the particular steadiness of someone who had made a decision, felt that steadiness leave her body instantly.

Her hands trembled, and her eyes went to Ruby’s face before she could stop them.

Ruby’s gaze dropped to the container, then back up to Ishita. The look she gave the older woman was not loud or dramatic. It was very cold, and very pointed, and it said everything without saying anything at all.

Derek’s brows drew together, and he narrowed his gaze at Ishita. "What is it?"

Ishita pulled her eyes back to him and swallowed, deciding to summon the courage to continue.

"It’s about—"

Derek’s phone rang, cutting her off once again. He glanced at the screen and saw Connor’s name and held up a hand to Ishita. "Wait."

She closed her mouth and stood there with the container pressed between her palms, her heart going too fast. She refused to look at Ruby, who was still standing by the doorframe, arms folded. Her eyes were almost glowing with fury.

"Connor." Derek’s voice was already moving toward the clipped efficiency it took on when something was wrong.

"Your Grace." Connor’s voice came through carefully. "The Queen... she’s refused to come home."

Derek went still. "What do you mean she’s refused?"

There was a short hesitation on the other end. "After her classes this morning, she asked to be taken to the park at The Central. She’s been there a while, sitting with her friend. She hasn’t said much to any of us."

Another pause. "She’s just checked into one of the hotels here. She’s told us to leave. All the other guards are in the lobby. I’m the only one still at her door, but she’s ordered me to retire for the evening and—"

"Send me the location. I’m on my way."

Derek was already moving. Leo stirred inside him, hackles rising at the thought of Kira sitting alone in a hotel room somewhere, telling her entire security detail to go away. It made something in his chest pull tight in a way he did not stop to examine.

Behind him, the kitchen was quiet.

Ruby let out a slow, triumphant breath and looked at Ishita. Ishita looked back at her, the container still in her hands, and said nothing.

***

The hotel room was not large, but it was private, and that was all Kira had needed when she had walked up to the front desk and asked for it.

She sat now on the edge of the bed with her knees drawn up and her shoes off, and she was crying in the particular way she hated most, the quiet kind, the kind where the tears just kept coming without noise, making her feel helpless in a way that loud crying never did.

Jessica sat beside her with one arm around her shoulders, saying nothing, which was the right thing to do. Jessica had always known when to talk and when to simply be present, and this was a being-present moment.

Kira had told her everything. About Lydia. About the way the words had sounded when Lydia had leaned across the table and said them so quietly, as though lowering her voice could soften the weight of what they meant.

He killed your mother. Rolf strangled her to death.

She had held herself together through the taxi ride back. She had held herself together through the park, sitting on a bench while the afternoon moved around her, and Jessica held her hand and didn’t push. She had held herself together right up until the hotel room door closed behind them, and then she had stopped holding. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Her father had killed her mother.

And then he had spent twenty years blaming the child for it.

She pressed the back of her hand against her mouth and breathed through it. Her mind kept circling back to the same question, the one that had been sitting at the edge of everything since she’d left Lydia at that restaurant table.

If Rolf had hated her that much, more than could be explained by grief or rage or wounded pride, if he had wanted her dead every single time she drew breath near him, then maybe the hatred was about something more than the affair. Maybe it was about what the affair had produced.

Maybe she was not his.

The thought settled over her quietly, not like a shock, but like something she had been circling for a long time, finally coming to rest.

"He’s a psychopath," Jessica said, breaking the silence gently. "Alpha Rolf. He’s always been. You know my mum told me once that there used to be people in Moonfang who talked about your mother? Openly, just... remembered her."

Her voice dropped. "They’re not around anymore. Any of them. It became a pattern. People who mentioned the former Luna started disappearing, or meeting with terrible accidents, and eventually everyone just... stopped. Because staying silent was the only safe option."

Kira lifted her head slowly. "All of them?"

Jessica nodded. "Every single one. My mum only told me because she trusted me not to repeat it. She said it wasn’t worth dying for a memory."

She squeezed Kira’s shoulder. "Thinking of it now, I think there is something Rolf is hiding, Ki. Something bigger than an affair. And Lydia knows what it is."

Kira stared at the carpet. "She knows more than she told me," she said quietly. "I could feel it. She was giving me pieces, not the whole picture."

"Then we need the whole picture." Jessica turned to look at her properly. "Kira. You have access to someone who could find out everything. Your husband—"

"No."

"Hear me out—"

"I said no, Jessica." Kira pulled her knees tighter. "I’m not going to him with this."

Jessica studied her face. "Why not?"

Kira was quiet for a moment. When she spoke, her voice was steady by sheer effort. "Because this morning he looked me in the face and told me that if he wanted someone to nag him, he would have gotten himself a real wife."

She let that sit in the air between them. "I knew what this marriage was. I knew from the beginning. But I was starting to forget." She let out a short, humourless sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. "That was my mistake."

Jessica opened her mouth.

"A contract, that is all I’ll ever be to him. I can’t trust him with information like this about myself. He wouldn’t even care."

Jessica rubbed her shoulder. "I’m so sorry about that, Ki."

"I was beginning to like him," Kira said, wiping her tears and looking around as if to keep them in check. "Really like him, which is apparently what I do. I find the most inconvenient person in any given situation, and I start to feel things about them."

She pressed her fingers to her eyes. "My whole life is one big mess, Jess. My father murdered my mother. My husband thinks I’m a contractual obligation. And I’m sitting in a hotel room crying about both of them. I don’t even know who to trust anymore."

"Hey." Jessica pulled her closer. "You are not a mess. You are a person dealing with things that would flatten most people, and you are still standing, which frankly is extraordinary, and you should be giving yourself significantly more credit."

Kira laughed despite herself, a wet, shaky sound. "You always know what to say."

"I really do," Jessica agreed. "It’s a gift."

Three knocks came at the door, startling them.

"Connor, I told you to go home," Kira called, wiping her face quickly with the back of her hand.

Silence.

Then a voice came through the door, low and unmistakable, with the particular quality of a man who had driven across the city and was never going to leave without her.

"It’s not Connor," Derek said. "Open the door."