Olivia sat cross-legged on the edge of the bed in Brian’s private quarters, dressed head to toe in sleek black trousers and a fitted jacket that made her look more like a professional thief than a wife waiting for her husband.

An earpod was tucked discreetly in her ear as she listened intently to the live feed, her fingers tapping nervously against her knee. Brian had no idea she had planted the tiny device, and right now she was grateful for it.

The door suddenly slammed open with enough force to rattle the walls. Olivia jumped so hard her phone clattered to the floor.

Crane stormed in like a thundercloud given legs, his face dark with fury, and Olivia’s stomach dropped straight through the floor.

Everything was coming apart for him, and it showed. He could no longer reach Rolf. Not a single call was answered. And worse, word had reached him that Rolf and his entire family had already fled Moonfang and vanished into hiding, slipping clean out of his grasp.

For the first time in a very long time, Crane felt himself standing in the dark, fumbling for threads that kept dissolving in his hands. And now even Brian, his own son, his careful little plan B for when everything else failed, had disappeared without a trace. Useless boy!

"Where is he?" Crane demanded.

Olivia shrank back, her eyes wide. "I haven’t seen him since yesterday, Father-in-law. I swear it."

Crane’s eyes narrowed to slits. He crossed the room toward her slowly, deliberately, and Olivia stepped backwards until her shoulders hit the wall and there was nowhere left to go.

His gaze raked over her, taking in the black trousers and the dark jacket.

Without warning, his hand shot out and wrapped around her throat, not tight enough to choke, but firm enough to make her freeze.

"And why," he said softly, "are you dressed like an assassin?"

Olivia shook her head quickly, her pulse hammering against his palm. "It’s nothing. I was only role-playing. It’s a little hobby of mine, when Brian’s away, and I’ve nothing else to do. Helps me... relax."

Crane studied her face for a long, cold moment.

"Tell me the truth," he said. "Where is my son?"

"Father-in-law." Olivia’s voice came out small and trembling. "You know better than anyone that Brian doesn’t think enough of me to tell me where he goes. He never has. He never shares his plans with me."

And that, Crane knew, was true. His son would sooner burn his own tongue out of his head than share a single secret with the wife he despised. There was no use squeezing water from a stone.

With a disgusted snort, he released her throat. Olivia sagged against the wall in relief.

"If you do know where he is," he said, stepping back, his voice low and lethal, "and you keep it from me, I will cut that pretty tongue out of your mouth myself. Are we clear?"

Olivia nodded fast.

"Get out."

She scooped her phone up off the floor and hurried from the room without a backward glance.

The moment the door shut, Crane began tearing the place apart.

He yanked open drawers and slammed them shut, shoved stacks of papers off the desk, overturned a side table, all the while muttering under his breath like a man possessed.

"What can I use to drag you out, you ungrateful little bastard? What is it? There’s always something."

He reached the tall bookshelf against the far wall and swept his arm across it, sending books tumbling to the floor in a clattering heap. One landed open at his feet, and a small stack of photographs slid out from between its pages.

Crane bent and picked them up.

The one on top stopped him.

It was Brian and his mother, the two of them squeezed into a photo booth, heads tilted together. And Brian, in the picture, was beaming. Not the cold, mocking smirk Crane knew so well, but a real, wide grin, the kind that crinkled the corners of his eyes.

Crane stared at it for a long moment, and something almost like contempt curled his lip.

"So this is the life you’d have chosen," he murmured. "This common path after I gave you everything. A mother who threw you away." He sighed through his nose. "Let’s see how long you stay hidden, boy, once I have her in my hands."

He lifted his phone, snapped a photograph of the picture, and dialled a number. It was answered almost at once.

"I’ve just sent you an image," Crane said coldly. "Find that woman and bring her to me. I don’t care if she’s at the very ends of the earth. She’s a Lycan. So find her."

He ended the call and shuffled through the remaining photographs in his hand. And then his face split into a slow, delighted smile.

Because there, in his fingers, were two more pictures. One of Kira sitting across a café table from her stepmother. And one of her best friend, standing by an SUV, helping the queen into a disguise.

The same photographs he had been asking Brian to use appropriately.

"Perfecto," Crane breathed.

***

Somewhere deep in a forest, inside a modest tent hidden among the trees, Rolf and Lydia sat across from one another with a chessboard resting on the low table between them.

A voice called out from beyond the flap of the tent.

"Come in," Lydia said.

A man entered, ducking low, and bowed to them both. "Forgive me. Alpha, Luna. It’s that Mr Crane again. He’s been calling without pause. Should we tell him to stop?"

Lydia moved a chess piece calmly and smiled. "No. Leave the fool to keep calling. Telling him off will only end his frustration and confusion. Let him stew in it."

The man bowed again and withdrew.

Rolf leaned back and looked at his wife with open admiration. "You’re a genius. You do know that, don’t you?"

Lydia chuckled softly and made another move. "We simply needed to repay him properly for orchestrating the massacre of his own people all those years ago and then pinning it on you. Some debts deserve interest."

Rolf laughed and moved his own piece. "The sheer audacity of the man. Years of spreading his filth about me, painting me as the butcher, and then he comes crawling to our door, asking us to work together."

Lydia laughed softly. "He thought we’ll never find out. Well, thank the goddess for Kira’s presence in Dravengard." She moved another piece. "Now we’ve no further use for him. He’s already done what we wanted. He has got us inside Dravengard. Now we simply wait, and take it."

She lifted her eyes to Rolf, amusement glittering in them.

"Tell me. How does it feel? To be the one holding the leash for once, instead of wearing it?"

Rolf chuckled again and advanced his own piece across the board. "Satisfying," he said. "Deeply, deeply satisfying."

Lydia’s smile widened. She reached out and slid her queen into place with a single tap of her finger and sat back.

"Checkmate," she said.