This Chapter is dedicated to italma_rios.

Thank you so much for the multiple comments. They were the best part of my morning. 🥹🤭❤️

... 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

Torak felt a burning gaze pressing on his back, before he saw it.

Everything in him tightened. His wolf stirred, alert, and low in his chest. His wolf growled in warning. The presence he felt did not belong to the rhythm of the dance, or the softness of the moment they had just shared.

His gaze shifted, and then he saw him.

Alpha Blackfen stood across the hall, with his eyes already locked on them like he might tear them apart anytime soon.

Torak stilled.

The air changed, and his first instant was to protect Adele. It felt ridiculous protecting her from her father, but that was all he gathered at the moment.

Everything that had been soft, hidden, and dangerously intimate between him and Adele... snapped into something exposed.

And in the next second, Alpha Blackfen moved. He moved fast, at the speed of lightning.

One moment he was across the hall, and the next moment, he stood right before them.

The people around did not bother to even lift a glance, as they were too engrossed in their conversations to notice.

"Adele." Alpha Blackfen called calmly.

Adele tensed instantly in Torak’s arms.

"Father!" she said quickly, her voice catching just slightly. "This is—"

"I know who this is." He replied, not raising his voice. He didn’t need to, as Adele was already shivering inside.

His eyes never left Torak. Not once. They dropped briefly, to where Torak’s hand still rested at Adele’s waist.

Adele noticed his eyes. Gracefully, she stepped out of Torak’s hold. She did it so gracefully that it hurt.

The warmth vanished instantly.

She moved to stand beside her father. Her posture fixed itself immediately, becoming perfect, and her expression turned composed.

She switched up immediately, like nothing had happened. Like she had not just been breathing him in seconds ago.

Torak’s brows furrowed.

He stepped forward instinctively, and Adele stepped back. She did not just back, she moved behind her father, and the message became clear to Torak.

He finally got the message, and it hit him harder than anything else. For a second, her eyes met his softly.

So painfully soft it almost undid him. Then it vanished, and her dark eyes turned cold again.

Torak straightened slowly.

He tore his gaze from her, forcing himself to look at the man in front of him.

Alpha Blackfen stood tall, sharp-featured, and unreadable. Power clung to him in an absolute way.

"Torak MacKenzie," Torak said, extending his hand.

Alpha Blackfen took it. His grip was firm, and testing. "If you’d excuse my daughter now," he said smoothly, "a gentleman requires her hand."

Torak’s gaze flickered to Adele briefly.

His lips parted to speak, but Adele was faster.

She took her father’s arm without hesitation. "Let’s go, Father."

"Of course, my dear," Alpha Blackfen replied, drawing his hand back to himself. His eyes returned to Torak. "See you around, Mr. MacKenzie."

Torak nodded, slowly, and controlled. He withdrew his hand, and watched them leave.

Adele did not look back. Not even once.

Meanwhile, the music resumed. Or perhaps, it had never stopped but Torak couldn’t tell.

Everything around him felt distant and muted the moment she walked away with her father, leaving him in the middle of the dance floor. It felt like she had pulled the world away just enough for him to stand alone in it.

He stayed exactly where he was, and watched where she walked to with her father.

Alpha Blackfen did not take Adele far. He deliberately made sure Torak could still see her.

That much was intentional.

Torak knew it, and his jaw tightened as he clenched and unclenched his fist, unable to bounce back from the sudden blow he felt in his heart.

Across the hall, Alpha Blackfen slowed near a group of men already deep in conversation.

Alpha Blackfen leaned slightly toward one of them, as he paraded Adele. A man who stood out even among them. He looked older, and composed.

Too old not to have a mate, if Torak should judge.

Torak’s eyes narrowed slightly. He recognized him. That was Lord Kael Varent, a man whose influence stretched across multiple territories.

A strategist, and a kingmaker.

He was the kind of man whose support could shift alliances, and whose rejection could end them.

Alpha Blackfen said something to him, then he turned slightly, and gestured toward Adele.

Adele stepped forward, graceful, composed, and perfect. She was so composed like she hadn’t just been standing in Torak’s arms minutes ago, forgetting the world.

She curtsied slightly.

Lord Kael Varent took her hand.

His expression softened with approval and interest.

He parted his lips, and started speaking. His talk went on, and Adele listened. She stood poised, then she smiled whenever her father did.

Torak felt the pain in him physically. The pain felt like his guts were tearing out, and something sharp had lodged itself beneath his ribs, and twisting itself to harm him.

She smiled, and then, gradually, she began to laugh softly. Her laugh was real enough to be convincing.

Torak’s fingers curled slowly at his sides.

Across the hall, Alpha Blackfen left Adele and Lord Varent, and watched Torak instead. He smiled in satisfaction at the obvious.

He wouldn’t let just anybody use his daughter to climb up for power, wealth, and fame.

Torak didn’t look away. He couldn’t, even when every instinct told him to.

His wolf stirred restlessly beneath his skin, and he couldn’t understand why. Adele wasn’t his mate yet....

Lord Kael Varent spoke again, closer now, as he leaned slightly toward Adele with a private tone, and a calculated interest.

Adele responded. Her posture remained open, and engaged.

She tilted her head slightly, listening while stealing repeated glances at her father.

Then she said something. Torak couldn’t hear it, but he saw the effect. The man smiled. His smile came out genuine, and Torak could tell that the man liked her.

She was everything she needed to be. Beautiful, composed, and strategic. Exactly the kind of woman a man like him would consider.

Torak exhaled slowly through his nose. His lungs felt like they were filled with water, and he was drowning.

His mind betrayed him at that moment. It replayed moments where her breath was against his neck, with her fingers brushing his shoulder.

He replayed the way she had looked at him like he mattered. Like he was more than everything she had been taught to value.

And no, she stood there, laughing for another man.

His jaw clenched.

Across the hall, Adele felt the weight of his gaze. It pressed against her, and burned into her skin.

She didn’t turn. She couldn’t even dare to. Her father stood just a few steps away, watching her, and her every movement.

As if reading her thoughts, Alpha Blackfen walked closer to them.

"Your daughter is remarkable," Lord Kael Varent said the moment Alpha Blackfen was close.

Alpha Blackfen inclined his head slightly. "She is," he replied.

"I believe she would make a powerful alliance," the man added, thoughtful now. "Come to the next mate ball, the moon goddess will make the right choice."

Alpha Blackfen’s gaze flickered briefly past him, and to where Torak stood.

A slow satisfaction settled in his expression. "Yes," he said calmly. "I believe she will."

Adele’s smile remained in place, but her fingers curled slightly at her side, hidden and controlled.

She could feel the pull. It was still there, and still strong.

Torak watched it all. He watched every second, every movement, and every lie. For the first time, Torak didn’t know if she would ever choose him at all.