The sound of the crowd grew louder from the field.
A horn blast announced the start of another challenge.
Gretta stood among the spectators, her attention fixed on the competitors as several men approached the first obstacle. Thick ropes had been suspended from a wooden structure, while heavy logs were scattered across the ground.
It was a rudimentary competition.
Almost unnecessarily brutal.
One of the competitors hoisted a log onto his shoulders and began climbing the slope. Another had already reached the rope, pulling himself upward with a determination that made the spectators shout even louder.
Gretta barely noticed them.
Her eyes had found Adam.
He stood farther ahead, speaking with another Alpha, a man whose family was also among the most influential in the country.
Even from a distance, there was something about him that was impossible to ignore.
His presence.
The way people behaved when he was nearby.
His confidence exerted a quiet, almost effortless influence over the people around him.
The way people naturally made space for him without his ever needing to ask.
Gretta watched him for a long moment.
Adam was everything Taylor wanted.
Everything she had worked so hard to achieve.
Taylor had never been interested in simple things. She liked intelligent people, complex conversations, difficult problems. She admired situations capable of challenging her, of making her think instead of simply agreeing with her.
And Adam was exactly that kind of man.
Gretta knew how many times Taylor had tried.
She had seen the effort.
The carefully chosen conversations.
The lengths Taylor had gone to in order to become his assistant, creating opportunities just to stay close to him.
The way she studied him, as though understanding him somehow would make him finally look at her.
And, for a moment, it had seemed as though he might, as if everything had somehow fallen into place.
Life worked that way: sometimes, the improbable won against the odds, for no apparent reason at all.
Gretta knew this better than most.
She understood what it meant to want something desperately, to do everything within your power, and still not get it.
She understood that.
What she didn't understand was why Taylor couldn't have that one happiness.
Why did it have to be someone else?
Why did Adam have to look at someone else that way?
Gretta's eyes drifted toward Damián.
For a moment, something unpleasant twisted inside her.
It wasn't hatred.
Not exactly.
It was something more complicated.
She knew what sympathy felt like.
She knew what pity felt like.
And she wanted neither of those things for Taylor.
She wanted her daughter to be chosen.
To be loved.
To have the kind of happiness that didn't need to be explained or defended.
Maybe that was why the thought had started to surface.
Maybe this was the moment when Taylor could finally show Adam what she was capable of.
Maybe, if circumstances changed...
Gretta cut the thought short.
It was a foolish idea.
Maybe worse than foolish.
Idiotic.
She knew that.
She had spent enough of her life watching people make terrible decisions and call them fate.
And yet, she couldn't make the thought disappear.
Her gaze returned to the field.
One competitor fell from the rope.
The crowd let out a gasp of surprise, then laughed when he got back up, apparently unharmed.
Gretta didn't laugh.
Instead, she thought of another man.
Her ex-husband.
The man who had left her and their children for an omega from a prominent political family.
Back then, she had told herself there was nothing she could do.
What could a woman with children and no protection do against a family with money, influence, and connections?
She had stayed.
Swallowed her pride.
Worked.
Endured.
Accepted whatever arrangement kept food on the table and allowed her children to keep moving forward.
She had told herself dignity was a luxury.
That survival came first.
And maybe, in the beginning, that had even been true.
But there had been other choices.
Choices she had made consciously.
Choices she made because they were easier than facing the truth.
Choices she had defended for years because admitting they had been mistakes would mean acknowledging that she herself had helped build the life she later came to hate.
Gretta's fingers tightened around the edge of her coat.
Her ex-husband hadn't been worth destroying herself over.
She knew that now.
He never had been.
But the terrible truth was that she hadn't destroyed only parts of herself.
She had made decisions that had also shaped her children.
Without realizing it, she had taught them that love could be something you endured.
That security was worth almost any sacrifice.
That sometimes you had to accept less because wanting more was dangerous.
Taylor had learned that from her.
Maybe that was why Gretta couldn't stand to watch her daughter lose again.
A strange feeling moved through her.
For the first time, she looked at herself without the excuses she had spent years building.
And what she saw made her uncomfortable.
Not a victim.
Not a villain.
Just a woman who had survived some things...
and made others even worse.
The realization left a bitter taste.
Bizarre.
Almost humiliating.
Gretta lowered her eyes.
Maybe she was wrong.
The thought surfaced quietly.
And, for the first time, she didn't push it away immediately.
She looked at Adam again.
Then at Taylor, standing farther back among the spectators.
Taylor was smiling.
Trying to look as though none of it mattered.
Gretta knew that smile.
She had taught her daughter to wear it.
The smile of someone pretending not to want something because wanting it had become too painful.
Gretta's chest tightened.
No.
She couldn't simply stand there and watch her daughter accept the great defeat of her life.
Maybe she could still do something.
Maybe she could give Taylor a chance.
The idea came back.
This time, it frightened her.
Because, somewhere beneath the desire to protect her daughter, there was another impulse.
Something darker.
Something that sounded dangerously familiar.
Gretta looked at Adam again.
She knew it wasn't a brilliant idea.
In fact, it might be a completely foolish one.
But she had spent a good part of her life making decisions because, in the moment, they had seemed necessary.
And maybe this was the moment she finally decided to make one for herself.
The horn sounded again.
The next competitor entered the field.
Gretta remained still.
Watching.
Thinking.
And, for the first time in years, she wondered whether wanting something badly enough could make a person mistake interference for love.
Clarice stood in front of the mirror.
She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, then tilted her face slightly, studying her own reflection.
She looked tired.
Not tired enough for anyone to notice.
But she knew.
She had lost hours of sleep.
Too many hours.
Thinking.
Replaying every detail.
Every look.
Every opportunity.
Every moment she could have done something and hadn't—she and Callum, just friends.
Clarice picked up her lipstick and swept a thin layer over her lips.
"This is the moment to say goodbye to common sense."
She said it to her own reflection.
And, to her surprise, she didn't feel bad about it.
In fact, she felt strangely light.
Maybe because, after spending so long trying to be reasonable, she had finally accepted that reason didn't always take people where they wanted to go.
Sometimes you had to cross the line of fire.
And crossing that line seemed perfectly acceptable when you had a goal.
Clarice studied her own face.
There was something different in her eyes.
A quiet determination.
She thought about opportunities.
Some only passed in front of you once.
Others came back around.
But there was no way to know which was which until they were already gone.
Maybe that was why certain opportunities needed to be bitten.
Not held delicately.
Not touched with care.
Bitten.
Like a fierce animal finally finding what it had been hunting all along.
You had to sink your teeth in.
Hold on.
And not let go.
Clarice closed the lipstick.
That was when she realized what had really been bothering her for so long.
She'd had an opportunity.
A real one.
And she hadn't bitten it.
Callum had been so close.
She'd had her moments.
She'd had countless opportunities to create different situations.
And she had hesitated—she had disappointed herself.
Out of fear.
Out of common sense.
Out of believing there would still be another chance.
A small smile appeared on her lips.
There wouldn't be another chance.
Not that one.
Clarice took a deep breath.
If she wanted something, she needed to stop waiting for life to hand it to her.
This time, she would make her own opportunity.
Later, the hallway of the Campbell Mansion was loud.
Clarice walked slowly, her heels echoing discreetly against the floor.
There was no one near the grand staircase. She had been upstairs, admiring the view from the great balcony. There were lights across the lawn and a crowd below.
Then she thought:
If only the universe would send me a sign...
She stopped in front of the staircase.
Looked down.
Then up.
The distance wasn't great.
She started down, still thinking.
When she spotted Aster coming up, for a moment everything around her seemed to slow down.
She didn't need a tragedy.
She didn't need broken bones.
She didn't need blood.
She just needed pain.
Enough pain to leave a few marks.
Enough pain that, tomorrow, when someone touched her arm or her back, her body would react before she could control her expression.
Clarice closed her eyes for a moment.
An almost perfect way to create an incident had just appeared.
Then she took the first step.
One more.
She got right up close to Aster.
Stopped.
For a fraction of a second, her body hesitated.
Maybe this was her last chance to back out.
She thought of Callum.
Then, for a moment, she thought that the best opportunities were exactly the ones that arrived and disappeared.
She thought about the way everyone else seemed to have found their place while she remained on the outside, watching.
Then she let out her breath.
She deliberately bumped into Aster, making herself lose her balance.
The fall happened in an instant.
One step.
Then another.
Her shoulder hit first.
Her hip struck the edge of a step.
Her leg twisted painfully before she managed to break her fall with her hands.
Clarice let out a short scream.
She didn't need to fake the pain.
It was real.
For a few seconds, she lay still.
Breathing hard.
Feeling her whole body protest.
Then she opened her eyes.
No one had seen what she'd done.
Clarice clenched her teeth.
Slowly, she tried to move.
A sharp pain shot through her side.
She flinched.
This time, the movement didn't need to be rehearsed.
It was exactly what she needed.
The pain would be her ally.
Not because it made her a victim.
But because it would give her a story.
A story other people could tell for her.
Clarice stayed sitting on the floor, waiting.
Waiting for someone to find her.
Waiting for the first question.
Waiting for the moment when she could seem too frightened to explain everything.
Then she heard footsteps.
"Oh my God!"
Sarah Campbell's voice came from the hallway.
Clarice looked up.
Sarah had just appeared at the top of the stairs.
For a moment, she froze.
Her gaze dropped to Clarice on the floor.
Then rose.
Stopped on Aster.
He was a few steps below, still trying to understand what had just happened.
Aster looked at Sarah too.
And he understood.
It wasn't Clarice's fall that affected him.
Not even the shock of realizing that he had been deliberately pushed.
It was Sarah's look.
That look.
A silent, rigid look, almost impossible to read as anything but disapproval.
Aster knew that look.
For a fraction of a second, the staircase disappeared.
He wasn't there anymore.
He was standing once again in front of an office door, many years ago.
Gene Heston had pointed a finger at him.
Accusing him of theft.
The orphanage director had stayed silent.
She hadn't wanted to know what had happened.
She had only looked at him.
With that same kind of disapproval.
That look that said the decision had already been made before he could even open his mouth.
Aster remembered the feeling perfectly.
The absurd need to prove he wasn't a delinquent.
The memory vanished as quickly as it had come.
Aster came back to the staircase.
Sarah was still watching him.
Clarice was still on the floor.
Her face had lost every trace of surprise.
"Clarice!"
The concern in Sarah's voice finally broke the silence.
She knelt beside Jared's daughter without fully taking her eyes off Aster.
"What happened?"
Clarice took a deep breath.
She didn't answer right away.
It was better that way.
She let the pain speak first.
Her face tightened when she tried to move.
"I... don't know."
The lie came out almost perfectly.
She brought one hand to her side.
"I think I lost my balance."
Sarah looked at the staircase.