Kade's POV
The first document I'd already read.
But reading it again with full understanding was different. The medical report said his cause of death was crushing injuries. Consistent with a cave collapse. But there were notes. Questions. Someone had investigated and then stopped investigating. Someone with authority had decided the answers didn't matter.
Someone like my father.
I spread all the documents across my desk. Pages and pages of proof. Of lies. Of crimes that had happened right under my nose while I was being groomed to become Alpha.
I read the genealogical records again. Slower this time. Tracing the bloodline with my finger like if I touched it carefully enough, it might change. Might prove that Rose was someone ordinary. Someone lower rank. Someone I could have rejected without consequences.
But the bloodline didn't change.
It just got worse.
First Alpha bloodline. That was the real name. The original foundation. The woman who had established the entire werewolf pack system across North America. And her blood ran through Rose's veins like liquid fire.
I started on the letters next.
They were written by hand. Dated twenty years ago. Signatures from council members I recognized. Dead now. Mostly. One signature made my hands shake so badly I almost couldn't read it.
My father's signature.
The letter was addressed to the head of the council at the time. It was a response to news about Rose's parents. About their bloodline being discovered. About the threat they represented.
"We cannot allow this to continue," my father had written in his careful, measured handwriting. "A female heir of the First Alpha bloodline would destabilize the entire pack structure. I recommend immediate action. We must protect our system. We must protect our power."
Immediate action.
That was what he'd called murdering two people.
The next letter was the response. It was approval. Confirmation. It was an order to kill Rose's parents and to erase any documentation that proved who they'd been.
My father had signed off on it.
I pushed back from my desk and walked to the window. The pack compound spread out below me. Wolves moving between buildings. Omegas doing their work. Higher ranks overseeing everything. The system that my father had helped protect by ordering murders.
I'd spent my entire life trying to be like him.
I'd spent my entire life thinking he was strong because he made hard decisions. Because he chose the pack over everything else. Because he was willing to do whatever it took to maintain order.
What I hadn't understood was that the order he was maintaining was built on blood.
Built on lies.
Built on killing women who threatened his power.
I went back to the desk and grabbed the DNA tests. Three different labs had tested Rose's blood. All three came back with the same result. First Alpha bloodline. Verified. Confirmed. Real.
Which meant everything she'd told me was true.
Which meant the pull I'd felt wasn't weakness.
Which meant my wolf had known.
My wolf had recognized her the moment I saw her in the Moon Ceremony clearing. It had felt the bond screaming across the distance. It had known that she was mine in a way that Elena would never be. In a way that no other woman could ever be.
True mate.
Not political alliance. Not strategic choice. Not something I'd chosen because men in power told me it was the right decision.
A true mate. The kind that wolves only got one of in a lifetime. The kind that you couldn't deny without losing part of your soul.
And I'd denied her publicly.
I'd told five hundred wolves that she was worthless.
I'd told her that the bond wasn't real.
I'd pushed her away so hard that she'd run into the forest and disappeared for five years.
And all the while, my wolf had been screaming at me that I was making the biggest mistake of my life.
The papers blurred in front of my eyes.
I couldn't breathe properly. My chest was tight like something was crushing me from the inside. This was what guilt felt like. This was what it felt like to realize that you'd destroyed the one person your entire being was designed to protect.
I'd been trained my whole life to believe that emotions were weakness.
But sitting in my office surrounded by proof of my father's crimes and my own betrayal, I understood that wasn't true. Emotions weren't weakness. They were truth. They were instinct. They were the part of you that recognized what actually mattered when everything else was just noise and politics and lies.
My father had ignored his emotions to maintain power.
And it had turned him into a murderer.
I wasn't going to be like him.
Not anymore.
I gathered all the documents and organized them carefully. By date. By significance. By the level of truth they contained. Every page was evidence. Every signature was confession. Every letter was a piece of a puzzle that proved my entire leadership was built on corruption.
The sun came up while I was reading.
I didn't notice it at first. Just realized suddenly that I could see without the desk lamp. That morning light was coming through the windows. That an entire night had passed and I'd barely moved.
I looked at my phone.
Messages from Victor. From the other council members. From Jackson asking if I was okay. From everyone who'd probably sensed that something massive had shifted in the pack dynamic.
But nothing from Rose.
She'd delivered her truth and then walked away. Left me alone to process what it meant. Left me alone to understand exactly what I'd done.
She was giving me space.
Or maybe she was just done with me.
The thought made my wolf go crazy. It was pacing inside me, demanding that I find her. That I explain myself. That I fix what I'd broken. But Rose deserved better than explanations. She deserved a man who'd actually changed. Not someone who was just reacting to being caught.
My phone buzzed.
A text message from an unknown number.
"Emergency council meeting. One hour. Pack house main hall. Attendance mandatory."
I stared at it for a long moment.
No signature. No explanation. But I knew who'd sent it.
Rose had just accelerated everything.
She wasn't waiting for me to process. Wasn't giving me time to prepare the council or come up with some strategy. She was forcing the issue right now. She was forcing me to choose between protecting my father's secrets or admitting the truth in front of everyone who mattered.
One hour.
Forty other council members.
And documents that would destroy everything.
My hands shook as I started gathering everything back into the folder. My father's crimes. My own failure. Rose's sacrifice. Five years of running and research and building herself back up so she could walk into this pack house and demand justice.
And I was going to have to sit in front of the council and admit that she was right.
That my father was a murderer.
That the pull I'd felt wasn't weakness.
That the woman I'd rejected and broken was the strongest person in this entire compound.
My phone buzzed again.
This time it was Jackson.
"What's happening? Council meeting called emergency. Rose Morgan is here. She's in the main hall waiting. Kade, what did you do?"
I stood up from my desk and grabbed the folder.
One hour until my entire world changed.
One hour until I had to choose between protecting the man I'd tried to become and honoring the woman I should have chosen five years ago.
One hour until everyone found out that the Alpha who'd spent six years being cold and controlled had been broken the entire time.
I walked toward the door.
Time to face the truth.