The name lingered in the air long after she said it, heavy and suffocating, pressing against Austin's chest as if the room itself had tightened around him. His eyes stayed locked on the folder in her hands, the faint rustle of paper suddenly louder than it should have been, each movement deliberate, almost ceremonial in the way she opened it.
Elizabeth didn't rush.
She flipped it open with the calm precision of someone who had already memorized every page, her gaze drifting across the contents as if confirming something she already knew to be true.
"This contains the official records," she said, her voice measured, almost clinical. "Autopsy reports, investigative summaries, and… financial documentation."
She slid the folder across the table toward him.
The motion was smooth, controlled, stopping just within his reach.
Austin didn't touch it immediately.
This is a play… it has to be.
His fingers hovered for a moment before finally closing around the edge, pulling it toward himself with quiet reluctance. The paper felt heavier than it should have, the weight of it settling into his hands as he opened it.
The first page hit him instantly.
A photograph.
Clinical. Cold. Unforgiving.
Clara's body lay on a steel table, pale under harsh fluorescent lighting, the skin discolored, marked by trauma that had been carefully documented but not softened. The angle was precise, detached, capturing damage without emotion.
Austin's breath caught, shallow and controlled, as his eyes traced the image.
No…
He flipped to the next page.
Autopsy details. Structured. Methodical. Lines of text describing injuries, time of death, cause, all written in that detached tone that stripped humanity from tragedy.
His jaw tightened as he kept reading, forcing himself through it, every line digging deeper.
Then the financial records.
Dates. Transfers. Large sums moving quietly from the Rivera treasury into accounts tied to the head of department. The timing aligned too cleanly, overlapping with the exact period when the investigation had stalled… then vanished entirely. Dismissed, closed and forgotten.
Austin's fingers pressed harder into the paper, the edges bending slightly under the pressure.
"That's not all," Elizabeth added, watching him closely.
Her voice softened, giving the information space to settle, to sink into him fully before she continued.
"The current mayor and your boss, Alexander Farren, has access to far more than what's in that folder," she said. "He's been under Elaine Rivera's influence for years."
The room went quiet again.
Austin flipped back, scanning the pages more carefully now, his eyes sharper, searching for inconsistencies, for anything that would disprove what he was seeing.
There was nothing.
Only confirmation.
Elizabeth leaned back slightly, letting the silence stretch before speaking again.
"If you keep reading," she said, "you'll find something even more interesting."
His eyes shifted to the next section.
Two months prior to Clara's death.
A report.
Brief. Incomplete.
But enough.
The Dantes family.
Decimated.
The word sat there, understated, almost buried in bureaucratic language that failed to capture the weight of it. No headlines. No public record. Just a quiet erasure, executed with precision.
Austin's brow furrowed as he read, his mind already moving ahead, connecting threads.
Dantes… Clara's family…
His grip tightened again.
The pattern was too familiar.
Too close to what had happened recently.
"Similar to the Gryphons," Elizabeth said softly, her voice cutting through his thoughts. "Only quieter. Cleaner. That's why no one noticed."
Austin's eyes flicked up to her, then back down to the page.
She knew…
"Clara knew," Elizabeth continued, her tone almost thoughtful now. "And yet… she never told you."
The question hung unspoken.
Why?
Clara was never the type of person to talk about her family. She never talked about them because they hated the whole idea of her being married to Austion, a human. That was all Austin knew. That she excommunicated herself and didn't want to talk about it, focusing only on their lives and memories together.
Elizabeth's voice followed the thought almost perfectly.
"Around that time, she told you she got a tattoo," she said, watching him carefully. "You noticed it. You asked. And she gave you an answer you didn't challenge."
Austin's jaw set as memory surfaced, uninvited.
Clara, standing in their bedroom, adjusting her shirt, the faint glimpse of ink across her chest, intricate, unfamiliar.
He had asked.
She had smiled.
Said it was something new. A style. Nothing important.
He had accepted it.
You didn't question it…
Austin turned back to the autopsy photographs, his motions now quickened and edged with urgency. His eyes roved over the image once more, scrutinizing every detail. Chest. Skin. Unmarked. No tattoos. No traces of ink. Nothing at all. A cold weight settled in his gut, dragging his stomach down.
That's not possible… I saw it… I know I did…
The room seemed to tilt slightly, the edges of his vision tightening as the realization began to form.
Elizabeth didn't rush to fill the silence this time.
She let it build.
Let him arrive at it himself.
"And then," she added quietly, "after her death… your son began showing the same mark."
Austin froze.
The words landed harder than anything else she had said.
Adam.
The memory hit him instantly. A glimpse of skin. A pattern that shouldn't have been there, identical to his mother's. The way he had dismissed it, rationalized it, buried it under grief and exhaustion.
It was a coincidence… it had to be…
"You explained it away," Elizabeth said, almost gently now. "You needed to."
Her gaze didn't waver.
"But you were wrong."
The air felt thinner.
"He and you," she continued, her voice cooling slightly, "have been dangerously naïve. But if you had stayed in Moonstone… there's a very real chance you would both be dead by now."
Austin snapped his head up, the composure he had been clinging to finally slipping.
"What the hell does that mean?" he demanded, his voice tightening despite himself. "How do you know any of this? Why are you telling me now?"
The questions came fast, overlapping, driven more by instinct than control.
Elizabeth didn't answer them.
Instead, she shifted. Subtly and deliberately.
Her focus narrowed, her posture straightening slightly as she moved to the next piece.
"If this is already too much for you," she said, her tone measured again, "then what comes next might be… difficult."
Austin held her gaze, something conflicted flickering behind his eyes.
Do I even want to hear this…
"What is it?" he said anyway, the word coming out steadier than he felt. "I can handle it."
A brief pause.
Then she said it.
"Your son is a fully awakened werewolf."
The room went still.
Austin blinked once, as if the words hadn't registered properly, as if repeating them internally might somehow change their meaning.
No… that's not…
"How?" The question came out sharper than intended, confusion bleeding into anger. "When? Why?"
His mind scrambled, trying to find logic, trying to reject it outright.
Then the anger found a target.
"You did this," he said, his voice hardening. "This is your doing."
Elizabeth's reaction was immediate, but not what he expected.
She laughed.
Not loudly.
Not mockingly.
But with a quiet amusement that made his accusation feel almost… naive.
"If he were my son," she said, recovering easily, "I would have turned him myself. At least then he would have a fighting chance against what he truly is."
Her gaze sharpened slightly.
"But I didn't."
The denial landed with calm certainty.
"What I can do," she added, "is tell you who did."
She paused, just long enough for the tension to coil tighter.
"Before that though," she continued, shifting again, "the island."
Austin's eyes narrowed slightly.
"You encountered a werewolf there, didn't you?"
The memory surged forward instantly.
Something massive.
Black fur.
Blue eyes cutting through the chaos.
The sound of bone breaking. The scream cut short. The sheer force of it as it tore through his squad like they were nothing.
It was unstoppable…
"You remember," Elizabeth said, watching the recognition settle in.
He didn't respond. Didn't need to.
"Your son is quite the strong wolf, isn't he?" she said.
The words hit harder than anything else so far.
Austin's breath faltered, his mind rejecting it even as the image refused to leave.
"No," he said under his breath, shaking his head slightly. "That's not possible…"
"The one who turned him," she continued, undeterred, "was the Alpha of the Gryphon clan. Lance Gryphon, or what was left of him at least."
The name carried weight.
History.
"The last confirmed sighting of him," she added, her voice tightening just slightly, "was when he was taken into FSS custody."
A heavy, unavoidable silence settled over the room. Austin's mind began to spiral, drawing connections he could neither control nor ignore. Names surfaced unbidden: Farren, the FSS, Rivera, Adam. Each tethered to a web of thoughts and implications he could not escape.
No… no, that would mean…
The implication settled in slowly, like a poison working its way through his system.
His son hadn't just been turned.
He had been made into something.
Something controlled.
Something targeted.
And that mark…
That tattoo…
He swallowed hard, the weight of it pressing down on him.
Elizabeth said nothing for a moment, allowing the realization to take root fully.
Austin finally looked up, his voice lower now, steadier but strained. "What do you expect me to do with all this?"
She didn't answer directly.
Instead, she leaned back slightly, her expression softening just enough to appear reassuring.
"Your son is safe Austin," she said. "Right now, there is no safer place for him than Moonstone Academy."
Her gaze held his.
"He's under the protection of my daughters. And certain… individuals who are more than capable."
The image of the hooded figure flashed through Austin's mind, the one who had pulled him back from death.
So that wasn't luck…
"What's in it for you?" he asked, narrowing his eyes. "Why go through all this? Why protect him?"
His voice sharpened slightly.
"And if that mark makes him a target… why not just kill him yourself?"
Elizabeth's expression didn't change.
If anything, it became more composed.
"You've spent too long alone, Austin," she said quietly. "It's narrowed your perspective."
Her gaze didn't waver.
"Not every werewolf wants the same thing." A small pause. "My interests lie elsewhere. Your son isn't part of them."
Austin studied her, searching for the lie.
He didn't find one.
"Then what do you want?" he asked.
This time, her expression shifted subtly. Becoming serious now.
"The truth," she said. "And for you to understand why you were placed in the FSS to begin with."
She leaned forward slightly, her presence sharpening again.
"Farren and his organization are a threat. To me, just as much as to you."
Austin frowned. "In what way?"
"They're developing something," she said. "A project."
Her eyes darkened slightly.
"When completed, it will allow for efficient, large-scale control and extermination of werewolves."
Austin let out a dry breath, something bitter slipping into his tone. "So what… a gun that works on you?"
The comment landed poorly. He saw it immediately in the slight tightening of her jaw, the controlled stillness that followed.
Wrong move.
She didn't respond to the jab directly.
Instead, she continued.
"Elaine Rivera doesn't control Farren as completely as you think," she said. "Their relationship is… strained." she paused as if weighing what she was about to say next, "She killed his wife."
The statement settled with quiet weight.
"After he disobeyed her," Elizabeth added. "He may be her puppet, but he's learned to hide things. He has the resources to build something even she can't fully see."
Austin's mind worked through it, the pieces forming a larger picture.
A hidden project.
A weapon.
A fracture between powerful figures.
"It's a cold war," Elizabeth said. "And you're in the middle of it."
She held his gaze.
"You need to find what he's building. And you need to destroy it."
Her voice lowered slightly.
"Not just for us."
A pause.
"But for your son's sake too."
The words lingered.
Heavy and unavoidable.
"If that project succeeds," she continued, "he won't just be a target. He'll be vulnerable."
Austin's grip on his mug tightened again, the ceramic creaking faintly under the pressure.
"And running now," she added, "won't save him. It'll only delay the inevitable."
Silence filled the space between them. Slow and pressing.
"There's no closing this box once it's open."
Austin didn't respond. He couldn't.
His thoughts were too loud, too tangled, every path leading him somewhere he didn't want to go.
Across from him, Elizabeth rose smoothly to her feet.
The movement broke the stillness, subtle but final.
"The choice is yours," she said.
No pressure in her tone. No demand.
Just certainty.
Her guard moved immediately, collecting the folders with practiced efficiency, the soft snap of the briefcase closing echoing faintly.
Elizabeth turned toward the door, pausing only briefly before stepping out.
And just like that, she was gone.
The house fell silent again.
Austin remained where he was, the weight of everything settling into him, heavier now, harder to ignore as his thoughts returned to the present.
The coffee in his hand had gone cold.
Across from him, the untouched mug of hot chocolate sat exactly where it had been placed, its surface now dull, lifeless.
His eyes drifted to it, unfocused.
There was never really a choice…
He didn't say it out loud.
He didn't need to.
Because somewhere beneath the shock, beneath the anger and the doubt, the truth had already taken hold.
And it wasn't letting go.