Damon POV
"You were planning to destroy my entire pack."
The words hung in the air like poison. I watched my mate's face go white as I held up her notebook. Page after page of my security schedules, guard rotations, and weak places in our defenses.
This wasn't just theft. This was war planning.
"I can explain," she whispered.
"Can you?" I flipped to another page. "Explain this: 'Best time to attack - dawn shift change. Guards tired, attention low. Hit the barracks first, then the communications building.'"
Her green eyes filled with tears, but I forced myself not to care. The mate bond was screaming at me to comfort her, to believe whatever reason she gave me. But I was stronger than some magical link.
I had to be.
Because the last time I'd trusted my heart instead of my head, Emma had died.
"That was just angry writing," Kira said desperately. "I never would have actually—"
"Wouldn't you?" I crouched down so we were eye level. "You've been stealing from me for six months. Freeing my inmates. Making me look weak in front of other packs. Why should I believe you'd stop there?"
"Because I'm not a killer!"
"Neither was the rogue who murdered Emma."
The name slipped out before I could stop it. Pain shot through my chest like a knife. I never said her name out loud. Never let myself think about her if I could help it.
But now my mate was looking at me with those same green eyes Emma used to have, and the memories were pouring back like a flood.
"Who was Emma?" Kira asked softly.
I should have walked away. Should have told my warriors to chain her up and drag her to the pack prison. But something about the way she asked—gentle and caring instead of nosy—made me answer.
"Emma was going to be my Luna. We were together for three years. She was kind and smart and..." I stopped myself. "She was everything you're not."
Kira flinched like I'd slapped her. Good. I needed her to understand that this mate tie meant nothing to me.
"What happened to her?" she asked.
The memory hit me like a punch to the gut. Emma laughing as she helped rogue children who'd wandered onto our land. Emma asking me to let the rogue family stay just one night because their youngest pup was sick. Emma trusting people who didn't deserve trust.
"She convinced me to help a family of rogues," I said. "A mother and father with three small children. They claimed they were just passing through, looking for somewhere safe to stay."
Kira's eyes went wide. She could probably guess where this story was going.
"I let them stay in our guest house for a week while we figured out what to do with them. Emma spent every day with those children, teaching them pack practices, sharing her food with them. She loved kids so much."
My voice cracked. I hated that it cracked.
"On the seventh night, I woke up to screaming. The rogues had used the information Emma shared to attack our nursery. They were stealing our pups to sell to fighting groups."
Kira gasped. "No. That's horrible." "Emma ran to stop them. She threw herself between the rogues and the children, trying to protect kids that weren't even hers." I closed my eyes, seeing it all again. "They tore her apart. Literally tore her apart while she was still trying to hide a three-year-old from their claws."
When I opened my eyes, Kira was crying. Real tears, not fake ones meant to influence me.
"I'm so sorry," she whispered. "That's awful. No wonder you hate rogues."
"Do you understand now?" I stood up, looking down at her. "Every rogue I've killed since then has been payback for Emma. Every family I've ruined has been payment for what they took from me."
"But those other rogues weren't the ones who hurt her."
"They would have been, given the chance. You would have been."
I held up her notebook again. "This proves it. You were going to attack my nursery too, weren't you? Steal our children just like they did?"
"No!" She fought to sit up, ignoring the pain from her injuries. "I would never hurt children. Never! I was angry and I wrote stupid things, but I'm not a monster!"
"Prove it."
The challenge hung between us. How could she prove she wasn't trying to hurt innocent people? How could anyone show what was really in their heart?
"I don't know how," she revealed.
I nodded. "Then you'll understand why I can't trust you. Why I'll never trust you."
My warriors were loading the caught rogues into transport trucks. Soon we'd be going back to pack territory, and I'd have to figure out what to do with my unwanted mate.
Pack law was clear: I couldn't reject a mate bond without serious cause. But planning to attack my pack was definitely serious cause. The council would accept a rejection if I showed them this notebook.
The trouble was that rejecting a mate bond this strong would probably kill both of us. The pain would be terrible. Most dogs died within days of losing their fated mate.
But maybe that was better than being tied forever to someone I could never trust.
"Alpha." Lydia appeared beside me, her face pale with worry. "We have a problem."
"What now?"
"One of the rogues we caught is talking. He says he knows who your mate really is."
I glanced down at Kira, who'd gone very still. "What do you mean?"
"He says her name isn't Kira. He says she's Kira Blackwood. The past Alpha's daughter from the Blackwood Pack."
The world turned sideways. Kira Blackwood had been lost for ten years. Her pack claimed she'd died in a training accident, but there had always been whispers that she'd run away instead.
If this rogue was telling the truth, my mate wasn't just a poor thief.
She was royalty.
"Is it true?" I demanded, staring down at the girl who'd apparently been nameless.
Kira's face crumpled. "I can explain."
"Another explanation? How convenient." But my mind was racing. If she really was Kira Blackwood, everything changed. Her father's pack was one of our greatest allies. Rejecting his daughter would cause a war.
But keeping her would mean accepting that she'd lied about her name from the very first moment we met.
"The Blackwood Pack thinks you're dead," I said slowly. "Your father has been missing you for ten years. Why would you let him believe his daughter was gone forever?"
Fresh tears spilled down her face. "Because he told me he wished I was dead. Because I killed my sister, and he couldn't stand to look at me anymore."
The pain in her voice was real. Raw and deadly. For a moment, I almost believed her.
But then I remembered Emma, and how real her pain had sounded when she begged me to help those rogue children. Right before they killed her.
"More lies to get sympathy," I said coldly. "How many other things have you lied about?"
Before she could answer, Lydia grabbed my arm. Her grip was so tight it hurt.
"Damon," she whispered quickly. "There's something else. The rogue who told us her identity? He says there's a reason she's been taking medical supplies."
"What reason?" " He says she's not working alone. He says there's a whole network of rogue healers trying to stop some kind of plague that's been spreading through the homeless communities."
My blood went cold. "What plague?"
"A sickness that makes wolves rabid. Makes them fight anything that moves, including their own families. He says it's already killed hundreds of rogues, and it's getting worse."
I stared down at Kira, who'd gone pale as death.
"Is that true?" I asked.
She nodded slowly. "We call it the Red Death. It makes dogs go crazy before it kills them. The medical items I've been stealing are the only things that slow it down."
"Why didn't you tell anyone? Why didn't you ask for help instead of just stealing?"
"Because no one cares what happens to rogues!" she cried. "Because packs like yours would rather let us all die than risk getting infected yourselves!"
"And you think we're wrong to protect our people?"
"I think you could help us find a cure instead of just letting us suffer!"
Before I could answer, one of my warriors came running over. His face was twisted with fear.
"Alpha! We have a big problem!"
"What?"
"Three of the rogues we just caught are showing symptoms. Fever, red eyes, angry behavior." He swallowed hard. "I think they have this plague the girl was talking about."
"And they're in trucks with the rest of our prisoners?"
"Yes, sir."
Which meant the sickness was probably spreading to the other rogues right now. And soon my warriors would be revealed too.
I looked down at my mate, who might be the only person who knew how to stop a plague from destroying both our peoples.
"How long do we have?" I asked her.
"Before the sick ones go completely insane? Maybe six hours."
"And then?"
"Then they'll attack everyone around them until they're put down or they die from the fever."
My mind ran through the possibilities. I could leave the infected rogues and save my pack. I could quarantine everyone and hope the sickness didn't spread. Or I could trust the mate I couldn't trust and let her try to save people who might be beyond saving.
All bad picks.
But as I watched Kira struggle to her feet, ignoring her own pain to focus on helping others, I realized something that scared me.
Despite everything she'd done, despite all the lies and theft and planning, part of me wanted to trust her.
Part of me was already starting to love her.
And that was the most dangerous thing of all.
"If I let you try to help them," I said quietly, "and you're lying about the cure, my entire pack could die."
"And if you don't let me help," she answered, meeting my eyes steadily, "they'll definitely die. Including me. Your mate."
The choice was mine.
Trust the enemy I was meant to love, or let the mate bond kill us both.
Either way, someone was going to die tonight.