Lyra's POV
The Principal's office smelled of stale coffee and expensive, cloying perfume. It was a suffocating mix. Heavy. Thick in the air conditioning. Coating the back of my throat.
I sat on the edge of the leather sofa. Back straight. Hands folded in my lap. To the untrained eye? I was a terrified single mother, clutching her purse for comfort. To a trained eye, I was perfectly balanced. Ready to snap the woman's neck before she could draw a breath.
"I want them gone!" Mrs. Vane shrieked, her voice pitching up into a frequency that made my teeth ache. She was aBeta wolf, but she wore enough diamonds to fund a small rebellion in the North. Her finger, tipped with a manicured, blood-red claw, jabbed toward my children. "Those... those savages attacked my sweet Timothy! Look at him!"
I glanced at Timothy. The boy was significantly larger than any of my triplets, currently sobbing into a handkerchief while shoving a chocolate bar into his mouth. There wasn't a scratch on him.
"Mrs. Vane," the Principal began, wiping sweat from his balding forehead. "We haven't seen any physical evidence of—"
"Emotional damage!" she roared, slamming her hand on the desk. "My son is traumatized! And look at them! They're not even sorry!"
I looked down at my trio.
Leo was staring at his shoes, shoulders shaking. Mrs. Vane thought he was crying. I knew he was laughing so hard he could barely breathe. Aries was glaring at the wall, his jaw tight, looking like he was calculating the structural integrity of the building. And Cyra...
Cyra was blinking up at the Principal, her golden eyes wide and wet, clutching a teddy bear she hadn't played with in three years.
"We didn't mean to," she whispered, her voice trembling perfectly. "Timothy just... he started dancing."
"Dancing?" Mrs. Vane sputtered. "My son does not dance! He is a Vane!"
"He was breakdancing," Aries grunted, finally speaking up. "Badly."
"You little—" Mrs. Vane lunged forward.
I didn't move. I didn't have to. I simply shifted my gaze.
For a second, the mask slipped. Just a fraction. I let the 'harmless mother' facade crack, revealing the cold, dead abyss of the Shadow Lord beneath. No aura—that would attract every Alpha in five miles. Just intent. Bleeding out. Touch them, and you lose the hand.
Mrs. Vane froze. Her nostrils flared, her instincts screaming at her to submit, though her brain couldn't process why. She stumbled back, clutching her pearls.
"Principal Skinner," I said softly. My voice was low, calm, but it cut through the room like a scalpel. "Before we discuss expulsion, perhaps we should view the security footage? I assume a prestigious institution like Star Academy records its playground?"
"Of course," Skinner stammered, fumbling with his computer mouse. "We have the most advanced surveillance system in the city."
Cute. My daughter hacked your 'advanced system' in three minutes. Used a smartwatch and a lollipop stick.
"No need!" Mrs. Vane snapped, recovering some of her bravado. "My son's word is law! Unlike these fatherless mongrels—"
Bastards. Mongrels. Savage.
The words were old friends. They used to sting, back when I was eighteen and pregnant and alone in the snow. Now? Now they were just noise. But my wolf... she didn't like noise. She paced in the back of my mind, growling, wanting to rip Mrs. Vane's throat out and mount it on the wall.
Not today. Today we use a different kind of weapon.
"Let's just watch," I suggested, offering a thin, polite smile.
Skinner got the projector working. The screen flickered to life, showing the playground from a high angle.
I watched Cyra out of the corner of my eye. She was tapping her finger against the teddy bear's leg in a rhythmic pattern. Three, two, one...
The video played.
In the footage, my triplets were sitting quietly on a bench, reading books. Angels. Absolute saints. Then, Timothy Vane approached them.
But the bullying shoving match I knew happened? Gone. The on-screen Timothy suddenly threw his hands in the air. He flailed wildly. Spinning in circles. Kicking at invisible enemies. Looked like he was fighting a swarm of bees. Or engaging in an interpretive dance about the futility of existence.
At one point, he punched himself in the face. Hard.
The on-screen Aries rushed forward, looking concerned, trying to help him up. Timothy shoved him away and performed a clumsy somersault into the mulch.
The room went dead silent.
I heard Leo let out a tiny, high-pitched squeak that he tried to disguise as a cough.
"As you can see," I said, my voice dripping with concern. "Timothy seemed to be having some sort of... episode. My children were merely trying to assist him."
Mrs. Vane was gaping at the screen, her mouth opening and closing like a fish. "That... that's not..."
"Are you suggesting the camera lies, Mrs. Vane?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. "Or perhaps Timothy has a future in the performing arts we aren't aware of?"
Principal Skinner looked from the screen to the red-faced boy. "Mrs. Vane, it does appear that Timothy... instigated the incident. And inflicted the damage upon himself."
"This is doctored!" she screeched. "This is fake!"
"I'm just a single mother," I said, spreading my hands helplessly. "I barely know how to use the microwave. How could I doctor a security feed in real-time?"
It was the perfect defense. Weaponized incompetence. No one suspects the pretty, overwhelmed mom of being a Tier-1 hacker's mentor.
Mrs. Vane looked at me, then at the Principal, who was already drafting a mental apology letter to avoid a lawsuit. She knew she had lost. She grabbed Timothy by the ear.
"We are leaving," she hissed. She turned to me, her eyes narrowing into slits. "This isn't over. You don't know who you're messing with. My husband knows people. The Storm family—"
"The Storm family?" I interrupted, standing up. I moved closer to her, invading her personal space just enough to make her uncomfortable. I lowered my voice so only she could hear. "Mrs. Vane. Take a piece of advice. Before you threaten someone, make sure the predator isn't standing right in front of you."
"What... what are you?" she whispered, her fear scent spiking, sour and sharp.
"I'm just a mother," I smiled. "And you're making me late for dinner."
I gathered my cubs and walked out.
As soon as the door closed behind us, I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding.
"Nice video," I murmured to Cyra as we walked down the hallway. "But the somersault was a bit much."
"He deserved it," Cyra replied sweetly, tucking her teddy bear under her arm. "Besides, I fixed the timestamps. It's foolproof."
"Don't get cocky," I warned, ruffling Aries's hair. "We survived today. But we made noise. And noise brings wolves."
Julian's POV
The wind cut across the parking lot. Scent of rain. Asphalt. I leaned against my silver coupe, tapping a cigarette against the pack but not lighting it.
I was supposed to be in a board meeting. Listening to Damon growl about quarterly projections. No such luck. I was here. Cleaning up another Vane family mess. Being the cousin of the Alpha came with perks, but also with a lot of glorified babysitting.
The doors of the Academy opened.
I straightened up, expecting to see a crying woman dragging her brats, maybe begging for a second chance. That was usually how these things went when Mrs. Vane targeted someone lower on the food chain.
Then, a woman in a beige trench coat walked out. Canvas. Stiff against the wind.
She wasn't crying. She wasn't rushing.
She moved... strangely.
I narrowed my eyes, observing her. Most humans—and even most wolves—walked with a heavy, clumsy cadence. Heel-strike, weight shift, toe-off. It was noisy. It was inefficient.
This woman flowed.
Her upper body remained perfectly still while her legs absorbed the impact of every step. She moved like water over stone. It was the "silent walk." I'd only seen it used by elite special forces and the most dangerous assassins in the North.
She was holding the hands of two children, with a third trailing behind, but her head was constantly moving. Left. Right. Check mirrors. Check corners. Scanning for threats. It wasn't paranoia; it was protocol.
Who the hell are you?
She reached a battered sedan—a Honda, totally unremarkable—and ushered the kids inside. The way she stood by the open door while they climbed in... that wasn't a mom waiting. That was a bodyguard clearing a sector.
She looked up.
For a split second, her gaze locked onto mine across the parking lot.
I felt a chill run down my spine. It wasn't the submission of an Omega meeting a high-ranking wolf. It was the cold, calculating assessment of an apex predator deciding if I was worth the bullet.
Then, she blinked, and the look was gone. She was just a tired mom again. She got in the car and drove away.
I let out a breath. Pulse hammered in my throat.
I pulled out my phone and dialed later.
"Speak," Damon's voice growled in my ear. He sounded like he was in a mood. Then again, he was always in a mood these days.
"You're not going to believe what I just saw," I said, watching the Honda disappear into traffic.
"Unless it's the quarterly report turning into gold, I don't care, Julian."
"Forget the report," I said. "I'm at the Academy. I just saw the woman involved in the Vane incident."
"And?"
"And," I paused, trying to find the right words. "She walks like a ghost, Damon. She cleared the perimeter before putting her kids in the car. And the kids... I didn't get a good look, but the boy pushed a Vane kid twice his size."
There was silence on the other end.
"Start talking," Damon said, his voice dropping an octave.
"I think your 'gold digger' neighbor might be more than just a pretty face," I said. "She moves like she's hunted. Or like she's the hunter."
"Get me the footage," Damon ordered. "The school surveillance. Now."
"On it."
I hung up and looked back at the empty parking spot.
The game was changing. And I had a feeling Lyra Vane—or whatever her real name was—was playing by a completely different set of rules.
Damon's POV
I stared at the tablet on my desk.
Julian had sent the file two minutes ago. School_Playground_Cam_04.mp4.
I pressed play.
I watched the Vane kid throw a tantrum. I watched him punch himself in the face. I watched him perform a physically impossible somersault into the dirt.
A low growl rumbled in my chest, but it wasn't anger.
It was amusement.
"Deepfake," I murmured. "And a damn good one."
I paused the video and zoomed in on the timestamps. They were perfect. Even the shadows aligned correctly. Whoever did this wasn't just a hacker; they were an artist.
My eyes drifted to the three children on the bench. They sat so still. So disciplined. Like little soldiers waiting for orders.
And then, my gaze shifted to the edge of the frame. Where she stood.
Lyra.
Her jaw was set. Tight. Even in this shitty resolution, I could see the line of it.
She was just observing. But even in the grainy footage, I could see the tension in her shoulders. The way she positioned herself between the threat and her cubs.
She walks like a hunter, Julian had said.
I leaned back in my chair, the leather creaking under the strain of my muscles. My wolf was pacing again, restless, scratching at the cage of my ribs.
She's hiding something. Secrets. Danger. Delicious. The thought hit my blood.
My wolf paced. A traitor in my chest. He didn't want to kill the threat. He wanted to claim it.
I tapped the screen. Background check. Lyra Blackwood. Age 24. Widow. Antique dealer. No criminal record. Credit score average.
Too clean. A paper shield. Thin. Fragile.
I picked up my phone.
"Double the surveillance," I ordered the head of my security team. "And send a team to her apartment."
"To take them out, Alpha?"
"No," I growled, my eyes flashing gold. "To watch. If anyone else tries to touch her or those kids... kill them."
I hung up and looked at the woman on the screen one last time.
"Who are you really, Lyra?" I whispered into the silence of my office. "And why do you smell like my salvation?"