RECKONING

POV: Darrel Williams

With a stifling weight, the lair appeared to encircle me, the ghosts of the past pressing. Grabbing the edge of the bulky oak desk till my knuckles became white, I used the physical agony to anchor my disorganized thoughts.

How could I have believed the lies that were presented to me seven years ago with such blindness and willingness? I could smell treachery and deceit in the strong earthy smells that had always comforted me.

Every time I closed my eyes, Ivory's face swam behind mine, her beautiful features bearing the scars of her exile. As my most reliable friends denounced the woman I was a woman whose only transgression was giving birth to a child whose entire existence they considered a "abomination," I had said nothing.

No matter how hard I tried to ignore the memory of that terrible night, a deep growl rumbled in my breast. Callum's greasy tones were still hissing in my head like a snake.

Alpha, the whelp threatens the purity of our ancestry. What is to