Back in Silver Pack.

In the Kade family quarters where Camilla lived with her family, she turned to look at her son who had just walked in carrying a gift and arched a brow at him.

"What is the occasion? It is not my birthday and you only ever gift me on my birthday." She said, eyeing him with open suspicion as Javier stood there beaming from ear to ear like a child who had gotten away with something.

"It is a gift because I had a wonderful dream this evening, Mami." Javier remarked, dropping himself down onto the couch beside her. "I dreamed that I finally took the Alpha seat and got crowned."

Camilla looked at her eldest son with the particular kind of tired patience she had developed over the years specifically for moments like this one. Javier had always been a master of delusion, forever building grand castles in his head that crumbled the moment reality breathed on them, and she couldn’t believe he was indulging in this particular nonsense again when they hadn’t managed to remove Sebastian from his seat after all this time.

"A dream without action is nothing but a dream, boy. How many times must I say that to you?" Camilla said, pressing her fingers to her temple. "You will never so much as smell that Alpha seat for as long as your cousin is alive and walking, and as of right now we have never once succeeded in taking his life."

Javier let out a laugh, full and hearty and completely unbothered, waving his mother off with a casual hand. "Well, Mami, we have succeeded now. He is dead. My cousin who everyone believed was untouchable will very soon be resting in a grave where he belongs."

Camila’s eyes narrowed sharply at her son and Javier was quick to catch himself, holding up his hands as he said, "I mean he died in my dream, of course. You cannot imagine how happy I was. But my dreams always come to pass, Mami. Let us wait and hear the news of his death." He said it lightly, almost whistling to himself as he got up from the couch, and then he turned back to add,

"By the way, you don’t have to bother yourself with my loser of a brother anymore. We don’t need his help and he can stick his help straight up his ass along with that wolfless bitch." He spat, and then continued,

"I have decided who I want as my wife and future Luna. I find Ember very interesting, and she is hot as hell. I think I will make her mine once I get crowned." He flashed a smirk and turned to leave, throwing his last words over his shoulder. "I am going back to sleep to continue my sweet dreams."

Camila watched her son walk away in a good mood and she parted and closed her mouth, at a loss for words. What was this fool up to now? Javier was only ever in this dreamy mood when he had done something he wasn’t supposed to do without her knowing, and made up some nonsense about a dream so that when it happened, he would tell her his dreams had come true.

"What has he done this time?"

---

A short while later in a dim room elsewhere, a silver haired man sat comfortably on a couch with his left ankle crossed over his right knee, listening to a phone call with an expression that gave nothing away.

"He won’t survive, supreme Alpha. The man we sent has been killed along with every one of his men, but we found a trail of the target’s blood on the ground, and one of those bullets to the body is enough to finish any wolf. Wherever he is right now, as long as the bullet found him, it is only a matter of time before he dies."

The silver haired man was not pleased. "You were given one job and you cannot even confirm whether he is dead or not." He gritted out, his voice dropping low with fury.

"I am sorry, supreme Alpha. I will send men to search through Nightshade immediately to confirm. We believe the girl has taken him somewhere. There are tire tracks on the ground that suggest she moved him in a car." The person on the phone spoke quickly, as he knew how dangerous the person he was dealing with was. To put a man under his loyalty, he would use one’s family as a scapegoat, if you went against him, your entire family paid the price.

He wasn’t ready to offend such a powerful person, who could break his bones with a single look alone.

"You have until morning to return with confirmation. I need full proof of his death. Do you understand me?"

"Yes, supreme Alpha. It will be done."

The call ended and the man’s eyes settled on the night lights of the city spread out beyond the window. This was taking far longer than he had anticipated. He was tired of concealing himself and suppressing his powers and biding his time in the shadows of someone else’s seat.

"You had better be dead." He said quietly to the silence of the room. "You have lived long enough. It is time for someone else to take what was always supposed to be theirs."

---

"What do you think you are doing?" Miss Lara asked Viola, who had sent one of the girls for a bucket of water and a clean rag.

Miss Lara had heard her sobbing quietly in the room and had told the girls to leave her to grieve and bid her husband farewell, believing this must be the will of the moon goddess. But then the girl had suddenly gone silent and come out requesting a bucket of water and a rag.

Miss Lara had waved for one of the girls to fetch it without thinking much of it, never imagining the girl intended to use it to try to counteract the bullet damage from the inside of the wounds, whatever she believed that would accomplish when those bullets were actively dissolving his tissues and killing him from within.

"You said you couldn’t help him, Miss Lara. I can’t stand to watch him suffer toward his death without trying something. I am experimenting to find out if there is a way to neutralize the bullet’s effect." She said, her voice coming out hoarse and very quiet, giving away how emotionally drained she was. Her eyes were swollen and so was her face, which looked puffy from all the crying.

Viola couldn’t bear it anymore. She couldn’t sit still and watch him die in front of her. He couldn’t even speak to her now, couldn’t look at her. At this point she would welcome his teasing with open arms, would take every bit of his flirting and kiss him back without hesitation if only he would stay alive and not die. She was willing to do anything but grieve his death.

She didn’t like this condition he was in and she refused to accept it or lose him without at least trying to find out what these smoking bullets were made of.