Chapter 170: Accusations

Julia and Ger stared at me in complete shock. I simply couldn’t tear my eyes away from them.

They had changed—far too drastically for the five years we had been apart. And those changes were terrifying.

The people who had once been my family were begging for scraps near a cathedral, sitting on the dirt like vagrants. Looking at them, that was precisely what they had become. Over the years, I had seen all kinds of people living on the streets. Many, despite everything, still mended their clothes, found ways to wash themselves, and fought to retain a shred of human dignity.

Then there were the others. The ones who surrendered entirely, sinking to the very bottom.

Their clothes resembled filthy rags, and lice crawled through their overgrown, matted hair. Their skin was caked in layers of ground-in grime and marred by raw red sunburns. That was what my brother and sister looked like now.

"So you’re alive?" Ger asked in a low voice.

Looking at him now, it was almost impossible to recognize the chubby, spoiled teenager with the permanent smirk carved onto his face—the boy who used to devour all the decent food in the house and pin the blame on me while I slept on an old couch in the kitchen. He had grown unnaturally gaunt. Nothing remained of his smirk, replaced only by a look of wild exhaustion and complete emptiness in his eyes.

"Yes. I’m alive," I replied, staring down at them, still unable to fully process what was right in front of me.

"And where the hell have you been all this time?! Do you have any idea what fell on us because of you?!" Julia suddenly scrambled to her feet, taking a harsh, aggressive step toward me.

Her gaze was unhinged. Given that she had possessed a nasty, hysterical temperament long before ending up on the streets, her outburst didn’t come as a surprise.

"And why should that concern me?" I countered, standing my ground. "As far as I recall, all of you disowned me. We’re strangers to each other, and—"

I didn’t get to finish. Julia lunged at me with a shrill scream, but Ger immediately seized her arm, yanking her back. In that exact fraction of a second, a broad back materialized directly in front of me.

The sudden shift caught me off guard. It was one of the pack warriors who shadowed my every move on Magnus’s orders—my personal guard, a formidable Gamma named Jake. He stood like an impenetrable stone wall, cutting my sister off from me completely.

"To avoid the use of physical force, I strongly advise you not to step any closer to the Luna," Jake said, his tone absolute zero, devoid of any emotion.

"Luna?!" Julia shrieked hysterically, thrashing against her brother’s grip. "So you’re some big shot now, huh?!" Her face twisted into a mask of pure venom. "If you’re so damn important, why didn’t you help us when we were thrown out onto the street?! Why didn’t you show up to Father’s funeral when he died?! He kicked the bucket because of that lover of yours! We had nowhere to live while you played Luna! Mother worked herself to death, and you—!!"

She screeched, spraying saliva as her eyes bored into me with raw hatred.

"Julia, shut up!" Ger barked. The sheer force in his tone made our sister flinch and glance at him with a flicker of apprehension.

"I’m right! I—"

"No, Julia. You’re not. You, Mother, and Father disowned your sister right before she was almost sent to prison. And I remember crystal clear how you personally lied under oath alongside Father and others."

Magnus’s voice sliced through the air from behind me. In the very next second, the heat of his broad chest brushed against my shoulder blades. He stepped up flush against my back, ready to strike or defend in a heartbeat’s notice. The sheer pressure of his wolf’s aura sent a wave of goosebumps rolling across my skin.

"You’re the reason Father’s dead! Murderer! Murderer!" Julia broke into a hysterical scream again.

Ger twisted her arms behind her without a word, pinning her securely against himself. Only now, as he drew himself up to his full height, did I notice how much he had grown. Though still gaunt, with his clothes hanging off his broad shoulders like a rack, he had become shockingly tall.

Something scraped against my senses, refusing to settle. I drew a slightly deeper breath, trying to catch a whiff of his scent, but the foul stench clinging to Julia overpowered everything.

"I’m sorry for this... Jane, I’m just glad that you’re... doing well," Ger said quietly.

Adjusting his grip on our thrashing sister, he dragged her away toward the residential quarter, leaving me behind with a strange, conflicting tightness in my chest. I hadn’t expected those words from him. And I certainly hadn’t expected to find them here.

"Let’s go, my soul. We have business to attend to," Magnus murmured, leaning down to press a swift, scorching kiss to the curve of my neck that set my skin ablaze.

Jake escorted us to our vehicle. Only now did I spot his discreet SUV parked a short distance from ours, where another pack guard sat inside, continuously scanning the perimeter. I hadn’t noticed them during the drive, but they had clearly maintained a watchful distance, safeguarding my every step. Magnus never left anything to chance.

As we pulled away, I still couldn’t fully process everything I had just heard. I had excised my family from my life the day they betrayed me, incapable of forgiving the malice they had inflicted upon me. Julia’s reaction had been pathetic and predictable.

But Ger had acted strangely.

And my sister’s accusations about Father refused to leave my head. Had Magnus really killed him? Given his ruthless nature, it was well within the realm of possibility—yet I couldn’t bring myself to take Julia at her word. She had always been a habitual liar, and everything that spewed from her mouth had to be taken with a grain of salt.