Chapter 328 It felt so good to see her again

Chapter 328: Chapter 328 It felt so good to see her again

Damian’s POV

The Lyon estate reeked of old money and older grudges the moment I stepped through the front gates.

I’d been to a hundred packs like this one. The kind that lined their walls with ancestral portraits and treated tradition like a weapon.

I didn’t come here for pleasantries. I came for Aria.

The Alpha’s study smelled of pipe smoke and cedar polish. Kiel Smith sat behind a desk that could have doubled as a coffin, and the moment his eyes found me, his lip curled. Old man. Silver at the temples, spine still straight, the kind of Alpha who’d rather break than bend.

"So the King himself graces my home," he said, not rising. Not offering his hand. "Should I be honored, or should I ask what you want before you take it."

I let the insult roll off me. I’ve been called worse by better.

"I’ll make this simple," I said, lowering myself into the chair across from him without waiting for an invitation. "You’re keeping a woman locked in the east wing of this house. Aria. I want her released. Today."

His jaw tightened. Somewhere under his composure, his wolf bristled at the presence of mine. Good. Let him feel it. Let every Alpha in this territory remember exactly who they were speaking to.

"That *woman*," he said slowly, "is my blood. Whatever she is to you, she remains under my roof, under my rules. Confinement is a family matter."

"It stopped being a family matter the second you chained my Luna to a wall like a runaway servant." My voice stayed level. It always does. The colder I sound, the more they realize how little standing between them and a very bad decision. "She’s not yours to cage."

"And she’s not yours to claim." Kiel leaned forward, and I’ll give the old bastard credit—he didn’t flinch. "You have a Bond with her, yes. But no Mark. No ceremony. In the eyes of the Moon and the law, you are not yet recognized as my granddaughter’s mate."

He wasn’t entirely wrong. That was the problem.

The Bond between us was real. But knowing it and having it recognized were different things. "Release her," I said again, quieter now, which was more dangerous and he knew it. "You do it willingly, and you keep the goodwill of the Crown. You make me do it my way, and Crescent Moon loses a great deal more than one granddaughter’s freedom."

For a moment neither of us moved. Two Alphas, one desk, the air thick enough to choke on.

"You threaten me in my own study," Kiel said softly.

"I’m offering you a courtesy. Learn the difference."

He opened his mouth—

And the door slammed open hard enough to rattle the portraits on the wall.

She stood in the doorway, chest heaving, jade-green eyes blazing, light brown hair loose around her face like she hadn’t slept a single hour of the night.

Aria.

And every thought in my head went quiet at once.

It felt so good to see her again.

---

Aria’s POV

I hadn’t slept.

I’d spent the whole night pacing the length of that miserable little room, chewing my thumbnail down to nothing, thinking about him. About the King who’d walked into my grandfather’s house like he owned the ground beneath it. About what my grandfather would do to him if he found the slightest opening.

Kiel Smith didn’t lose. And Damian Blackwood didn’t bend. Two immovable things in one house never ended well, and something in my chest wouldn’t stop twisting at the thought.

By dawn I couldn’t stand it anymore.

I threw on the first clothes I could find and slipped into the hallway. There was a guard posted outside my door, broad shoulders, arms crossed, and when he turned I actually stopped short.

"Harrison?"

The former Beta of Crescent Moon.

"Aria." He said it out of habit, then caught himself and looked away. Ashamed, maybe. He should be.

"I need to get to my grandfather’s study," I said. "Now."

"You know I can’t do that." He didn’t even look at me. "I have orders. You’re not to leave this floor."

"Harrison." I stepped closer, and I let every ounce of the exhaustion and fury I’d been swallowing bleed into my voice. "You’re going to walk me down to that study, or I am going to open the nearest window and throw myself out of it, and I am going to make very sure the last thing I say is your name. Let’s see how the King handles the man who let his Mate die on his watch."

His head snapped toward me. "You wouldn’t."

"Try me." I held his stare and didn’t blink. "I have nothing left to lose. That makes me the most dangerous person in this house."

Something in him cracked. He knew I meant it. Maybe he even knew I’d earned the right to.

"Fine," he muttered, jaw tight. "But I walk you there myself. If anyone asks, I found you wandering."

"Whatever helps you sleep."

We moved through the silent corridors, my heart pounding louder with every step. And then, three doors from the study, I heard them.

My grandfather’s voice, cold and clipped. And under it, a lower one, quiet and steady in a way that made the hair on my arms rise.

"You threaten me in my own study."

"I’m offering you a courtesy. Learn the difference."

I didn’t think. I didn’t stop to breathe or plan or care what waited on the other side.

I shoved the door open with both hands and walked straight into the middle of it.