Chapter  315

LUMINA I couldn't shake the feeling. Even as I stood in our bedroom, watching Xenois make phone calls to organize the emergency pack meeting, even as I tried to focus on what needed to happen next, my mind kept circling back to one particular piece of the grocery store gossip. Silvia and Samuel Blackwood. The previous Alpha and Luna. My in--laws. Their silence. I moved to the window, staring out at the pack lands without really seeing them. The manicured gardens, the training grounds in the distance, the forest line where our territory began----all of it was familiar, home in a way that had taken years to feel real. But right now, it all felt uncertain, like the ground beneath my feet was less solid than I'd believed. "What are you thinking?" Xenois asked, ending his call and coming to stand beside me. He didn't touch me, but I could feel him there, solid and present in a way that usually grounded me. Today it just made the anxiety worse. "Your parents," I said quietly. "Margaret was r