Alpha's Regret: The Seventh Time was Forever

Chapter 238 – Better than Daddy

Voren kept his eyes anywhere but on Seraphine’s face, which was probably the most sensible thing he’d managed all morning. And for the first time since he’d arrived at the Centenary pack, he was genuinely grateful for Damon’s presence because Damon’s voice cut across the moment before it had a chance to fully ignite.

"Sera."

Seraphine scooped Bryan up in one clean motion, settled him against her hip like she used to do when she lived at the pack, and walked toward Damon with the unhurried authority of someone who had already made a decision and was simply letting the world catch up to it. "No matter what happens today," she said quietly, "you are driving me back to the hotel tonight."

"Not gonna happen," Voren said from somewhere behind them, his voice carrying the relaxed ease of a man with his back against the hood of his car and nothing particular to prove. Like he was reading something mildly interesting. Like this was a completely ordinary Tuesday morning.

Seraphine turned and looked at him. The look was precise. "I wasn’t talking to you."

"Neither was I." His eyes moved past her to Damon. "I was talking to him. Unless he can take me in the ring and actually win, he’s not driving you anywhere."

The arms Seraphine had around Bryan tightened before she caught herself, and she eased her hold before Bryan felt it, but the tension was real.

Something about Voren, the ease of it, the total absence of apology in the way he moved through every single space he entered, had started to feel less like confidence and more like something territorial.

loud and was now just operating from that place,

said softly in Seraphine’s mind. ’His wolf genuinely likes us,

right

just slightly the way it always did when he was this close. She carried him

had a nightmare." He looked at her with absolute seriousness. "Can you take me with you when you

tight inside her chest. She kept the smile exactly where it was. "I’d love nothing more, but you’re being trained to be

I don’t want to be

it gently, without pulling away from it. "And one day, I genuinely

with the wide-open, uncomplicated innocence that only very small

face exactly where

of eyes, all of them already watching, all of them already having decided something

way it always does when a room has already made up its mind about you

left, sliding into the open air of the gym like a blade being drawn slowly.

of the people Daisy had put in place to torment

warrior pushed off the wall to her right, arms crossed, posture radiating the specific kind of arrogance that belongs to someone who is absolutely certain the room is standing behind him. Kevin.