Therefore, even if Old Madam Presgrave had bared her fangs at the human ruling council and threatened to collapse the entire financial territory just to retrieve her kidnapped grandson, it still made sense in the harsh logic of pack hierarchy. An Alpha's bloodline was never something to abandon, even if the entire city had to tremble for it.
The pressure that followed had been unbearable. The enforcement pack—those who acted under the human systems but answered to deeper, hidden instincts of order—had no choice but to mobilize everything they had to bring young Elliot back alive. Their duty was simple in theory, absolute in practice. A pup of an Alpha bloodline could not be allowed to fall.
But if that pressure hadn't existed… would my mother still be alive?
The thought struck like a snapped bone inside my chest.
