Cade's POV
Cade woke up screaming.
Not with his mouth. His throat was locked down too tight for sound. But his wolf was screaming inside him. Howling. Clawing at his insides like it was trying to break free and run. Something was wrong. Something was catastrophically, impossibly wrong.
The mate bond was empty.
Not broken. Empty. Like he was reaching through their connection and there was nothing on the other end. No heartbeat. No emotions. No Rowan. Just a void where she was supposed to be and it was pulling him apart from the inside out.
Cade threw off the covers and shifted before his feet hit the ground. His wolf took over, larger and faster and infinitely more desperate than his human body could ever be. He burst out of his penthouse bedroom and tore through the pack house hallway.
Her room. He needed to find her room. Needed to find her scent. Needed to find proof that she was still here somewhere in the building.
His claws raked across the wooden floor as he ran. Portraits of past Alphas fell from the walls. A vase shattered. He didn't care. Nothing mattered except finding her.
Wolves scattered out of his way. They could feel his rage through the pack bond. Could feel that something was wrong with their Alpha. But Cade didn't stop for explanations. He tore down the stairs toward the basement where the healing center was.
The room was empty.
He shifted back to human form and stared at the narrow bed. The thin mattress. The small desk where she'd studied healing magic. Everything looked exactly the same but she wasn't here. The scent was already fading from the room. Hours old. She'd been gone for hours.
The realization hit him like a fist to the chest. She'd left after the ceremony. While he was still downstairs with the pack. While he was pretending to be happy with Victoria. She'd packed her things and walked out and left him nothing but her absence.
Cade ran to the training grounds. Then the gardens. Then the pack offices. Every place he'd ever seen her. Every place her scent had ever touched. All of it was empty. All of it was just a memory of someone who wasn't coming back.
By the time Jaxon found him, Cade was back in her room. On his knees on the floor. Holding a piece of paper in his hands.
"I hope she was worth it," it said. Seven words. That's all she'd left him. Seven words that destroyed everything.
Cade read it again. And again. Seventeen times. His hands were shaking so badly he could barely hold the paper. His wolf was still howling but now it sounded defeated. Like an animal that understood it had lost something it could never get back.
Jaxon appeared in the doorway. He took one look at Cade on the floor holding the note and understood everything.
"She's gone," Cade said. His voice didn't sound like his own. It sounded like someone drowning. "She left."
"I can see that." Jaxon stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. "The question is what you're going to do about it."
"I have to find her." Cade stood up on shaking legs. "I have to track her down and bring her back."
"Do you think she wants to come back?"
The question was like a second punch. Cade looked at the note in his hands. Looked at the empty room. Looked at his best friend's face and saw the answer already there.
"No," he whispered.
"Then what's your plan?" Jaxon's voice was hard. Questioning. Like he was testing whether Cade understood the magnitude of what he'd done.
"I'm going to make her understand. I'm going to show her that this was a mistake."
"She already knows it was a mistake." Jaxon moved to the window and looked out at the pack grounds. "The bond doesn't lie, Cade. She felt every moment of it. She felt you with Victoria. And she still left. That tells you everything you need to know about what she thinks of you right now."
The words hit like knives. Cade wanted to argue. Wanted to tell Jaxon he was wrong. But through the fractured mate bond, he could sense it. Rowan's pain. Her determination. Her absolute conviction that she needed to get away from him and never come back.
"Where would she go?" Cade asked.
"Away from here. Away from you. That's all that matters to her right now." Jaxon turned around. "Listen to me. Victoria has already told the pack that the omega girl left because she couldn't handle the responsibility. She's already spinning the story. If you run off chasing her, you look weak. The pack will start questioning your leadership."
"I don't care about the pack right now."
"Well you should." Jaxon's voice hardened. "Because right now, your position is shaky. You just crowned a new Luna. You need to project strength. You need to show that you're not falling apart because some omega girl got scared."
Cade wanted to howl. Wanted to tell everyone exactly what Rowan meant to him. Wanted to scream from the rooftop that she was his true mate and that he'd made the biggest mistake of his life.
But he couldn't. Because an Alpha didn't show weakness. An Alpha didn't admit failure. An Alpha just kept moving forward and pretended like his heart wasn't shattered in a million pieces.
"I'll find her," he said quietly. "When things settle down, I'll find her."
"Okay." Jaxon squeezed his shoulder. "But for now, you need to go upstairs and sleep. Tomorrow you need to wake up and act like nothing is wrong. The pack needs to see their Alpha in control."
Cade nodded even though the idea of sleeping felt impossible. Even though the mate bond was a constant ache in his chest. Even though he could still smell her in this room. Could still feel the ghost of her presence like she was standing right next to him.
He walked back to his penthouse bedroom and collapsed on the bed fully clothed. The mate bond was pulling him in the direction she'd gone. Miles and miles away. Somewhere beyond the pack grounds where he couldn't sense her anymore. The bond stretched thin and burned but refused to break.
That was the worst part. The bond wouldn't break because it was supernatural. Because they were true mates. Because no matter how far she ran or how much she hated him, they would always be connected.
He was about to close his eyes when the bedroom door opened.
Victoria walked in wearing his shirt. Just his shirt. Nothing else. Her hair was down and she was smiling like she owned him.
"You're upset," she said, not a question. She moved to the bed and tried to sit down next to him.
Cade moved away from her.
"Looking for the little omega?" Victoria's voice was mocking. "She left last night. Probably scared of all our power. Can't blame her really. She's nobody. You made the right choice choosing me instead of her."
Cade stared at her and felt something click into place. Something about the way she was looking at him. The certainty in her voice. The fact that she seemed to know exactly when Rowan had left.
"You knew she was going to leave," he said slowly.
Victoria's smile widened. "Of course I did. I watched her run out of the great hall last night like her life depended on it. It was obvious she couldn't handle seeing us together."
She moved closer and tried to touch his face but Cade grabbed her wrist.
"Did you do something to her?" His voice was deadly quiet. His wolf was pushing to the surface. "Did you threaten her? Did you tell her to leave?"
"I told her the truth." Victoria pulled her wrist free. She looked amused by his anger. "I told her that you'd chosen me. That she was nothing but a distraction. That any mate bond she felt was probably just her imagination trying to convince herself that you'd want someone like her."
The room went red.
Cade shifted before he could think. His wolf surged forward with killing intent. Victoria screamed and tried to run but he grabbed her by the throat and slammed her against the wall. His claws dug into her skin and blood ran down her neck.
For a second, just one second, he wanted to end this. Wanted to snap her neck and be done with her.
Then he realized what he was doing and pulled back.
He shifted back to human form and stepped away from her. His hands were shaking. His wolf was shrieking inside him but he forced it down. He couldn't kill her. Not yet. Not until he understood what was really happening.
Victoria slid down the wall gasping for air. She was laughing even as blood dripped from her throat.
"Now you understand," she said between gasps. "Now you see what you gave up. She was weak. She was always going to leave you. And you got exactly what you deserved."
Cade walked to the window and stared out at the darkness. Somewhere out there, Rowan was running. Somewhere out there, she was trying to escape from him and the pack and the life that had broken her heart.
And he had no idea how to find her.
The mate bond stretched across the distance like a wounded thing. Burning. Aching. Pulling him toward her but not strongly enough to track her. Not strongly enough to find her before she disappeared completely.
For the first time in his life, the most powerful Alpha in North America understood true helplessness.
He had lost his true mate.
And he had no idea how to get her back.