As night crept over the city, I found myself standing on the expansive terrace, holding a glass of red wine in my hand.
I kept watching the lights tremble in the distance like tiny yellow stars dancing against the dark landscape below me. Somewhere out there was my former pack's territory.
In the past, it was a beacon of hope to me. Now, it was nothing but a tiny dot of light mixed with the rest of them.
Now, it was literally nothing.
Life sure was a funny thing. Just this morning, I was literally a nobody. Tonight, I was sitting in a multi-million dollar villa, under the protection of Logan Grant.
My phone buzzed in my pocket again. Sam. He has been calling me nonstop ever since I left, and I was reluctant to spare him even a second. Perhaps it was the wine, or maybe the fact that I was surrounded by such luxury, but in the end, I took a deep breath and finally answered the call.
"What do you want?" My voice was steady, devoid of any desperate emotions that had lingered there in the past.
"Where are you? Have you found a new place already?" He demanded like I still owed him something. "My parents are worried you'd crawl back to us because you're homeless."
I couldn't help but laugh. Both he and his fucking family were insanely delusional. "Tell your parents not to worry. I wouldn't come back to that place even if that was the last house on the whole damn earth."
"Then where are you?" He pressed, surprisingly eager. "Some dirty motel? Or did you crawl under a cheap man just to have a bed to sleep on tonight?"
I took another sip of wine, savoring the warmth spreading in my mouth. That dirty comment didn't touch me by one iota.
"I'm staying at a private villa in Moonlight Heights," I opted for the truth. "Beautiful place. Amazing view. You wouldn't get it."
He scoffed bitterly as if he couldn't believe that someone like me could even get near such an exclusive place. "Don't lie to me, Amelie. There is no fucking way anyone would ever get you near Moonlight Heights!"
Ha! I scoffed internally, pleased at how accurate my guess actually was.
"It doesn't matter whether you believe me or not. What matters is that I'm not there with you." I said, a wide smile tugging at the corners of my lips. "How's Miranda, by the way? Still pushing you toward that big deal with the Grant family?"
He took quite a few moments to answer, and that was all the information I needed. "What do you even know about that?" he finally asked in a tight voice. He sounded nervous and tense, and I liked that a lot.
"I just wanted to know what she had to say about meeting the notorious Logan Grant today. If I were to describe his reaction to that meeting... Hmm... He seemed rather unimpressed."
"What the fuck are you talking about?!" Sam snapped, but the tremble in his voice betrayed his real emotions. "You don't know anything about Logan Grant! You don't know a fucking thing, Amelie!"
"Sure, if you say so," I conceded. "But I do know that Logan Grant has already hired the best lawyers to help me settle our divorce. It's quite interesting, isn't it? Someone of his status taking an interest in someone as worthless as me?"
I ended the call before he could respond, feeling a petty but satisfying sense of triumph. For once, I had left Sam speechless instead of the other way around.
It felt great.
***
Logan leaned back in the back seat of his car, scrolling through the daily report on his tablet as his driver hummed something under his breath.
Jake, his beta and personal secretary, sat right next to him, looking at something on his phone. The evenings when they were heading back to one of the pack houses were always the calmest time – perhaps even the only time he could actually spend doing something for himself.
Which was online shopping.
"I heard you went to Riverstone today," Jake finally asked, his eyes still glued to his phone. "How did it go?"
"Eye-opening," Logan replied right away, not looking up from his tablet as well. "Say, wasn't the Johnes name listed as a potential partner candidate for our development project?"
Jake finally hid away his phone and checked his notes. "Yes, Mr. Grant. Tim Johnes has been pretty persistent in pushing his daughter, Miranda, as one of the potential investors. Mr. Samuel Crane, too."
"I see." Logan's fingers finally stopped scrolling, and he looked at his beta with a cold smile. "I don't want their names anywhere near that project. Kick them out."
Jake's eyebrows nearly jumped to his hairline, eyes widening for a few seconds before he nodded and typed something on his own tablet. "What reason should I give them?"
"Tell them we've found better candidates for the partners' roles," Logan said firmly, turning back to his reports. "And Jake? Make sure the word gets around all packs about this decision. Make the gossip spread in the nastiest manner."
"As you wish, Mr. Grant," Jake replied, a small smile playing at his lips. "Consider it done."