Elena’s POV
They dragged inside the packhouse against my protests, my wounded arm screaming in pain as Damien’s grip tightened around my waist. Every instinct in my body was screaming at to turn around and chase after her, to find my daughter before she disappeared again into whatever hell they were keeping her in.
"You need dical attention," Damien insisted, his jaw set in that stubborn way that usually made my heart flutter. Right now it just made want to punch him.
"I need to find Briar," I shot back, struggling against his hold as Maya burst through the door with her dical kit already open.
The silver bullet lodged in my shoulder felt like liquid fire, but I barely registered the pain. Nothing could compare to the agony of seeing my baby girl pointing a gun at with empty eyes that should have recognized her own mother.
Maya imdiately started working to extract the bullet, her gentle hands surprisingly steady despite the chaos. "This is going to hurt," she warned.
"Everything already hurts," I muttered, my eyes never leaving Damien’s face. "How can you question what I saw out there?"
"Because you want to see her so badly that you might be imagining things," Damien said softly, crouching down to et my eyes. The pain in his voice almost broke . "Elena, she was just a baby when they took her."
"I carried that child through my entire pregnancy. I nursed her. I morized every detail of her face before they ripped her from my arms." My voice cracked, but I pushed forward. "She has my eyes, Damien. My exact eyes. And your stubborn chin that you passed down to both our children."
"If it was really her, why didn’t she recognize you?" His question hung between us like a blade.
"She was trained to kill us," I whispered, the horrible truth settling over like ice water. "They’ve had her all these years. They’ve probably convinced her we’re monsters."
The room fell silent except for Maya’s quiet work on my shoulder. I could see the mont Damien started to believe , the way his shoulders tensed and his hands clenched into fists.
Caleb suddenly burst through the door, his chest heaving like he’d run miles. His clothes were torn and he was only wearing a pair of ratty shorts, evidence that he’d shifted to chase our attackers.
"I followed them as far as I could," he panted, "but they knew what they were doing. Professional."
"Hunters," Damien said grimly.
The word hit like a physical blow. Hunters had my daughter. They’d stolen my baby and turned her into a weapon against her own family. The thought made want to tear the world apart with my bare hands.
I could see the sa realization dawning on everyone else’s faces. The hunters weren’t just using random tactics anymore. They’d taken the one thing guaranteed to destroy and molded her into their perfect soldier.
"They’re using her," I said, my voice barely above a whisper. "They know she’s the only thing that could distract long enough to get what they want."
But what happened when they were done with her? When she was no longer useful? The hunters didn’t keep werewolves as pets. They eliminated threats.
My daughter was living on borrowed ti.
I tried to stand up, panic flooding my system, but Damien and Gage imdiately moved to hold down. "Let go. I have to find her before they decide she’s expendable."
"Maya, give her sothing for the anxiety," Damien ordered.
"No!" I struggled against their grip, but I was already weakened from blood loss and shock. "I won’t abandon her again!"
The sedative hit my bloodstream fast, and despite my best efforts to fight it, darkness pulled under.
When I woke up the next morning, sunlight was streaming through our bedroom windows and Damien was nowhere to be found. My head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, a lovely parting gift from whatever Maya had injected with.
I found myself dressed in clean pajamas, evidence that Damien had taken care of while I was unconscious. Under different circumstances, the gesture might have ward my heart. Right now, it just reminded of how much ti I’d lost.
Voices drifted up from downstairs, heated and urgent. I slipped on my robe and crept to the staircase, staying hidden while I listened to what sounded like a full-scale argunt in our living room.
"What the hell are you talking about?" Damien’s voice bood through the house.
"I pulled the security footage from last night," Caleb replied, and I could hear papers rustling. "Mom wasn’t imagining anything. Look at these photos I printed. Right before she pulled the trigger. Look at her face, Dad. The hair, the eyes. Hell, look at the mouth. That’s your mouth."
My heart hamred against my ribs. Caleb believed .
"So you’re saying the hunters actually have Briar?" Damien’s voice was quieter now, strained.
"Mom was so convinced that a silver bullet barely slowed her down. In years, she’s never once claid to see Briar. Never. This is different."
"Gather so n," Damien said finally. "We need to investigate this properly, or your mother is never going to let this go."
Never let this go? As if this was about persistence instead of finding our daughter.
They started filing out of the living room and spotted on the staircase. The look of pity in Damien’s eyes made sick.
I turned around and walked back to our bedroom, slamming the door hard enough to rattle the fra.
He thought I’d never let this go? Damn right I wouldn’t. Not when my baby was out there, alone and confused and probably terrified.
I grabbed my laptop and settled onto the bed, my fingers already flying over the keys as I accessed the dark web. If there were whispers about hunter activity, I’d find them.
Hours of searching revealed attack patterns, casualty reports, witness testimonies. But when I specifically searched for ntions of a teenage girl working with hunters, I found nothing.
That realization chilled to the bone. They only brought her out for us. This wasn’t random violence. This was personal.
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