Silence lasted less than a second.
Then the room erupted.
“Get her heart medicine!” Roland shouted.
“Call the family healer again!”
Lyra shoved toward Isla.
“Get your hands off my mother.”
“No one touches Isla,” Logan said.
His quiet command cut through the panic.
Isla loosened Vespera’s high collar.
The matriarch’s pulse raced beneath her fingers, but every breath came as a thinner, harsher wheeze.
“Bring the estate’s medical kit,” Isla ordered.
“I need oxygen, a list of her medications, and everything she has eaten or drunk in the past three hours.”
The servants looked uncertainly toward Lyra.
Logan’s eyes flashed gold.
“Now.”
They scattered.
Roland reached for the unconscious woman.
“We should sit her up.”
“Don’t move her,” Isla warned.
“And don’t put anything in her mouth.
She can’t swallow.”
“You expect us to obey you?” Lyra demanded.
“You aren’t a healer.”
“No.
I studied wolf biochemistry and pharmacology at Ashworth.” Isla kept her voice steady.
“Her pulse is racing, her oxygen is falling, and her throat is swelling.”
“There’s no rash,” Roland argued.
“This cannot be an allergic reaction.”
“Not every severe reaction causes one.”
Isla inhaled near the tea spilled across the rug.
Beneath its ordinary herbal scent was something bitter and sharp.
Vespera’s wolf should have been fighting to heal her.
Instead, its presence was disappearing.
“Something is suppressing her wolf’s response,” Isla said.
“That’s why this looks like a heart problem.”
Lyra gave a cold laugh.
“You read a few books and now you think you know more than the physicians who have treated her for years?”
Isla looked down at Vespera’s blue lips.
“This isn’t the time to protect your pride.”
Lyra’s face twisted with fury.
Footsteps thundered through the hall before she could answer.
A gray-haired man entered carrying a black medical case.
“Let me through.”
The crowd immediately parted for the family healer.
Isla moved aside just enough to give him access.
He checked Vespera’s heart and blood pressure before listening to her chest.
“She has a cardiac condition,” he said.
“Bring her usual medication.”
“Her heart is compensating,” Isla said.
“It isn’t the cause.”
The healer glanced sharply at her.
“And you are?”
“Isla Vale.
I studied wolf pharmacology.”
His gaze flicked over her Omega collar before returning to Vespera.
“Then you should understand the danger of interfering with a diagnosis.”
“And you should listen to her breathing.”
His mouth tightened, but he placed his instrument beneath Vespera’s jaw.
His expression changed.
“There is swelling,” he admitted.
“Her airway is narrowing by the second.”
“Without knowing what caused it, I cannot be certain—”
“You don’t need to identify the exact trigger before treating anaphylaxis.”
The healer looked displeased, but he didn’t contradict her.
A servant hurried back carrying the estate’s medical kit and several medicine bottles. Visit g.com for the full chapter.
Another brought a portable oxygen tank.
Isla helped the healer place the mask over Vespera’s face.
“What did she eat or drink?” Isla asked.
“Nothing since lunch,” one of the maids answered.
Her frightened gaze moved to the broken ceramic cup.
“Only the tea.”
“What kind?”
“A new blend.
It was sent by one of Madam Vale’s friends.”
“Did she drink it before today?”
“No, ma’am.
This was the first time.”
The maid hesitated.
“What else?” Isla demanded.
“She started clearing her throat after the first few sips.
I asked if something was wrong, but she dismissed me.”
Isla picked up a damp piece of the broken cup and smelled it again.
Silverthorn.
The rare pollen was harmless to most wolves, but it could react violently with certain suppressants and cardiac treatments.
“Does one of her medications contain wolfsbane extract?” she asked.
The healer picked up a dark bottle.
“A controlled amount.
It regulates her heart during dominance surges.”
“Silverthorn can react with it.” Isla pointed toward the spilled tea.
“It’s suppressing her natural healing while her body goes into anaphylaxis.”
The healer’s face grew grave.
“What does she need?” Logan asked.
“Epinephrine,” Isla answered.
“Intramuscular.
Immediately.”
The healer hesitated.
“At her age, with her cardiac history, epinephrine could cause a dangerous arrhythmia.”
“And without it, she will suffocate.”
“You want to inject my mother with a drug that could stop her heart?” Lyra cried.
“Based on an Omega’s guess?”
“It isn’t a guess.”
“You are not a doctor!”
“No,” Isla said.
“But right now, I’m the only one who recognized that she can’t breathe.”
Lyra turned to the healer.
“You will not risk my mother’s life on her orders.”
Vespera convulsed weakly beneath the oxygen mask.
Her pulse was becoming harder to detect.
Isla’s fear sharpened into anger.
They were wasting the few seconds Vespera had left because accepting help from an Omega offended them.
“If I’m wrong, blame me,” Isla said.
“Throw me out.
Ruin my name.
Do whatever you want.”
Lyra stared at her.
“But if I’m right and you delay another minute, she could die before your doctor reaches the gate.”
The room fell silent.
Everyone looked toward Logan.
He stood over them, his expression unreadable.
“How certain are you?” he asked Isla.
She refused to offer a promise no one could make.
“I can’t guarantee she’ll survive,” she said.
“But she won’t breathe much longer without it.”
His gaze held hers.
Isla’s heart pounded.
Only hours ago, his grandmother had discussed taking her child after their divorce.
Logan turned to the healer.
“Administer the epinephrine.”
Lyra gasped.
“Logan!”
The healer remained still.
“On whose authority?”
“Mine.”
“If she is wrong—” Lyra began.
“The responsibility will be mine,” Logan said.
Isla stared at him.
All her life, people had used her when they needed something and blamed her when it went wrong.
Logan had no reason to risk his position for her judgment.
Yet he had.
The healer opened the medical kit and prepared the injection.
He pushed the needle into the outside of Vespera’s thigh.
Everyone waited.
One second.
Two.
Nothing changed.
Vespera’s chest rose in a shallow, broken movement.
Then her entire body stiffened.
Her limbs began to convulse, and white foam gathered at the corner of her mouth.
“Nana!” someone screamed.
Lyra dropped beside her mother.
“What did you do?”
“She was deprived of oxygen,” Isla said.
“Give the medicine time to—”
Roland pressed trembling fingers to Vespera’s wrist.
His face went white.
“I can’t feel her pulse.”
The room exploded with accusations.
“She killed her!”
“It was the injection!”
“Arrest the Omega!”
Something changed in Logan’s face.
One moment Isla was kneeling beside Vespera.
The next, her back struck the wall.
Pain burst through her shoulders.
Logan’s hand closed around her throat, lifting her until her feet barely touched the floor.
“Logan—”
His name broke into a gasp as his fingers tightened.
His eyes burned gold, but there was no recognition in them.
No trace of the man who had defended her.
No sign of the Alpha who had trusted her only seconds earlier.
Serena hurled herself against Isla’s skin.
‘The baby!
Protect the baby!’
Isla clawed at Logan’s wrist with one hand and covered her stomach with the other.
“Wait,” she choked out.
“The medicine…needs time.”
He didn’t hear her.
Behind him, Lyra screamed that Vespera was dead.
Logan’s grip tightened.
Darkness crept across the edges of Isla’s vision.
The man who had defended her against his entire family might be the one who killed her.