Chapter 9: Are You Certain That Is Your Territory?

"What are you doing inside my sanctuary?"

Dominic’s voice had dropped to a temperature so freezing it could numb a warrior's blood.

He had never calculated that before his intelligence network could even finalize Clara Thorne’s tracking profile, her scent would breach his own private stronghold!

Within a single heartbeat, his lethal instincts passed absolute judgment upon her standing.

She was deliberately infiltrating his orbit.

Including this exact hour, his mind concluded that she had meticulously targeted his Matriarch to force a reunion!

Faced with his suffocating pressure, Clara found her voice paralyzed, utterly cornered on how to construct a response.

After all, by legal definitions, she had been violently abducted and driven across his borders against her will.

Standing beside them, Matriarch Evelyn captured the violent ripples colliding between their competing auras, her wise eyes gleaming as she registered the hidden friction. "Dominic, have you cross-contaminated paths with young Clara before this hour?"

Acting on a sudden instinctual urge to shield Clara from his predatory wrath, the Matriarch deliberately suppressed her global title as Serena.

Dominic’s commanding features darkened further, his dark amber eyes narrowing as he issued an absolute, flat denial. "No. She is an absolute stranger to my territory."

"Heh, it carries no weight. I personally summoned her here to solve a breakdown with an ancient relic. Furthermore, tomorrow morning you shall convey my immense gratitude to young Clara. Secure a private dining chamber and escort her to a formal feast, am I understood?"

Evelyn had single-handedly expanded the Vance Empire across the warring regions, standing invincible against generations of rival packs; her status relied entirely on her razor-sharp, hawk-like vision.

The electric, possessive current flowing between Dominic and Clara was entirely transparent to her senses.

Yet, she chose not to violently expose their secrets.

Instead, she weaponized the complication, forcing Dominic into an ironclad contract to share a private space with Clara.

"There is absolutely no need, Matriarch. My talent scarcely resolved your complication," Clara interjected swiftly, scrambling to decline the arrangement. Every instinct screamed at her to sever all overlapping lines with Dominic Vance; she wanted nothing more than to vanish from his sensory grid forever.

But Evelyn merely directed a subtle, authoritative look toward her grandson. "You stubborn pup, do you intend to break your Matriarch's command within her own den?"

Dominic’s dark brows knitted together in an untextured display of irritation. What internal game was the old wolf playing today?

He understood her unyielding temperament flawlessly; if she engineered this trap, she possessed a supreme, calculated motive.

Consequently, though his wolf fiercely resisted the dynamic, he shifted his predatory focus entirely back onto Clara's pale features.

"Madam Thorne. Tomorrow evening at the seventh hour, does your calendar support my arrival?"

Clara felt completely deadpan. Only a second ago, the man was glaring at her with a raw, ravenous hostility that threatened to tear her limb from limb, yet with a single turn of his head, he was commanding her presence at a private feast? Just as she opened her mouth to issue an absolute refusal, Evelyn reached out, her warm, wrinkled hand locking around Clara's fingers.

"My precious girl, the exact hour you breached my doors, my ancestral blood felt an immediate, profound kinship toward you."

"Grant this old wolf a sliver of reverence and accept, will you?"

Clara simply did not possess the cruelty required to shatter the request of a revered pack elder. With no leverage left, she offered a stiff nod of agreement.

Evelyn’s features smoothed into a highly satisfied, regal smile. She pivoted back toward Dominic, her tone laced with absolute authority. "The midnight hours are deep, and I refuse to permit Clara to hazard the wilderness alone. My scouts have retired from their shifts; you shall personally escort her back to her territory."

Dominic froze. The Vance estate maintained four elite vanguard drivers on a continuous, twenty-four-hour tactical rotation.

However, his sharp intellect instantly unraveled his grandmother’s trap.

A flash of dangerous, freezing crimson light ignited within his amber gaze. "By your command."

He pivoted on his heel, his towering form actually stepping forward to personally throw open the massive oak doors for Clara.

"Thank you... for your courtesy."

Clara’s green eyes widened in utter disbelief, a wave of profound bewilderment and shock washing over her as she stepped past his massive frame into the cool night air.

He granted her a flat, noncommittal nod, keeping his lips sealed.

The exact second they crossed the threshold into the enclosed, leather interior of his armored vehicle, the Alpha King completely unleashed his freezing, suffocating aura, letting it saturate the space without a shred of restraint.

"The coordinates to my territory... you already possess them, correct?"

Sensing his long, deliberate hesitation before igniting the engine, Clara ventured to question him in a hushed undertone.

Dominic cast a sideways, lethal glance at her profile, his baritone slicing through the silence like a blade. "Are you entirely certain that the border coordinates you provided last time belong to your true home, Clara?"

In that exact breath, a cold dread seized Clara’s spine, leaving her with the agonizing sensation that his predatory gaze had completely hollowed out her deepest secrets.