#Chapter 96: Sense and Reason

ELENA The door to my father’s study was already cracked open. I paused outside anyway, hand resting against the worn wood. It had been years since I’d knocked to enter this room—back then, I’d always been too eager to be invited inside, too desperate to sit across from him and feel like he was proud of something I’d done. Now? I didn’t even know what I’d say once I stepped in. But Mason wasn’t going to come. And someone had to. I pushed the door open gently. He was seated behind the broad oak desk, the same one he’d used since I was a child, though the surface was clearer now. Fewer books. Fewer papers. Just a crystal tumbler of something amber he hadn’t touched, and a framed photo of the four of us—me and Mason standing between our parents, all dressed in formal wear from some long-forgotten ceremony. I couldn’t remember what it had been for. Maybe an alliance gala, or a naming day for someone in the pack. We were all smiling in the photo, a happy family. My fathe