Rhen disappeared into the corridor, the door closing behind him with a quiet click.
Sule did not follow.
Prying at Rhen’s defenses only made them calcify, and nothing said tonight could alter the boundary his brother had maintained for years.
Sule looked back toward Leena and their son.
He had never feared Rhen’s love for her.
Rhen’s loyalty had never once been in question.
What troubled him was the price his brother paid to ensure it never would be.
Chapter 9
Hours after the heir’s birth, Cole had returned to the rubber ball.
It struck the kitchen wall in the same slow rhythm as before.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
The sound cracked through the silence like a metronome for violence.
Across the room, Malakai worked a curved blade over a whetstone, each measured stroke scraping through the quiet. The scent of blood still lingered in the halls—Leena’s, the newborn’s, and the darker trace carried from the eastern guest suites.
Dax leaned against the sink with his arms crossed, his gaze fixed on the window. The glass reflected the kitchen’s low firelight, but his attention was elsewhere.
The heir had arrived safely.
The woman tethered to Rhen was still trapped in transition.
Bar X had gone quiet.
Too many pieces had shifted in a single night.
Dax reached out and caught the rubber ball before it could strike the wall again.
“That’s not annoying at all.”
“Fucker,” Cole said, though half a smile pulled at his mouth. “Better this than breaking someone’s neck.”
Malakai glanced up at the movement.
No argument here.
A pained cry drifted down the hall—thin, raw, and wrong.
Dax and Cole stilled.
Malakai caught the change in their faces and looked toward the door leading into the corridor.
The wards had settled around the newborn heir, but they continued to shiver around the adjoining guest suite.
The woman was still fighting the transition.
