Free Web NovelChapter 58: NADIA’S VERDICT
CALLUM’S POV
I left Keisha in her room and made my way home.
Most of the lights were off and the main corridor was dim. My feet moved across the floorboard as I walked into the main house, wanting some quiet.
I wanted wine, silence and approximately four hours of not making decisions.
I got three steps into the entrance hall before Nadia appeared at the top of the stairs.
She was in her sleep clothes with her arms folded and a frown on her face.
"Where have you been?" She asked.
"Out." I stared at her.
"Out." She repeated. "It’s almost midnight, Dad."
"I’m aware of the time." I said as I moved toward the corridor that led to the wine cellar. "Go to bed, Nadia."
"I’ve been waiting for hours." She said, coming down the stairs. "I wanted to talk to you."
"Tomorrow." I sighed.
"You always say tomorrow." She followed me into the corridor. "And then tomorrow comes and you’re busy and then it’s the day after and you’re busy again and nothing ever gets said." She caught up to me and stepped in front of me. "Tonight."
I looked at her.
She looked back at me with her mother’s eyes and her arms still folded.
Stubborn girl. But she had my attention. freewebnovёl.ƈom
I exhaled. "Five minutes." I said. "Walk with me."
She fell into step beside me and we went down to the wine cellar where I found the bottle I was looking for and poured two glasses and handed her one.
She took it which meant she was serious because Nadia didn’t usually drink wine with me at midnight unless she was working up to something difficult for her to say.
I waited quietly.
"Vanessa is living here now." She stated.
"She’s staying on the estate." I said. "Temporarily."
"The maids talk." She said. "Everyone talks. They don’t even seem to care that I’m in the vicinity, it’s like it’s public news." She set her glass down on the old wooden shelf beside her. "Dad. What is happening?"
"The elders arranged—"
"I know what the elders arranged." She said. "I was there for the lunch. I watched her walk in wearing that dress—" She stopped and started again. "You know she’s not genuine."
"It’s complicated." I muttered.
"Everything is complicated with you lately." She shot back. "That’s the answer I always get. It’s complicated. It’s pack business. It’s not something I need to worry about." She picked her glass back up and then put it back down without drinking. "I’m your daughter. I live here. If a woman is moving onto this estate and planning to become the Luna of this pack then it is absolutely something I need to worry about."
"Nobody has been named Luna." I reminded her.
"Yet." She said.
I said nothing.
"She’s awful." Nadia said. The words came out flat and certain and I could tell she had made up her mind. Glad to know I wasn’t the only one getting sick of Vanessa already. "She walked into that hall and looked at Keisha like she was furniture. That woman is so fucking disrespectful. Not to mention that she’s very entitled and I don’t want her here." She looked at me. "And you want to bring that into this pack."
"I don’t want to bring anything." I said. "The elders—"
"The elders don’t live here." She cut me lff. "They don’t have to look at her every day. They don’t have to watch what she does to the people in this house." Her voice had gone quieter and way more serious. "I do."
I looked at my daughter standing in my wine cellar at midnight, telling me about something I had thought about a million times.
"Nadia." I muttered.
"Don’t Nadia me in that tone." She said. "I’m not overreacting. I know what I saw today."
"You poured wine on a guest." I pinched my nose bridge.
"I poured wine on someone who was being cruel to my best friend in my father’s house." She corrected. "There’s a difference." She paused. "And you know there’s a difference."
I was quiet for a moment.
"Why didn’t you say something?" She asked. Her voice had changed slightly. Something rose underneath it that was less anger and more— hurt. "When she was talking to Keisha like that. Why did you just sit there?"
I looked at my glass because I didn’t have an excuse.
"Because standing up in that moment would have made things worse." I said carefully. "For Keisha and for the situation."
"How?" She asked. "How would telling someone to show basic respect to a person at your table have made things worse."
I didn’t have an answer for that that I could actually give her.
She watched my face. "You didn’t want to draw attention to how much you care." She said slowly. "About how she was treating Keisha specifically."
I said nothing but something shifted in her expression.
"Dad." She repeated.
"Don’t." I said.
"I’m not—" She stopped and looked at me for a long moment, something working through her face that she was deciding whether to say. "I just want to know that you see it." She said finally. "What Vanessa is. What she’s going to do to this pack if you let the elders push this through." She looked at me. "Do you see it?"
"I see it." I admitted.
"And you’re going to do something about it."
"In my own time." I said. "In my own way. Yes."
She looked at me for a long moment, searching for something in my face. Whatever she found seemed to partially satisfy her because some of the tension left her shoulders.
"She better not talk to Keisha like that again." She said. "I mean it. I don’t care who she is or what the elders want. Not in this house."
"Noted." I agreed.
She picked up her wine glass and actually drank from it this time before she looked at the ceiling. "I really don’t like her."
"I know." I said.
"She has a terrible energy." She kept going. "You can feel it. Like she’s always calculating something and I don’t like not knowing."
"Mm." I muttered.
"What energy is she even trying to give off?"
"Someone who wants to be underestimated." I offered.
Nadia looked at me. "Or someone who wants to intimidate."
"Both." I said.
She was quiet for a moment. "Are you going to be okay?" She asked quietly in a different tone from the rest of the conversation.
I looked at her. "What do you mean?"
"I mean—" She set her glass down again. "All of this. The elders pushing you into something you don’t want. Riven being here. Everything." She looked at me with those eyes. "Are you okay."
I looked at my wine and thought about Keisha.
"I’m managing." I muttered under my breath.
"That’s not the same as okay." She pointed out.
"No." I agreed. "It’s not."
She looked at me for another moment. Then she crossed the small space and put her arms around me briefly the way she had started doing when she got tall enough to reach.
I put one arm around her and she stepped back and picked up her wine before she headed for the door.
"Find someone better than Vanessa." She said from the doorway. "Someone actually good. For this pack and for you." She paused. "There are options."
She walked out before I could respond to that.
I stood in the wine cellar alone and looked at my glass, thought about what she meant and what she might know and how close to the surface everything was becoming.
Options? Oh, I didn’t need options. Because I already had someone who I wanted in that seat as my luna. If only it could be easy.
I refilled my glass and took Riven’s proposal documents from the shelf where I had left them earlier and sat down on the old wooden chair in the corner where I went through them properly.
I picked up my phone and rang Dane.
Dane answered on the second ring. "Everything alright?"
"Fine." I said. "Drop a memo to the communications team. I want a finalization meeting tomorrow morning. We’ll close both proposals and get Riven’s delegation on their way."
A pause followed like he was storing that in his head. "Done." He said. "How was Nadia?"
"She wasn’t asleep. She wanted to talk about.you know—" I said.
He made a sound that was almost a laugh. "She figured anything out?"
"She’s working on it." I muttered.
Another pause followed. "And Keisha?"
I looked at the proposal in my hand.
"She said there’s something she needs to tell us." I informed him. "Both of us. When she’s ready."
"Did she say what?" Dane said.
"No." I said.
"Okay." He said finally but he sounded thoughtful.
"Okay." I repeated.
Whatever she had to say was important. I knew that much. But what exactly was it?
But something told me I had a wild guess. And I wasn’t sure how I felt about that possibility.
