Chapter 3

Florence POV:

Three weeks later.

The glass doors of the Carroll Architecture Firm slid open. I walked in, my heels clicking rhythmically against the marble floor. I wore a simple black dress, high-necked and long-sleeved, hiding the healing puncture wound on my hip.

My ID was deactivated, naturally. The receptionist, Betty, looked up and paled.

"Mrs. Car- I mean, Florence. You can't be here."

"I'm just here to pick up my personal sketches, Betty," I lied smoothly. "Unless Julius wants a lawsuit for intellectual property theft on top of everything else?"

"Let her in."

The voice came from the mezzanine. Kenzie stood there, looking radiant. She leaned over the railing, smiling down at me. She looked remarkably healthy for someone who supposedly needed a life-saving transplant weeks ago.

"Let her come up," Kenzie said. "I want to thank her personally."

I took the elevator. When the doors opened, the office fell silent. My former colleagues stared at their screens, terrified to make eye contact.

I walked to my old office. It was already changed. My awards were in a trash bin. The walls were painted a garish pink. And Kenzie was sitting in my chair.

Julius stood by the window.

"You look terrible," Julius said without looking up.

"And you look incompetent," I replied.

The room gasped.

Julius turned slowly. "Careful, Florence."

I pointed at the blueprints on the desk. "That's the Lunar Temple project. You've placed the load-bearing pillars on a ley line. The magical interference will collapse the atrium within six months."

Kenzie laughed. "Listen to the human trying to teach us pack magic. I redesigned it. My intuition told me the flow was better this way."

"Your intuition is going to kill people," I said flatly.

"Enough!" Julius slammed his hand on the desk. "Get out. You have your sketches. Leave."

Kenzie stood up and walked around the desk. She stopped in front of me, invading my personal space.

"You know, Florence, you really are pathetic," she whispered. "You couldn't keep your man, you couldn't keep your house. You're just... empty."

She raised her hand and slapped me.

The sound cracked like a whip.

My head snapped to the side. My Inner Wolf didn't just growl; she roared against the cage of my mind. Kill her. Paint the walls with her.

I slowly turned my head back. I tasted copper.

"Do you feel better?" I asked softly.

Kenzie smirked. "Much."

I looked at Julius. He was watching, arms crossed. He approved of this.

"Get out," Julius said.

I nodded. "Gladly."

I walked to the elevator. As the doors closed, I let a small, cold smile play on my lips.

They thought they had humiliated me. They didn't know that while Kenzie was posturing, my phone had been cloning the localized server.

I had just downloaded ten years of financial records, illegal trade deals, and the original blueprints.

And before I left my office, I had dropped a small, silver USB drive behind the server rack.

The Trojan Horse was in the city.