Page 348 of A University of Betrayal

What had he done?

“If you’ll excuse me, I have a conversation to finish,” he said, and was about to leave when he paused once more. “You should dance with Emely. She’s been looking in our direction this whole time, like she’s waiting for you.”

I didn’t look at Emely, because if she really wanted to dance with me, she would have approached me by now.

Instead, my thoughts dwelled on my father’s words as he just left me standing there.

I could have stood here longer, staring into nothingness, realizing what he had done.

A pact with the Alpha. You only had one free pact. The Alpha promised something, and you... gave your soul to the pack.

My father had joined the pack.

My vision darkened, and I was forced to turn around. The man who was to blame for making my life even harder after my mother’s death. It washim.Nickolas. The Alpha of the Canadian American pack.

“Good evening, Julian.”

He hadn’t changed a bit in the last two years. He still had that look, down from above, as if he wanted to show that he was the Alpha, but, as always, his authority didn’t really get through to me.

His dark blond, almost brown hair had turned gray, as had his short beard, which looked well-groomed, albeit rough, just as I had seen him as a child.

Standing in front of me was a man of tradition, and one who was better not to upset.

With all my effort, I gritted out a “Good evening.”

“I hope you enjoy it,” he continued immediately, looking around the ballroom with emphasis. “After all, you’re on our property.”

Those words were unnecessary. Just like the next ones, which made my body tense up even more.

“Just don’t enjoy it too much. I saw you with the Quatura, with that girl with the green dress, and the women I call my enemies for a reason.”

He looked at me with mistrust. His blue eagle eyes no longer scanned the ballroom. They hung menacingly over me.

“There’s a lot of potential in you. I saw that back then. You’re stronger than other Senseque. And yet you’rewastingit. One day you will realize where you belong.”

His words felt wrong. Like he was trying to inject an untruth into me. Through manipulation.

“You forced my father to join the pack,” I pressed out, and his gaze darkened.

If I were a stranger, I would be scared now, but something inside me wanted to rebel against this man. I wanted him to know that he wouldneverbe my Alpha.

“You know that every Senseque has to join a pack sooner or later,” he said with a threatening undertone in his voice.

I wondered if he spoke to his daughter like that.

How could she be so connected to the pack? A bunch of idiots blindly following a single deluded man.

“You know what awaits those who don’t.”

I began to tremble on the inside, with tension.

He had forced my father...blackmailedhim.

Stunned, I stared at the man I had once had so much respect for. Small, barely visible scars above his eyes reflected his past within the pack hierarchy, as well as all the games he’d been forced to participate in.

I had once admired him for that. What a naive child I had been. I realized now that if I hadn’t left, he would have brainwashed me.

As painful as the thought was, my mother’s death had opened my eyes.

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