Rise Of A Shattered Luna (Natalie) by Kave Derry novel Chapter 115

Chapter 115 The Keeper’s Shackles

Chapter 115 The Keeper’s Shackles

Baron’s POV

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Thad come to give Natalie the news, to show her the weapon her own children had forged for her, but the sight that most me stopped me dead in my tracks.

Natalie was hunched over her laptop, her hair a messy curtain around her face.

Her heart was hammering against her ribs, a sound that made my own pulse skip in concern.

“What are you doing?” I asked, my voice low and filled with concern.

She bolted upright, her eyes wide and glassy with terror and before I could even process the movement, she lunged forward and grabbed my wrist. Her fingers were cold, trembling, but her grip was desperate.

I froze.

My gaze fixed on her hand clutching mine.

It was the first time she had reached for me of her own without hesitation and in that small point of contact, my chest erupted like

a supernova.

The mate–bond, usually a steady hum, roared to life, sending a surge of possessive warmth through my veins.

Raze had accepted her as a mate from the moment we first met and it’s getting harder by the day not to mate and mark her as

mine.

I forced my face to stay calm, even as my wolf paced behind of her skin until the fear vanished.

my ribs, howling for me to pull her into my arms and mark every inch

Natalie didn’t notice my inner turmoil, she was too lost in her own nightmare. “Baron, do you know any reliable hackers? Someone who can get into a private cloud drive without leaving a trace?”

I arched a brow, slowly turning my arm so I could catch her hand in mine. “A hacker? That’s a very specific request for a Sunday afternoon.”

“It’s not a joke!” her voice rose, turning urgent, almost breathless. “My old laptop… It’s still with Jensen. Every draft I ever drew, every transcript of the ancient designs, the entire Celestial series–it’s all on that hard drive. Baron, if he uses those drafts and passes them off as Sharon’s, I’m finished, even if I design something new, the world will think I’m the copycat. I’ll never be able to use my name – my real name – ever again.”

She began to shake, her eyes turning glassy.

My eyes sharpened… the rage I felt for Jensen reached a new, lethal boiling point. I had nearly forgotten the primary reason I’d come up here.

“The hacker issue can wait a moment,” I said, my voice dropping into a commanding tone that forced her to look at me. “I need to ask you something first. Something very important.”

“Go ahead,” she whispered.

Her clear gaze held mine without the usual flinch.

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Chapter 115 The Keeper’s Shackles

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I led her to a high–backed velvet chair, gently pushing her down into it so she would stop pacing but I remained standing.

“When you designed for the Nightfang pack,” I began, my tone calm but intense, “did you sign an employment contract with them? A formal scroll? A blood–oath of service?”

Natalie blinked, the question catching her off guard. “No. Jensen said… he said my identity couldn’t be exposed to the Pack Council. He told me the board at the pack was full of old–fashioned Alphas who wouldn’t understand a female Scribe working outside the traditional temple. He said I was his secret weapon and that if we kept it between us, no one could interfere with our vision.”

My lip curled in a sneer of pure scowl.

Typical Alpha manipulation… He had played on her desire for protection and her dedication to her craft, stringing her along with the “us against the world” narrative while systematically stripping her of her crafts.

I shot her a look of such sharp intensity that she shifted uneasily in the chair.

“What?” she asked, her voice small.

I bit back the urge to growl, to tell her exactly how foolish she’d been to trust a snake with her venom. But I looked at the faint,

silver scars on her

collarbone and my heart softened. She had already suffered enough.

She had been a pup lost in a den of wolves, and she only wanted to survive.

“Didn’t you realize,” I said, my voice tight with suppressed anger, “that without a contract, your rights weren’t protected at all? Under the laws of the pack, if you aren’t on the ledger, you don’t exist. You were just a worker in his pack, Natalie.”

Her shoulders slumped, the fire leaving her eyes. She looked small in the large chair, “I know,” she muttered, her voice thick with shame.

She looked down at her lap, unable to meet my eyes. “At the time, I believed he was my savior… My light… He was the only family had left after I was thrown out, the only love I knew. I watched him fight for control of the pack, watched the other Alphas try to tear him down. I thought I was helping him build a future for us.”

The word “us” tasted like ash in the air.

“I was young and stupid,” she added, her fingers knotting together.

My jaw tightened until the muscles ached.

Seeing her so embarrassed, so thoroughly defeated by her own past kindness, made Raze roar in anger.

“Listen to me,” I said, kneeling so I was eye–level with her, forcing her to see the look on my face. “Since you never had a formal employment relationship with the pack and since they never paid you a wage or put you on the Pack’s tax rolls then all your designs remain your independent property. They are your designs. Jensen has no more right to them than a common thief.”

She looked up, a spark of hope flickering in the depths of her gold–flecked eyes. “Really?”

“Really. But I need to know the extent of the damage. Did you at least sign an authorization or an exclusivity contract with Jensen personally? A private bond?”

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