Rise Of A Shattered Luna (Natalie) by Kave Derry novel Chapter 56

Chapter 56 The Aftermath

Chapter 56 The Aftermath

Jensen’s POV

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I had waited outside Hades Pharmacy for hours… I had stood there like a beggar in the rain, staring at the locked black gates and the mocking gold lettering of the signboard, but the Witch Doctor never came.

By the time night fell, the black market was entirely empty. There was no trace of him, no scent to follow, only Hansel and I waiting for a ghost of a man.

Hansel watched me from the front seat, his expression increasingly grim. “Mr. Luke, the Witch Doctor’s movements are always unpredictable. We’ve been here for half the day, maybe we should head back. You don’t look well.”

He didn’t just mean the bruises… I looked and felt like I was shattering from the inside out.

My entire body felt like it was being devoured by a million fire ants. I had tried to find a lead, any lead, on the man who had stolen Natalie’s cufflinks, but I was hitting a wall of silence.

The cufflinks, her ashes… everything… gone.

I called Foster, demanding to know what the person who retrieved the cufflink looked like.

But Foster–a man in his prime, a man I trusted–stammered like a fool. He told me he didn’t remember… he could answer questions about the weather, about his business, but the moment I asked about the messenger, his mind drew a complete blank.

Either he was lying, or the person had done something to wipe his memory clean.

“Mr. Luke, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Foster had whispered, sounding genuinely terrified. “I have zero memory of that person; I can’t even recall their height or build. It’s like that part of the day was just… erased.”

hung up, and for the first time, I was forced to face a truth! hated: I was helpless.

“Keep this place unde

surveillance,” I growled at Hansel as he helped me toward the car. “The moment he shows up–call me; I don’t care what time it is. I want his head on a platter.”

“Yes, sir.”

My body was giving out… As we pulled away from the curb, my phone began to vibrate on the console. I didn’t even have to look to know who it was.

The persistence shows it could only be Sharon.

I felt a wave of nausea… the thought of her made my skin crawl.

“Take it,” I muttered, tossing the phone to Hansel. “Tell her the Witch Doctor didn’t show up… tell her I waited all day and passed out from exhaustion. Tell her not to bother me.”

Hansel swiped the screen, and Sharon’s shrill, annoying voice immediately filled the car, sharp enough to pierce through my headache.

“Jensen! Did you find him? When is he going to retrieve my wolf?! I can’t do without her!”

I watched as Hansel spoke, “Ms. Sharon, the Alpha waited at the black market all day without finding the Witch Doctor. He’s left

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10:52 am

Chapter 56 The Aftermath

someone to keep watch, but he has collapsed from fatigue, please focus on recovering and don’t add to his stress.”

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“What? Collapsed?” Sharon didn’t even pause to ask if I was okay. “How can that be? Wasn’t he just there? How did you not find him?! What am I supposed to do now? My wolf, Jensen! What about me?!”

I looked out at the passing streetlights, the orange glow blurred by my own tears of frustration. “Hang up,” I whispered. Hansel ended the call, and the silence that followed was the only mercy I had felt all day.

“Where to, Alpha?”

“Back to the pack house, and have Foster use the design sketches to remake the cufflinks. I can’t lose the last thing she left behind; even a replica made with gold is better than this emptiness.”

***

The pack house was deathly quiet.

I waved Hansel off at the door; I wanted the silence Natalie had left behind.

I wanted to sit in the rooms she had walked in, to breathe the air that still felt heavy with her absence.

I stumbled into the living room, laughing bitterly at the ceiling.

What a sick bastard I was… For five years I had spent sneaking around with Sharon, convinced she was the one I desired, the “true mate” the moon had sent me..

Now, she was my mate… no more hiding.

And yet, looking at her was looking at a stranger. I felt nothing but a cold, hollow irritation.

Maybe it was my imagination, but the air in the house felt strange tonight–heavier, carrying a faintly sweet, floral scent that didn’t belong here without

Natalie

But no one could get in

Without my fingerprints, and the security was top–tier.

I told myself I was just being paranoid, that the Witch Doctor’s herbs were making me hallucinate.

Eventually, sleep claimed me?

the couch. I woke groggily hours later to the doorbell–the food prepared by the maids.

I moved like an old man to retrieve the food, my joints stiff and my skin still prickling with that ghostly itch.

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