Unmatched Wife: Not His To Claim Anymore novel Chapter 151

Chapter 151

Chapter 151

RIVERA

“Okay,” she agreed. She looked at her notes, then back at me. “Now tell me what you’re actually thinking. Not the logistics version. The real version.”

I’d been waiting for her to ask that. Had been carrying the real version for most of the day, behind the logistics and the security updates and the careful attention to Louis.

“I keep thinking about Matthew,” I said.

She was still.

“Not-” I stopped, found the right framing. “Not in the way that suggests I’m threatened by him. I’m thinking about him as a factor. As a person I’ve been treating as an obstacle or a variable and not as-” I paused. “He’s a man who’s been trying to become something better than what he was. Who moved to another city for months because his son needed it. Who’s standing up in front of his whole pack to say the true thing instead of the comfortable thing.” I looked at the table. “And he’s going to walk into that assembly in six days without knowing the full picture of what’s waiting for him.”

“Klaus’s briefing-”

“Is accurate and incomplete,” I said. “He knows there’s a threat. He doesn’t know that the threat is connected to your bloodline and down to Theo by you. He doesn’t know what Thorne is actually there to do. He doesn’t know that his son might be carrying abilities he’s never been told about.” I looked at her.

“He’s doing everything right with the information he has. But the information he has is not enough.”

Bianca was quiet for a long moment.

“You think I need to talk to him,” she said.

“I think someone needs to,” I said carefully. “I think it’s most effectively you, because you’re the only person who can explain the bloodline, the inheritance, why Theo specifically is a target in a way that will make complete sense to him. But I’m also aware that’s a significant ask. And I’m aware of what revealing yourself to Matthew could mean for you.”

“The mate bond,” she said.

“The mate bond. Pack law. All of it.” I held her gaze. “I’m not telling you what to do. I’m telling you what I see when I look at the full picture.”

“You’re telling me you think I should reveal myself to my ex–husband who tried to have me killed.”

“I’m telling you I think Matthew Morrison is not the same person who made that choice. And I’m telling you that Theo is going to be in that assembly building in six days and Thorne is already in Silver Moon territory and Voss is setting anchors in the dark, and every piece of information Matthew is missing is a

1/3

+25 Bonus

gap in his ability to protect his son.”

She looked at her notes. At the anchor map she’d been building. At the careful, meticulous work of someone who’d turned their fear into something useful.

“He’s meeting Thorne tomorrow morning,” she said. “At ten.”

“Klaus mentioned that.”

“If I’m going to make contact before the assembly, it needs to be before that meeting. Thorne is going to read Matthew’s face during that conversation. If Matthew has new information and hasn’t had time to process it and settle it, Thorne will know something’s changed.”

She was already thinking operationally. Already past the question of whether and into the question of

how

“That gives us tonight,” I said.

“That gives us tonight,” she agreed. She looked at the clock. “Louis is asleep.”

“He’ll stay asleep. Klaus has two people on the perimeter and I’ll leave my phone on.”

“And you?” she said. “If I go to Matthew tonight–you’re not coming with me.”

It wasn’t a question. We both knew it wasn’t.

“No,” I said. “That conversation needs to happen without me there.”

“It might go badly,” she said. “He might react in ways that are—”

“I know.” I leaned forward, closing the distance between us across the table.

“Bianca. I’m not managing the outcome of this. I’m not positioning myself to intercept what happens or control how it lands. You go, you tell him what he needs to know, and then whatever he does with that information is his choice and you deal with it however you need to.” I paused. “But you come back here after. Whatever happens. You come back.”

She looked at me for a long moment.

“You’re not going to make me promise that,” she said.

“No,” I agreed. “I’m asking.”

She held my gaze, and I held hers, and the distance across the table felt like the exact right distance- close enough to be honest, far enough to be free.

“I’ll come back,” she said.

I breathed.

She stood, gathering her notes into a specific subset–the documents that Matthew needed to understand rather than everything she’d compiled. The practical focus that meant she was moving

2/3

Chapter 151

+25 Bonus

toward action rather than continuing to sit with the weight of it.

“I’ll need the car,” she said.

“Keys are on the hook by the door.”

She took her notes and her jacket and paused at the doorway. “Lucian.”

I looked up.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify