Ch. I Refuse to Be Your Luna 121 I Refuse to Be Your Luna 121

Chapter 121 The Name In The Ledger

Lady Flourish’s POV

22

Finished

Mira laid it all out plainly, piece by piece, like she was giving a report to the council rather than sitting in a private suite at dawn.

“Lydia arranged it through a hired waiter at last night’s welcome mixer,” she said. “The plan was to slip Damian a drink laced with an aphrodisiac before the family dinner even started. Selene was supposed to be waiting in a reserved suite when it hit him.”

I felt my stomach twist. “So the wine at dinner wasn’t Lydia’s only attempt.”

“It wasn’t even her first,” Mira confirmed. “It was her backup. The mixer plan failed before it started Damian never touched the drink meant for him. But Selene didn’t know that. She went to the room exactly as instructed.”

–

Beside me, Damian’s jaw was set hard enough that I could see the muscle working beneath his skin. “And instead of me, a stranger walked in with a key to the same room.”

“Beta Corwin Ashdown,” Mira said. “Mated, senior trade liaison for the Silver Moon pack’s southern office. According to hotel staff, he claimed the room under a mix-up with reservations. Whether that’s true or another layer of this mess, I haven’t confirmed yet.”

I picked the second sheet of notes back up, scanning the details Mira had gathered. Ashdown’s title. His pack affiliation. His office.

Something in the back of my mind stirred, quiet and insistent — the same feeling I got whenever a column of numbers didn’t quite balance the way it should.

“Corwin Ashdown,” I repeated slowly.

“You know him?” Damian asked.

“I know the name.” My pulse quickened as pieces I’d been chasing for weeks suddenly threatened to click into place. “Mira, can I see your tablet? I need to check something.”

She handed it over without hesitation. I pulled up the encrypted folder I kept for the silver moon invoice discrepancies – the investigation I’d been quietly running at F-Tech since three shipments of processed goods had come back short on returns, with paperwork that never quite matched what left the warehouse.

I typed the name into the search field with shaking fingers.

Three results populated instantly.

1

11:41 Thu, Oct 1

Chapter 121 The Name In The Ledger

22

Finished

Corwin Ashdown. Listed as the authorizing signature on two of the three flagged invoices. Listed again as a contact liaison on a shell account that had quietly siphoned funds through a series of vague “consulting adjustments” over the past four months.

My breath caught in my throat.

“Flourish?” Damian’s voice was low, careful. “What is it?”

I turned the tablet toward him slowly, watching his expression sharpen the moment his eyes landed on the highlighted name.

“He’s not just some trade official who wandered into the wrong hotel room,” I said quietly. “He’s the man I’ve been trying to catch for weeks. He’s been quietly stealing from F-Tech.”

The room went very still.

“You’re certain,” Damian said. It wasn’t quite a question.

“His signature is on the paperwork,” I said. “His name is buried under a shell account I couldn’t trace back to a real person until right now. I’ve spent a month wondering who was skimming from those shipments, and last night, Selene walked directly into his hotel room without either of us even trying.”

Damian’s eyes darkened, his wolf audibly rumbling low in his chest. “Then Selene’s disaster wasn’t just bad luck.”

“No,” I said slowly, the full shape of it finally settling into place. “I don’t think it was luck at all.”

I thought back to Karl’s crest etched into the broken vial from the dinner. I thought about Ashdown’s name buried under months of careful financial cover-up. Two separate threads, tangled together in ways that felt far too coordinated to be coincidence.

“Someone is using Lydia’s family to create chaos on one side,” I said, “while quietly bleeding my company dry on the other.”

Damian rose from the bed, already reaching for his shirt, his entire demeanor shifting into something sharp and dangerous. “Then it’s time Beta Corwin Ashdown answered a few questions himself.”

Mira straightened immediately. “I’ll have him brought in for questioning within the hour.”

“No,” Damian said, his voice dropping into something colder than I’d ever heard from him. “Don’t bring him in yet. I want to know exactly who he answers to first.”

He turned to look at me, and for the first time since the fever had broken, I saw something besides guilt behind his eyes. I saw a plan forming.

11:41 Thu, Oct 1

Chapter 121 The Name In The Ledger

Finished

“Because I don’t think Corwin Ashdown is the one pulling these strings,” he said quietly. “I think he’s just the first name we were meant to find.”

Nothing prepared me for this but I guess with how my life has been going, there’s nothing really new under the sun anymore.

All of these mysteries? Is there an end?

68

B

3/3

11:41 Thu, Oct 1

1 Refuse To Be Your Luna