Ch. I Refuse to Be Your Luna 188 I Refuse to Be Your Luna 188

Chapter 188 The Woman In The Footage

Lady Flourish’s POV

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I stared at the frozen image on Rhys’s phone while my wolf growled inside me, refusing to accept what my eyes were seeing.

Phina had just been standing across the boardroom from me, denying that she had killed my mother, and now security footage placed her inside a Stonehedge vehicle shortly before my father was found dead.

“Play it again,” I said.

Rhys looked at Damian first, waiting for some silent approval, and Damian gave a short nod before Rhys replayed the footage.

I watched Phina step out of the vehicle, pull her hood forward, and disappear toward the service entrance. My wolf recognized her scent from the boardroom, but there was something else mixed with it that I could not identify, something sour and unfamiliar underneath the perfume she always wore.

“Where did the vehicle come from?” I asked.

“Stonehedge’s executive garage,” Rhys answered.

“Who authorized it?”

He looked uncomfortable before he finally spoke. “The clearance belonged to Garret.”

My chest tightened. “Again? But Garret is dead.”

“Exactly,” Damian said, his jaw hardening. “Someone is using his credentials.”

My wolf paced restlessly under my skin. Someone had used my father’s security clearance after his death, which meant the authorization could have been created earlier, or someone still had access to his information now that he was gone.

Either way, Phina had been transported in a Stonehedge vehicle, and I could not ignore what that connection meant.

“Where is Phina?” I asked.

“Still upstairs,” Rhys said.

“Take me to her.”

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Chapter 188 The Woman In The Footage

Damian caught my wrist before I could move. “Not alone.”

“I wasn’t going to,” I said, looking at him.

His expression softened slightly. “Good.”

នយ

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We went back to the boardroom together, but Phina was no longer there. Harold stood beside the table, his face pale.

“Where is she?” I demanded.

“She left,” he said.

“When?”

“About five minutes ago.”

My wolf snarled low in my chest. “Did you let her leave?”

“I didn’t know she was going anywhere.”

Damian stepped forward. “Where did she go?”

Harold’s eyes moved between the two of us before he answered. “She said she needed air.”

I laughed, and there was no humor in it. “After Garret’s murder?”

“I didn’t know Garret was dead,” Harold said, and his face changed the moment the words left his mouth.

“He is.”

“How?”

“Someone killed him.”

“Phina didn’t do that,” he said quickly.

“You sound very certain.”

“I know her.”

“You don’t,” I said, my voice shaking now. “You thought you knew her, but you didn’t even know she was using the Voss name.”

His jaw tightened. “She told me.”

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Chapter 188 The Woman In The Footage

“When?”

“Tonight.”

“Why?”

He hesitated again before answering. “Because she wanted to leave.”

“Leave where?”

“I don’t know.”

M

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My wolf caught the scent of his fear rolling off him in waves, and underneath the fear, I could tell he was telling the truth, at least about that much.

Damian walked toward the conference table. “Where is Lydia?”

I looked around the room. She was gone too. My stomach tightened.

“She was with us downstairs,” I said.

Rhys checked his phone. “Her car just left the building.”

“She left without saying anything?”

“Yes.”

My wolf immediately grew suspicious of the timing. “Call security,” I said, and Rhys did.

I walked toward the window and tried to steady my breathing. My father’s death had happened too quickly, and now Phina had been placed in a Stonehedge vehicle, Lydia had vanished without a word, and the missing diary pages were still unaccounted for.

Someone was moving pieces around us, and I could not yet see the whole board.

I felt Damian’s arms settle around my waist from behind, and I leaned back against him without meaning to.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“No.”

His hold on me tightened. “You don’t have to pretend with me.”

“I don’t know who to trust anymore.”

“You can trust me.”

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Chapter 188 The Woman In The Footage

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I turned inside his arms so I could look at him properly. “I know.”

He brushed his thumb across my cheek. “I mean it.”

“I know,” I said, my voice softening. “You came back for me.”

“Every time.”

“I love you.” The words escaped before I could think them through, and his expression changed completely the moment he heard them. My wolf went still inside me, waiting.

Damian stared at me for a long moment before he pulled me closer. “I love you

too.”

He kissed me gently, and for a few seconds everything else in that house disappeared, the footage, the missing women, my father’s death, all of it fading until it was only the two of us.

Then my phone rang, and I pulled away to answer it.

“Flourish,” I said.

It was Mira, and her voice was trembling on the other end. “Lady Flourish, please come back to the residence.”

“Why?”

“I found something. I was cleaning your father’s study, and there’s a hidden compartment behind the bookshelf.”

My heart started beating faster. “What did you find?”

“Your mother’s belongings,” she said, then paused. “And a letter.”

“From whom?”

“I don’t know. It’s addressed to you.”

My grip tightened around the phone. “What does it say?”

“I haven’t opened it.”

“Good. We’re coming.”

We returned to the Steele Residence right away. Mira met us in the study and pointed toward the open bookshelf compartment. Inside were several documents, an old photograph, and a sealed letter.

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I picked up the photograph first. My mother stood beside Garret, and behind them was a young woman I recognized immediately as Lydia. But beside Lydia stood another woman. Phina.

My breathing stopped. My mother had known her long before Rowan ever came into the picture.

I turned the photograph over. A date was written on the back, three months before Elara’s death.

Damian took the letter from the compartment. “Your name is on it.”

I opened it carefully. My mother’s handwriting filled the first page.

Flourish, if you are reading this, then Garret has failed to keep my secret.

My wolf growled low in my throat as I kept reading.

Do not trust Lydia. Do not trust Phina. And most importantly, do not trust the man who calls himself your father.

I looked up at Damian, my heart pounding in my chest. Then I read the final sentence, and the floor seemed to shift beneath me.

Because Garret is not your biological father.

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I Refuse To Be Your Luna