Chapter 35


    The Hyenas Gather


    Exhausted, she only woke when Baron leaned over and kissed her cheek. She was on her stomach in a


    tangle of sheets, as theirst round of sex had left her. He was showered and had dressed, the fresh


    scent of his cologne still heavy on his skin after recent application. His cheeks were smooth, and his hair


    slicked back as he preferred it.


    “I have to go into the office,” he told her, stroking his hand down her spine. “Sleep, Jane. It is still early,


    and we have a function tonight.”


    She could not fall asleep again and so she rose and had a shower before stripping the over-used


    bedding off the bed and stuffing it into the hamper. She dressed in running gear, and cautiously made her


    way through the house hoping to avoid Angelique. As she reached the front door, movement on the


    landing caught her attention, and she looked up meeting Angelique’s eyes, before she dropped her gaze


    and hurriedly escaped into the morning.


    She ran to the café and knocked on the kitchen door.


    “Good morning,” James opened it. “We were beginning to worry,” he added as she stepped inside. “It


    has been a few days.” His eyes searched her for bruises. She had deliberately worn a long sleeve


    running top to hide the now yellowing bruise left by Baron’s teeth on her shoulder and so knew there was


    nothing for him to see.


    She smiled brightly. “I just couldn’t get away, I am sorry. They would stop me if they knew, so sometimes


    it’s just harder than others.”


    “They?” Patrick was in the kitchen unpacking boxes onto the shelves.


    “It’splicated,” she rolled up her sleeves.


    “Baron is... Well, that isplicated too, but not in the way you think. I don’t think he will hurt me. Not on


    purpose. But my family… and Angelique… Well, they would be furious. Baron would be too,” she added


    under her breath. “But I don’t think he would hurt me.”


    “Honey,” James exchanged a look with Patrick. “I don’t even know where to start with that.”


    “I just need to… If I can just, somehow, disappear,” she dropped her voice to a whisper. “I often fantasize


    about bing invisible, just… dissolving away, vanishing out of sight, so that no one can find me. I just


    need to be invisible and then…” And then what? She asked herself. She did not know.


    As she washed the endless stream of dishes, she thought through thest three days with Baron. Alice


    was to me for the unhappy start to their marriage, she thought angrily. Baron had been cold and cruel,


    and deliberately trying to wound her, because of what Alice had said, and perhaps that made a


    difference, but she no longer believed that her mother had been right, and marrying her true mate, her


    One, her Only, would lead to happiness.


    Life was just not that simple.


    Even if her marriage to Baron changed, there was still Angelique in the house until his mission for


    revenge was fulfilled, there was still her pack and the other packs in the city to contend with, and she


    would still be the runt, the weak, snivelling, pathetic omega of the pack. She would still humiliate and


    embarrass Baron at social functions because she would still be the subject of the pack’s vindictiveness.


    At some point, their opinions on her would prate, and Baron would look at her with distaste and


    wonder what he had been thinking in taking her as a mate and wife.


    He would curse the fate that had brought him her as his true mate ande to resent Jane as her father


    hade to resent her mother.


    She needed to escape that future, she thought, or, like her mother, she would surrender to their hatred.


    As she ran back along the road, a car swerved and deliberately drove through a puddle dousing her in its


    spray. She stood for a moment in shock as the cold, filthy water covered her head to toe, and then


    grimaced and continued towards the house. She was not surprised to see the same yellow sports car


    parked out front of the house. As she ran across thewn, other cars began to pull up.


    She groaned. Angelique had called in her friends. They were gathering out front of the house, being


    greeted by Angelique, exchanging air kisses, theirughter and exmations loud. One of them spotted


    her cross thewn, and all turned in unison to stare at her, wearing identical expressions of hostility.


    Belonging ? N?velDram/a.Org.


    What had Angelique told them? She wondered. Not the truth, of that, Jane was sure. Not without


    betraying the secrets Baron was paying the she-wolf to hide. How would Angelique exin her demotion


    from mistress and future wife to employee? Had she even said that much, or was Jane still the


    unwanted, unloved wife of Baron Western and Angelique the long-suffering mistress?


    Jane approached the kitchen entrance and found the staff busily prepping for Angelique’s guests,


    arranging petit fours and canapes on high tea tes, mixing cocktails, and filling champagne buckets


    with ice.


    “Madam,” Heathridge met her eyes across the frantic activity. “Best to be to your room quickly now. The


    hyenas are gathering, and it will not be pretty.”


    The kitchen staff sniggered, and for once, it was not Jane beingughed at, but included in the joke, a


    part of the pack, rather than the subject of its vitriol. Here, it was Angelique who was reviled and hated,


    not Jane.


    This is what it felt like, she thought, to be included rather than an outcast.


    Baron’s office was closed when she snuck past it on her way to the back stairs. She wondered if he were


    in it, or whether he had gone to the glossy tower in the city. It was impossible to know. She crept up the


    servant’s stairs and along to her room. There was no one in it. She closed her door and pushed a couple


    of the armchairs against it to discourage attempts of entry, before showering quickly and dressing in


    casual clothes.


    She sat on the couch with herptop and studied, managing to regain lost ground. She did the practice


    test and had begun the final assignment when the door handle turned, and the furniture lurched.


    Baron’s muttered curse had her set aside herptop and hurry to move the furniture aside for him.


    “Thank f-k,” he said entering and closing the door behind him. “When your door did not open, / thought I


    was done for.”


    He crossed the room to look out the window. “They are everywhere,” he muttered and then turned to


    Jane. “Well, I guess we are prisoners, Jane,” he observed. “What is it that you are doing, anyway?”


    “Nothing,” she said guiltily as she saved and closed her file. “Nothing important,” she lied.


    He threw himself onto the couch beside her, his big body sprawling and taking up most of the space.


    “You were working very hard at it when I arrived,” he pointed out. “So, I am intrigued. I am curious as to


    how you spend your day when I am not filling it.”


    Her heart was racing. “I was online shopping,” she lied.


    “Or online selling?” His body remained rxed, but his eyes were sharp. “A notification popped up the


    other day when I borrowed yourputer,” he said. “You sold a pair of shoes. Which made me wonder


    why you were selling them in the first ce?”


    She swallowed, hard.


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