We turn and look over at the hotel, and he releases a frustrated breath.

“Violet almost has a good idea. She just doesn’t realize the true depravity lurking inside Idun,” he says in deflection, as I watch movement stir in the house, even though the occupants remain quiet—aside from Tom and Violet, who loudly discuss which walls need to be opened up.

“A neutral haven for omegas, charged and legalized by the alpha Simpleton collection she’s recently acquired, and aided by Arion’s best beta. It’s the sort of ideology that will only break her heart when Idun uses it all against her to do just that. Idun may as well have said as much before she strutted off like she was untouchable,” I add, as Violet comes out with Bobo on her heels.

She’s carrying a small bag of trash. He’s carrying two overflowing, fifty-gallon trashcans.

She pauses at the street, and as they drop the trash curbside, her eyes coming up and landing on us. She gives us a small wave.

“All good?” she calls out.

Emit makes a gesture with his hand that signals all’s well, and she returns the gesture with a lazy thumbs-up, before heading back inside with Bobo lumbering at her side, instead of behind her. She even slows down to get behind him when she sees he’s trying to hurry in front of her to keep us from being at his back.

It’s all done so subtly that I wouldn’t have noticed if Idun hadn’t already planted the seed in my head. Violet doesn’t need her eyes opened, though; she already knows we’re monsters.

And they’re going to tell her just how terrible we all really can be.

“Fucking hell. Things are changing too fast,” Emit states, echoing thoughts too similar to my own.

“We focus on Idun for now. We need to know when her first move is coming before it actually comes,” I tell him, as a text comes through from Damien, giving me Idun’s current location.

“Now that she’s made her entrance, it won’t be long before the entire monster world is on edge,” Emit states flatly, as Avery crosses the street to join me.

Just as Avery reaches me, I tell him, “Call in more men. Violet is now your only priority for the foreseeable future.”

My phone goes off with a text from an unknown number with a link attached. I click the link, and it immediately takes me to a live video of Idun walking into a house. The screen flips to a new room as she sits down on a decadent chair that suspiciously resembles a throne.

Her eyes move to the camera, as she smiles tightly. “I figured I’d save you the trouble of having me watched. I’ll be under open surveillance, available to all alphas. Betas and omegas will also have access to this channel for their own peace of mind,” she says, causing my brow to furrow, as I cant my head.

“Full transparency is what I’m offering to everyone. I’m not asking for anything in return. For now, let’s focus on our own Houses in our own regions, as we once intended to do. My website has everything detailed there about what’s happened since my rising.”

She keeps her eyes soft, as she tries to shoot for sincerity. My jaw grinds seconds before I laugh to myself at how certifiably insane she is if she thinks this is really going to work.

“I’m not seeking penance,” she says as if we needed to know that. “I know I don’t deserve that,” she goes on. “But I’ve served my sentence, so please leave my family in peace, as we heal from the wounds some may feel are too severe.”

“Nice dig, Idun,” I mutter.

“It’s irrelevant now, because the only way to move forward is to stop fighting about the past,” she adds.

I idly wonder if she’s not weakened without that necklace, and if she’s trying to rattle us with this just to cover that up. She should be slitting throats and removing heads by now.

“And,” she says as she smooths a wrinkle out of her dress, while the camera nearest her pans wide to reveal the large room where all the skin walker alphas have gathered, fully hydrated now, “we’re about to hold our first on-camera family meeting.”

“Are you watching this?” Damien asks as he holds his phone up with a fucking-eh look on his face, while he stalks toward us.

“Of course I am,” I say as Clive, Idun’s father, steps up to the front of the table.

“As minutes-keeper of this meeting, I now call us in session.”

Idun kicks up her feet on the table, as she shuffles a stack of papers in front of her.

“Let’s begin,” she says with her red-lipped smile.

CHAPTER 6

VIOLET

Month One…

“And you really think you can do this in five months? I don’t even know if some of the materials can be here that soon, and I need longer to finish up some of the—”

Jerome’s words stop when he turns around, following my father’s line of view to me.

I pause descending the sketchy stairs to lift Arion’s bag out of the way and drop it over the edge. Jerome watches me, as his grin slowly grows.

“Why in the world are you buying and building a hotel, Violet?” he asks by way of greeting.

“I’m getting it for a steal, so it’s easier to make repairs,” is all I tell him. “When do you think you’ll have the finished outline?”