The name sounds different when it’s spoken in the council chamber instead of the quiet of a hallway or the intimacy of command drills, and hearing it framed by protocol makes my spine straighten before I can stop myself.
“Alpha Kian,” the observer says, voice level, “you’ve raised objection to integration parameters.”
Kian doesn’t answer immediately, and the silence he allows stretches long enough to remind everyone in the room exactly why he holds his position, because he has never been a man who rushes to speak when the weight of attention already belongs to him. When he finally looks up, his gaze doesn’t go to the observer or Adam or the assembled councils.
It comes straight to me.
“Sasha,” he says, and my name carries history in his voice, memory and expectation braided so tightly
