The climb through Aldo's bedroom window was muscle memory now—a skill her brother taught her years ago when he'd first discovered this particular route of rebellion.
"See, Ray?" he'd whispered that night, demonstrating how the oak tree's branches created a perfect ladder to his second-floor window. "Mom and Dad think we're trapped up here like Rapunzel, but we've got options. We always have options."
She'd laughed then, called him dramatic. Asked what thirteen-year-old needed a secret escape route from their own house.
Now she understood. Sometimes you need to leave. Sometimes you need to return. And sometimes you needed to do both without anyone knowing you'd been gone at all.
Reina landed softly on Aldo's carpet, her knees absorbing the impact with practiced ease. She straightened slowly, her body protesting every movement. The adrenaline that had carried her through the night was wearing off, leaving behind a bone-deep ache that made her want to collapse right there on the floor.
But she couldn't just yet.
The room was dark, illuminated only by the faint pre-dawn light filtering through the curtains. However, even in darkness she knew her way around this room so it was more than enough. Everything was exactly as Aldo had left it. His unmade bed was to her left, reading desk by a window corner, bathroom and dresser to her right. A few drawers were overflowing with clothes, bottles of colognes, and body creams and deodorants were scattered on top of the dresser along with a half-eaten bag of cheetos.
Her throat tightened, but she forced the emotion down as she struggled out of her disguise. The fake mustache came off first, peeling away from her swollen upper lip with a sting that made her wince. Then the theatrical eyebrows, the cheap wig, the baseball cap. Each piece felt like evidence of her failure, physical reminders of how spectacularly her plans had failed.
She'd walked into Club Pita with one clear objective—to kill Ruiz Souza. To put a bullet between his eyes and watch the life drain out of him the way it had drained out of Aldo. She had her shot, but she missed it.
That first shot, the one that mattered, the one that should've ended everything, had gone wide, catching his hand instead of his skull. And then she'd been beaten to a pulp. His friends had been on her, fists and boots raining down until she couldn't tell which parts of her body hurt most. The humiliation of it burned hotter than any bruise. She'd been so damn close, yet impossibly far away.
Capping it all, he recognized her.
That moment replayed in her mind like a horror film stuck in a loop. The way his eyes had widened in surprise, then narrowed in understanding. The way his body stiffened on top of her as he finally felt the softness of her feminine body through the horrid disguise. But it was the way he'd called off his friends, stopped them from attacking her and then told her to go that irked her the most. The bastard had shown her mercy.
Mercy—the same one he didn't show Aldo.
The memories burned like acid in her mind. Too raw, too uncomfortable, too unfair.
She shoved the disguise into a plastic bag, cramming it down with more force than necessary. Then the clothes followed—the oversized hoodie that hid Club Pita's waiting uniform, then the uniform—masculine trousers, a white shirt, and a bow tie, and then the binding she'd worn to flatten her chest. All of it went into the bag, which she then tied shut with vicious efficiency and stuffed into the back of Aldo's closet, behind the boxes of old textbooks and outgrown clothes their mother hadn't been able to bring herself to sort through yet.
She'd burn it all later in the day, when she could think clearly. For now, she needed to deal with the more immediate problem—her face.
Reina caught her reflection in Aldo's dresser mirror and flinched. Her left eye was swelling shut, the skin around it already darkening to a deep purple. Her lip was split, and crusted with dried blood. There were bruises blooming along her jawline, her cheekbone, and the side of her neck. She looked like she'd been hit by a car.
Her hands were shaking as she pulled open Aldo's bottom drawer—the one he'd always kept locked when their parents were around but had shown her the contents years ago. "Just in case," he'd said. "You can't heal like I can, Ray. So if you ever get hurt and can't explain it to Mom and Dad…"
The drawer was full of small glass vials, each one containing a glowing amber liquid that seemed to pulse with its own internal light. Healing potions from the pack Shaman, stockpiled by a brother who'd known his wolfless twin sister was fragile in ways he wasn't. Who'd worried about her even when he was making terrible choices, hanging out with boys who would eventually kill him.
Reina grabbed one of the vials with trembling fingers, uncorked it, and downed the contents in one swift gulp. The taste was exactly as she remembered—earth and copper and something indefinably bitter that made her tongue curl. But the effect was immediate.
Warmth spread through her body like liquid sunlight, chasing away the ache in her ribs, smoothing the sharp pain in her jaw. She could feel her split lip knitting itself back together, the swelling around her eye receding, the bruises fading from purple to yellow to nothing at all. Within minutes, her reflection showed an exhausted but unmarked face. No evidence of the violence. No proof of her failure.
If only the internal wounds healed as easily.
She pulled out one of Aldo's oversized t-shirts—faded black with some band logo he'd loved—and a pair of joggers. The fabric was soft against her healing skin, and more importantly, it smelled like him. She was pulling it over her head when her phone buzzed.
She glanced at the caller ID, and her heart lurched—Franco Oliveira was calling. She'd left him at the club, told him to go home, and promised she would get out safely. And she had, technically. But "safely" was a relative term when you'd just attempted murder and gotten your ass handed to you in the process.
She answered on the second ring, bringing the phone to her ear as she sank onto Aldo's bed. "Franco—"
"Don't." His voice was sharp, cutting. Angry in a way she'd rarely heard from him. "Don't you dare 'Franco' me right now."
She could hear the sound of a car door slamming in the background, footsteps on gravel. He was just getting home to the Brasa Pack settlement.
"You lied to me." He continued, each word clipped and precise. "You said you just wanted to talk to him. You said you needed closure, needed to look him in the eye and ask him why. You said you only needed me to get you in because security wouldn't let you past the door. That was all bullshit, wasn't it?"
Reina's jaw tightened. "I'm sorry I lied. But I'm not sorry for what I tried to do."
"Of course you're not." His laugh was bitter, humorless as a door slammed quietly in the background. "Because that would require you to think about literally anyone other than yourself."
"That's not fair—"
"Isn't it?" His voice dropped to a bitter whisper. " Tell me, Reina, what was your plan after you shot him? After you killed him in a crowded nightclub in front of dozens of witnesses? Were you just going to walk out? Surrender to security? Let his friends beat you to death before the cops arrived?"
"I—"
"You don't have a plan. You walked in there ready to die, didn't you? Ready to trade your life for his and call it justice."
The accusation hung in the air between them, and Reina found she couldn't deny it. Because he was right. She hadn't thought past pulling the trigger. Hadn't cared what happened after, as long as Ruiz was dead.
"Nobody was doing anything about it," she said quietly, her free hand curling into a fist against Aldo's comforter. "The police questioned them and let them go. The case is going nowhere. Aldo's body is already rotten in the grave, and those boys are still walking around like nothing happened. What was I supposed to do, Franco? Just sit here and wait for justice that's never coming?"
"So you decided to get yourself killed instead?" His voice cracked. "You decided that was the better option? Did you think about your parents at all? Did you think about what it would do to them to lose both their children? Your mom rarely gets out of bed as it is, and your dad has a heart condition. But sure, Reina, your revenge was more important than—"
"Don't talk to me about my parents!" The words exploded out of her, sharp and defensive. "Don't you dare act like you care more about them. I told you about them, you don't get to throw my words back at me. I'm doing this FOR them, Franco. I'm doing this for Aldo, because someone has to—"
"You're doing this for yourself," Franco shot back. "You're doing this because you can't accept that sometimes bad things happen and there's nothing you can do about it. You're doing this because feeling angry is easier than feeling sad."
Reina opened her mouth to argue, but no words came. Her throat felt tight, her eyes burning with tears she refused to shed.
"And what about me?" Franco continued, and now his voice was shaking. "Did you think about me at all? What happens to me if the police see tonight's security footage and see that I was the one who let you into the club? That I held the door open while you snuck in with a gun to commit murder? I'm an accessory, Reina. I'm an accomplice. My job is gone at minimum. At worst, I'm going to jail. Did that even cross your mind?"
It hadn't. God help her, it genuinely hadn't. She'd been so focused on Ruiz, on the gun, on finally making someone pay for what happened to Aldo, that she hadn't considered the consequences for anyone else.
"Franco, I—" she started, but the words died in her throat.
What could she say? That she was sorry? She'd already said that, and it clearly wasn't enough. That she'd make it right? How? The damage was done. A camera might've captured them together, recording her failure in high definition for anyone to see.
The silence stretched between them, heavy with everything unsaid. Reina pressed her palm against her eyes, trying to hold back the tears that were threatening to spill over.
"I'm sorry," she finally whispered. "I'll take the blame for everything. If it gets to that point, I'll take the blame…I just couldn't stand it anymore, Franco. It's been very hard."
"Let the pack handle this matter, Ray. I'll speak to my dad, I'm sure he'll—"
He stopped abruptly.
Deliberate footsteps echoed in the background, but other than that, Reina heard nothing more. She pulled the phone away from her ear to check the screen. The call was still connected.
"Franco? Hello?"
She frowned. "Can you hear me?"
"Good evening, Reina."
The voice that came through the line wasn't Franco's
It was deeper, older, carrying an authority that made her spine go rigid. She knew that voice—every student at Souza High did. Principal Benson Oliveira.
"G—good evening sir," she stammered, her mind racing. How long had he been there? What had he heard? Werewolves had supernatural hearing—he could've been standing ten feet away and caught every word of their conversation.
"It's quite late," Oliveira continued, his tone perfectly polite and utterly cold. "Franco needs to get to bed. You should too."
"Yes, sir. I—"
The line went dead.
Reina stared at her phone, her heart hammering against her ribs. The call had ended. Principal Oliveira had taken Franco's phone, spoken exactly two sentences, and hung up. Which could mean he'd heard everything. Her involvement, Franco's involvement, his rebuke. . .
Hopefully, he realizes his son was tricked, and doesn't get mad at him. But what about her?
What would Oliveira do? He was the Beta of the Brasa Pack, but more importantly, principal of Souza High—a school owned by the Souza family. He was loyal to them just as much as he was to the pack, but where does that leave her? She wanted to call back, to explain, but what good would that do? Her father was an Elder in the pack, so he would definitely inform him along with a stern warning for him to keep his daughter away from his son, no doubt.
She set her phone down with a sigh and curled onto her side on Aldo's bed, pulling his blanket up to her chin. The fabric still smelled like him—that mixture of cologne and laundry detergent and something uniquely Aldo. She buried her face in his pillow, and the tears finally came. They fell hot and silent, soaking into the fabric. Her shoulders shook with sobs she tried desperately to muffle, terrified of waking her parents or grandmother down the hall. She cried for Aldo, for the justice she'd failed to deliver, for Franco who's probably being interrogated by his father right now, paying the price for her recklessness.
"I'm sorry," she whispered into the darkness, into the ghost of her brother's presence that still lingered in this room. "I'm so sorry, Aldo. I had him. I had the shot, and I missed."
Her voice cracked, breaking into another sob.
"I failed you. I got Franco in trouble, got beaten like a dog and Ruiz—God, Ruiz spared my life. He didn't have any right to do that when you're dead because of him."
The tears came harder now, her body shaking with the force of her grief, rage and shame.
"But I swear to you," She choked out, her fingers curling into fists around his blanket. "I swear I'll try again. It'll be better next time. More carefully planned. More thorough. I won't fail. He'll die, Aldo. They all will."