Page 19 of Heart of the Rebel Mate (Wolf Billionaire #5)

CHAPTER 19

ELARA

" Y ou're sure about this?" Zara's voice is low, edged with doubt.

I stare down at the crumpled note in my hands, the words scrawled in a careful, deliberate script. A message left behind, but not for us. A directive. An alarm bell being rung. Evidence that someone inside our ranks is working against us.

"I wouldn't say it if I wasn't sure," I reply.

The wind howls outside, rattling the windowpanes of the small, abandoned office we're in. We left the safehouse an hour ago, needing space and quiet. A place to think without a dozen eyes watching.

The note was a fluke. A lucky break. One of Ethan's men found it slipped between the pages of an old ledger, hidden but not well enough. I would have dismissed it if not for the signature at the bottom—an insignia I recognize.

A Council mark.

Someone at the meeting, someone within our supposed inner circle, is reporting back to them.

"This was meant for a drop point," I say, running a finger over the ink. "Someone inside our ranks wrote this. And it was recent—no more than a day old."

Zara exhales sharply, pacing. "Ethan vetted every single person who attended."

"Then he missed something," I say. The words feel like another betrayal, another crack in the fragile foundation we've built. Ethan is careful and methodical. If he didn't catch this, either someone has been very careful or...

I don't want to think about the alternative.

Zara pulls a chair closer and sits down, arms crossed. "Okay. We know there's a mole. We know they were at the meeting. What we don't know is who they are or what they've already told the Council."

I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees. "We have to assume the worst. If they've been feeding information back, then the Council already knows about our summit. About the alliances we're trying to build. They know our safehouse locations, our supply routes, maybe even our strategies."

Zara swears under her breath. "Then we're compromised."

I shake my head. "Not yet. They don't know we found this. If they did, they wouldn't have left the note behind."

"Unless they want us to find it," she counters.

The thought chills me. A trap, maybe. A way to make us paranoid, turn us against each other. The Council wouldn't need to dismantle us with force if they could do it from the inside.

I rub my palms together even though it isn't that cold out. "We need to be smart about this. If we start pointing fingers without proof, we'll tear ourselves apart before the Council even makes a move."

Zara nods slowly, considering. "So what's the play?"

style="text-align: left;""We wait," I say. "We watch. We lay a trap of our own."

Back at the hideout, the air is thick with unease.

The first cracks in our unity have begun to show.

People move in tight clusters, murmuring in hushed voices. Every glance is suspicious, every conversation laced with tension.

I knew it would come to this. The moment the truth got out, the moment whispers of a traitor spread, the rebellion became fragile. Trust is a fragile thing, and we are bleeding it out by the second.

And then the shouting starts.

"You want us to believe you didn't know? That you didn't let someone in who's been feeding the Council information?"

I turn toward the voices. Two men stand near the main table, faces flushed with anger. Their accusations aren't directed at me—not yet—but I know it's only a matter of time.

"We all had a part in deciding who got to be here," someone else says. "We can't start turning on each other without proof."

"Without proof?" The first man laughs bitterly. "We have a damn spy among us, and you want to sit around and wait until they feed the Council our throats on a platter?"

More voices rise. More accusations. The foundation beneath us crumbles.

I step forward, voice cutting through the chaos. "Enough."

Silence.

I take a breath, steady myself. "I understand the fear. The anger. The frustration. But tearing each other apart is exactly what they want. The Council doesn't need to infiltrate us if we do the work for them."

A few nods. Some hesitation.

"We will find out who betrayed us," I continue. "But we will do it smartly. No baseless accusations, no reckless actions. We do this right, or we lose everything before we've even begun."

It's not a promise. It's a gamble.

But it's all I have.

One by one, people step back, the argument dissolving.

Zara moves to my side as the tension settles into an uneasy quiet. She leans in just enough for me to hear. "You handled that well."

I sigh sharply. "For now."

She studies me, something like pride in her gaze. "You're learning."

Maybe. But at what cost?

Back at the safehouse, I cannot stop pacing the length of the main room. My fingers tap against my arm as my mind works through the variables. Every decision is a risk. Every move could break us. But if I hesitate, if I let fear paralyze me, we'll never make it out of this war alive.

The Council is ahead of us. They always are. But this time, we have something—an opening, a lead. If we can retrieve the files from their facility, we might have proof that they've been manipulating mate bonds, using them as leverage to control the strongest among us. To bend wolves to their will.

I can't ignore it.

I won't.

I call Zara, Ethan, and the others into a huddle. Their faces are sharp with tension, but no one hesitates.

"We're going in," I say.

The decision feels like a line being drawn in the sand.

The argument with Adrian starts the moment I step away from the group. He's been at the door, listening to everything. For a moment, I thought he could be the mole, and then killed that idea. He would never. He had proven himself.

"You're out of your mind if you think I'm letting you do this alone."

I turn to face him. "I'm not alone."

"You might as well be." His voice is a low growl.

I cross my arms, my body wound too tight for this fight, but unwilling to back down. "Adrian, you don't get to let me do anything. I'm leading this mission."

His jaw flexes. "This isn't about leadership. It's about survival. You think the Council is just going to let you waltz into their facility and take what you want? This is a suicide mission."

"You don't trust me to pull this off?"

"I don't trust the Council not to tear you apart the second you step inside their walls."

A muscle jumps in my throat.

His concern is tangible, wrapping around me like an unshakable force, but it makes my spine stiffen. I'm used to fighting. I'm used to proving myself. And Adrian—Adrian is infuriating in the way he challenges me, pushes at my decisions, makes me second-guess things I know I can handle.

He steps closer, his voice dropping to something only I can hear. "You think this is just about the mission? It's you in there. I can't—I won't sit back and wait for you to come back in pieces."

Heat sparks under my skin.

It's not just the argument. It's not just him. It's us. The energy snapping between us, thick enough to taste.

I tilt my chin up, refusing to be the first to back away. "I don't need protection."

His gaze darkens. "That's not the point."

I don't even know when it happens. When the air between us turns from sharp to smoldering. When the frustration bleeds into something else. His scent wraps around me—earth and fire, something primal.

His eyes flick to my mouth. Just for a second.

I should step back. I should say something, cut this tension before it takes me under.

But I don't.

I can't.

A rush of heat coils in my stomach, low and needy, and I hate how easy it is for my body to betray me. To want him like this, even when he's being impossible.

The ache of it, the raw pull of wanting him now, is nearly unbearable. I want him to slam me against the wall, to grab me by the waist, to crush the space between us until nothing else matters. Until I don't have to think about the mission, or the rebellion, or the knife's edge we're constantly walking.

Adrian exhales sharply, as if he can sense it—how close I am to losing control.

I force myself to step back. "We'll talk later."

A flicker of something unreadable crosses his face. He doesn't press, doesn't push.

But I feel his gaze on me long after I turn away. I can't help but smile. I feel the tension slowly leave my body after that.

Later that night, we gather around a makeshift table, poring over blueprints and exit strategies. Ethan marks weak points on the facility's security grid. Zara maps out our rendezvous locations.

The plan is tight. It has to be.

"If anyone gets captured," I say, my voice steady, "we follow the secondary protocol. No rescue attempts unless we have a clean shot. We don't compromise the mission."

I say it like it's a rule we'll follow. Like I won't rip apart the entire Council if they take Adrian, or Zara, or any of the others.

We settle on our final strategy. The room empties, one by one, people heading to rest before the mission.

I don't sleep.

I don't even try.

Instead, I lie awake, staring at the ceiling, my heart pounding with something I can't name.

Fear.

Anticipation.

Regret.

A question gnaws at the back of my mind: What if this is the last time I see Adrian?

What if I never get the chance to?—

I shove the thought away.

But it lingers.

And that night, when sleep finally drags me under, I dream of my father.

Of him falling into an abyss, and me reaching, trying to pull him up, but it's?—

Too late.

I move swiftly, pressing my back against the cold metal wall of the corridor, my heart pounding in my chest. The air inside the facility is sterile, heavy with the faint scent of industrial cleaner and something metallic—like blood. The low hum of security systems vibrates through the floors. Every breath feels measured, every step a potential disaster waiting to happen.

Ethan signals from ahead, two fingers raised. Two guards around the next bend. I nod, gripping the tranquilizer gun tighter. It's a crude solution, but I'd rather not leave a trail of bodies behind. Zara is beside me, eyes sharp, expression taut. Adrian lingers near the rear, his presence like a shadow I can't shake. Even now, I feel his watchful gaze on me, assessing, weighing.

We move as one, timing our advance with the rotations of the overhead security cameras. The blue light from the motion sensors flickers, sweeping the hall. We pause in the blind spots. I count the seconds in my head, my pulse syncing with the rhythm of our careful footfalls. One mistake and we're done for.

Ethan makes the first move, stepping around the corner as the guards exchange a few words. Before either of them can react, he strikes one with a silenced dart to the neck. The second turns, reaching for his comm device, but Zara is faster, her blade flashing as she jabs it into the side of his neck, just deep enough to knock him out. The man crumples.

I exhale. "Move."

We drag their bodies into a dark alcove, stripping them of their keycards. Adrian keeps his focus on the corridor ahead, but I feel the tension in his stance. He didn't like that I came. He didn't like that I brought him. And yet here we are, working together in spite of everything.

The vault containing the files on mate bond manipulation is three floors down. We take the service elevator, silent but tense. A red light pulses faintly over the panel. Security override detected. Someone else is here.

Ethan curses under his breath. "We need to be fast. If someone trips an alarm?—"

The doors open before he finishes, and we're met with an empty corridor.

Too empty.

We move cautiously. The air feels different here, thick with something unspoken. A set of double doors looms ahead, a retinal scanner flashing beside them. This is it. I step forward, but Adrian pulls me back, his grip firm on my wrist.

"Something's wrong," he murmurs, voice low.

I open my mouth to argue, but then I feel it too. A shift. A stillness that doesn't belong.

Then—

Gunfire.

We drop to the floor as a shot ricochets off the metal paneling. I scramble behind a crate, yanking my gun free. A figure moves from the shadows, clad in full security gear. No, not a guard. The stance is too familiar. Too trained.

They fire again, but this time, Adrian moves. He lunges, a blur of movement, closing the distance faster than the eye can track.

Then a second shot?—

And the attacker collapses.

Silence.

I push myself up, gun still trained on the fallen figure. Adrian takes the mask off his face.

Isla. I recognize her face. Former Council operative. She was in the news for quite a long time for being a wanted woman of the council.

Adrian freezes.

She coughs, barely injured—his attack had been precise, controlled. Her lip curls as she looks between the two of us.

"Well," she mutters. "That could have gone better."

"What the hell are you doing here?" Adrian's voice is dark, edged with something I don't understand.

She smirks, wiping blood from the corner of her mouth. "Saving your asses, apparently."

Zara steps forward, blade still in hand. "Why should we believe that?"

Isla shrugs. "Because if I wanted you dead, you would be."

It's a bold claim. But the way Adrian tenses tells me it might not be an exaggeration.

"We don't have time for this," Ethan says. "We need to move before?—"

Alarms blare.

Shit.

"Too late," Isla says. "Now you really need me."

Adrian curses.

The doors behind us burst open. More guards. More guns. Isla doesn't hesitate—she pulls a knife from her boot and hurls it, taking out the first one through the door.

"Move!" I yell.

We run.

Through the corridors. Down the stairwells. Dodging bullets, barely making it past security checkpoints. Isla leads us through an emergency exit I hadn't even known existed.

We burst into the night air, lungs burning. Behind us, chaos erupts as the facility locks down.

We made it.

Barely.

I turn to Isla. "Start talking."

She just smiles.

Adrian doesn't.