My Gown Had No Gems, So I Walked Out of My Own Bonding Ceremony novel · Chapter 17 of 32

Chapter 17: The Wrong Number

Jasper's POV

Gordon Winslow confessed in front of the whole pack, and I did not believe a word of it.

The elder had him stand in the great hall with the ten stones laid on a cloth beside him.

"You ordered your daughter to hide Ironwood's gems," she said. "How many?"

"All of them," said Gordon. "All twenty-two. I told Margot to sew them into the quilt."

"All twenty-two."

"Yes."

"Alpha Winslow, there are ten in the quilt."

He blinked.

"Eleven are on your middle daughter's gown, where the whole Council has counted them. One was on your eldest daughter's hem." The elder tapped the cloth. "Ten here. Where did you think the rest were?"

"I don't remember exactly what I said to her."

"You set those stones on those gowns with your own hands, year after year, in front of this pack. A man who did that would know where they were."

Gordon said nothing.

His hands were shaking at his sides, and he did not look at his wife.

Lorna stood at the end of the table with her fingers laced, and I watched her watch him.

She did not look worried.

She looked patient, and that was worse.

The elder wrote something in the clerk's ledger and closed it.

"The Council hears the Alpha's confession and finds it incomplete," she said. "Margot Winslow's mate will be asked what he knows. We sit again at Winter Moon tomorrow."

I walked out into the yard, because I did not trust myself to stay.

The Snow Moon beta was waiting by the stable, a thin man with his collar turned up.

He had been married to Margot four years.

"Alpha Coyle," he said. "A minute."

"Say it."

"I didn't know about the stones." He swallowed. "She said they were old family pieces she was having cleaned."

"I'm sure she did."

"But there's another thing." He glanced over his shoulder. "All last winter she sat up in her sewing room with a pencil and a pile of Clara's old homework. I thought it was some kind of keepsake. She was copying one letter, over and over. The small a."

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