22. The Aftermath of Fire

The master suite felt different that night.

The fireplace was roaring, casting long, dancing shadows across the velvet curtains and the mahogany furniture. For the first time since I had been traded to this house, the air didn’t feel heavy with secrets. It felt light. It felt like victory.

I stood on the balcony, the cool Mediterranean breeze pulling at my silk robe. Below, the fires of the pack were still burning, the sounds of celebration echoing up from the olive groves. They were singing ancient songs, melodies of blood and moon that I finally understood.

Girard stepped out behind me. He had showered, his skin smelling of cedar and the expensive soap I liked. He didn’t speak; he just wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me back into the furnace of his heat. He buried his face in the crook of my neck, his stubble grazing my skin.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” he murmured, his voice a low, vibrating rumble. “You could have been lost in that void, Arielle.”

“I was never lost,” I said, leaning my head back against his shoulder. “I had the link. I could hear you the whole time, Girard. You were the only thing that was real.”

He turned me around in his arms, his eyes dark with a mixture of pride and a lingering, desperate hunger. The trial had done more than prove my worth; it had solidified the bond until it was a physical weight between us. Every breath he took, I felt in my own lungs. Every beat of his heart was a drum in my own chest.

“I spent my whole life fearing the beast,” he whispered, his hand sliding beneath the silk of my robe to find the warm skin of my thigh. “I thought a mate would be a weakness. A way for my enemies to hurt me. But you… you’re the blade, Arielle. You’re the one who keeps the beast focused.”

“Is the beast satisfied?” I asked, my fingers tangling in his hair, pulling him down toward me.

“Never,” he growled.

He picked me up, his strength effortless, and carried me to the bed. The lovemaking that night wasn’t like the desperate, frantic encounters of the war. It was slow, a deliberate worship of the body and the soul. Through the link, the pleasure was magnified—a feedback loop of sensation that left us both gasping. I felt his absolute devotion, his dark obsession, and the way he viewed me: not as a human, but as his equal.

In the quiet aftermath, as the moon began to set, Girard held me close. The fire had burned down to embers, but the heat between us was eternal.

“The Morettis will try to rebuild,” I said softly, my eyes drifting shut. “And the Syndicate… there are still those who want the serum.”

“Let them try,” Girard said, his voice firm and steady. “We aren’t the prey anymore. We’ve rewritten the laws of the hunt.”

But as I drifted toward sleep, I felt a strange, cold flicker at the edge of the bond. It wasn’t Girard, and it wasn’t the pack. It was a distant, clinical presence—a ghost in the machine.

Someone was still watching.