Chapter 4

Wren's POV

Midnight came slower than any hour had ever come in my life.

The hall still buzzed with leftover energy long after the formal part of the night ended, pack members lingering over drinks, retelling the ceremony to each other like they had not all just watched it happen together. I spent the hours after clearing tables, my body moving on its own while my head stayed somewhere else entirely. Vivian barked orders about folding linens the right way. Celeste floated through the crowd taking congratulations like a queen taking tribute, her laugh cutting across the hall every few minutes. Edwin shook hands with council members who lingered long after the food ran out.

Priya passed by twice while I worked, each time slower than the last, watching me the way a cat watches something it has not decided whether to bother with yet. The second time she stopped.

"Enjoying the cleanup," she said. "Fitting, really. You always did belong with the dirty dishes."

"I am fine, Priya."

"I did not ask if you were fine." She picked at her nails, bored already. "I just find it interesting that you keep disappearing tonight. First outside during the ceremony. Now you keep drifting off during cleanup like your mind is somewhere else entirely."

"I am tired. It has been a long night."

"Sure it has." She smiled, the kind that never reached her eyes. "Long nights make people careless. Remember that."

She walked off before I could ask what she meant, leaving me standing there with a stack of plates and a cold feeling settling in my chest that had nothing to do with the temperature.

Maribel caught me near the kitchen doorway as the last dishes came in. "You look like you are somewhere else tonight."

"Long night."

"Mm." She wiped her hands on her apron, watching me. "You are not sneaking off to see him, are you."

My whole body went still. "Sneaking off to see who."

"I did not say a name, dear." Small, knowing smile. "I have worked in this house a long time. I know what a look means when I see one."

"There is nothing to know."

"If you say so." She squeezed my arm once and let me go.

Nobody noticed when I slipped away toward the training grounds once the last guests left.

The old barn sat at the edge of the property, unused for years except by wolves who wanted somewhere private to think. Moonlight cut through the gaps in the wood siding in thin silver lines. Kade was already inside, changed out of his formal clothes, dark shirt, sleeves pushed up. He turned the second the door creaked, like he had been listening for it.

"You came," he said.

"You asked me to."

"I was not sure you would."

"I was not sure either." I stayed near the door, arms wrapped around myself against the cold. "What did you want to talk about, Kade?"

He crossed the barn slowly, stopping close enough that I had to tilt my head to keep looking at him.

"I stood up there tonight," he said, "and promised myself to your sister in front of the whole pack."

"I know. I was there."

"I meant every word of it. Every law behind it." His jaw tightened. "And the whole time, all I could think about was you in the corner, trying not to look at me."

"Kade, do not."

"I have tried not to think about you for years. You know that?"

"Try harder." It came out sharper than I meant it. "For Celeste's sake, if nothing else."

"I know what I should do." He stepped closer, close enough that pine and rain filled the space between us. "I am telling you what I actually do. Every day. Whether I want to or not."

"That does not make it right, Kade."

"I never said it was right." He looked at me steady, no apology in it. "I am done pretending it is simple. It has never been simple. Not since we were kids climbing that oak tree behind the training grounds."

"That was different. We were children."

"And I still think about you the same way I thought about you then, except now it is not innocent at all." His jaw worked, like the words cost him something to say out loud. "You want me to lie about that? Tell you I feel nothing?"

"I want you to remember what tonight was."

"I remember exactly what tonight was." His voice roughened. "That is the whole problem, Wren."

"Kade"

"Let me finish." His voice dropped low. "I think about you when I wake up. In council meetings, when I should be listening to elders talk about border patrols. I thought about you tonight, up there, promising forever to someone who is not you."

"You cannot say things like that. Not now."

"Why not."

"Because it does not change anything." I made myself hold his gaze. "You are still going to claim her. In a few weeks, none of this will matter."

"It matters now."

"It cannot."

He reached up slowly, giving me time to step back. I did not. His fingers brushed my jaw, and something in his eyes went dark, like years of holding back had just found one small opening.

"Tell me to stop," he said. "Right now, and I walk away and never bring this up again."

The word sat right there. I did not say it.

"Wren."

"Kade, we cannot."

"I know." His forehead dropped against mine, both of us breathing harder than the moment called for. "Tell me to stop."

Neither of us moved. Then a sound cracked outside, wood splintering somewhere near the far wall, and we broke apart fast. Kade's whole body shifted into something alert and dangerous in half a second.

"Stay behind me."

The door on the far side of the barn hung open, swinging in a breeze that had not been there a moment ago. Kade moved toward it fast. I followed, every instinct telling me to run the other way instead. Outside, near the tree line, something moved through the shadows, low and fast, gone before either of us got a clear look.

"What was that," I whispered.

Kade did not answer, eyes on the tree line, body tensed like a wolf ready to shift. He stepped forward, nostrils flaring, testing air for a scent I could not catch.

"Kade."

"Quiet."

I stood frozen behind him, heart slamming, watching his eyes track something invisible through the dark. Somewhere deeper in the trees a branch snapped, and every muscle in him locked up at once, like he might tear out of his own skin without warning.

"Should we get Grier," I whispered.

"No time." He did not look back at me. "Whoever it was, they are gone now. Long gone."

"How do you know?"

"Because they wanted to be seen." His voice was flat, controlled in a way that scared me more than if he had sounded afraid. "This was not an accident, Wren. Someone wanted us to know they were watching."

He finally turned to look at me, and whatever was on his face, it was not something I had seen on him before, not once, not in twenty some years of knowing this man.

"That," he said, "was not one of ours.”