Chapter 1

Serena quickly withdrew her hand, as though she had only just noticed the candles and anniversary cake on the table.

“I’m sorry. Am I interrupting?” She lifted her phone with an apologetic smile. “I was supposed to have dinner with a colleague, but an emergency came into the clinic and he stood me up.”

Rowan barely hesitated. “Since you’re here, join us.”

I looked up at him. When we used to go on dates, even a server checking on us one time too many had annoyed him. Now he was already on his feet, pulling out the chair beside him for Serena.

She did not sit immediately. Instead, she looked at me. “You don’t mind, do you, Maeve?”

Rowan was still holding my hand, his thumb brushing lightly over my mate ring, as though inviting the woman who had saved his life to our anniversary dinner was too reasonable to debate.

I looked at the wolf shadow behind him and shook my head. “I don’t mind.”

Rowan called the server over and ordered grilled sea bass, wild mushroom soup, and a vegetable salad. Then he added, “No nuts in the salad and no black pepper in the soup. Her stomach is sensitive.”

Serena paused, then smiled. “I only mentioned that once on the mountain. I can’t believe you remembered.”

“You were in pain all night,” Rowan said easily. “It would be difficult to forget.”

They began talking about the night they had spent trapped in the valley, the aurora beyond the ice cave, and the first shaft of morning light across the snow when the rescue team finally reached them. Those memories belonged to the two of them alone.

I lowered my head and cut my food, as quiet as a bystander who had wandered into someone else’s story.

Rowan did not neglect me. He remembered that I disliked rare steak and had my entrée replaced. When he noticed that my fingers were cold, he asked the server to raise the temperature. Every gesture was familiar, gentle, and beyond reproach.

But I alone could see that the wolf shadow that had stayed at my feet for seven years had risen.

It circled Rowan’s chair, crossed the wavering candlelight beneath the table, and finally lay down at Serena’s feet. When Serena spoke of the avalanche, it lifted its head toward her. When she coughed softly, its ears pricked up.

I sat beside Rowan, yet it never looked back at me once.

On the drive home, Rowan kept answering messages. Serena’s name flashed repeatedly across the screen. When he noticed me looking, he turned the phone facedown on his thigh.

“The foundation was only just established,” he explained. “She isn’t familiar with pack procedures yet, so she has questions about some documents.”

“All right.”

My calmness made him glance at me. He took my hand and enclosed my cold fingers in his warm palm.

“I know tonight wasn’t fair to you. I’ll clear Saturday and spend the whole day with you. Just us. Would that make it better?”

His palm was still warm. At his touch, my mate mark gave a faint answering heat.

Rowan still loved me.

But his wolf had already made the most honest choice for him.

As the car entered Northcliff territory, I watched the streetlights recede beyond the window and said quietly, “Rowan, I want to dissolve our mate bond.”