Chapter 17: The Night Still Led Back to Him

Isaac kept coming toward me, and panic tightened around my chest so fiercely that for a second I forgot the pain in my body. I tried pushing myself backward, but the moment I moved my left foot, a violent stab of agony shot up from my ankle and nearly made me scream. I clutched it with both hands, biting hard on my lower lip as tears instantly burned my eyes. It felt as if something inside had twisted or cracked when I landed from that fall, and every slight shift only made it worse.

I had escaped the mansion only to end up crippled in the middle of a forest I did not know.

The thought was enough to make frustration rise hotter than the pain. I wanted to curse, to cry, to pound my fists against the ground and demand why tonight refused to end, but all of those emotions vanished the second Isaac stopped directly in front of me.

I had not even heard him cross the remaining distance.

His large body towered over my seated form, silver fur faintly illuminated by the scattered fireflies that drifted lazily around us. In the darkness, his eyes looked sharper, almost glowing, and the heavy gust of breath leaving his mouth touched my face. My body locked on instinct. I could not move. My injured foot had already betrayed me, and there was nowhere to go even if it had not.

I pushed myself back using my palms, scraping against grass and damp soil, but Isaac simply followed, lowering his head little by little until his muzzle was close enough that I could smell the wild scent clinging to his fur. I shut my eyes, convinced that after all the horrors of this night, being mauled by a runaway husky in the forest was apparently the next item on fate’s agenda.

Instead of teeth, something wet slid across my cheek.

I opened my eyes.

Isaac was licking me.

For several seconds I simply stared at him, unable to process what was happening while he continued enthusiastically dragging his tongue over my face as if I were some beloved person he had finally located after a long search. My fear did not disappear immediately because my heart was still pounding from the terror he had caused, but confusion slowly forced its way in.

“What is wrong with you?” I whispered hoarsely.

He answered by pressing his furry head against my shoulder.

A disbelieving laugh almost escaped me. I had been certain this beast was about to end my life, yet here he was acting like an oversized affectionate pet. My breathing gradually slowed. The murderous image I had built of him started crumbling with every shameless lick he planted on my face.

I lifted one trembling hand and cautiously touched his head. Isaac did not resist. If anything, he leaned into my palm, his thick fur cool beneath my fingers.

“Well,” I muttered, still trying to recover from the emotional whiplash, “you are unstable.”

Isaac remained shamelessly pleased with himself.

I inhaled deeply and tried to stand. The second my injured foot touched the ground, my body tilted. Pain burst through my ankle so sharply that I lost balance at once, but before I could collapse, Isaac caught the hem of my dress with his teeth and pulled just enough to steady me.

I looked down at him, stunned.

He looked up at me as though this rescue operation had always been his intention.

Nothing in this cursed night made sense.

Still, I could not stay there forever. My body hurt, the cold was beginning to settle under my skin, and every passing minute inside this forest was another minute farther from safety. I gathered what little strength remained in me and began limping forward. Isaac stayed beside me without needing to be called, his pale body moving like a silent shadow through the trees.

I did not question it. I was too tired to question anything.

The forest swallowed us again in darkness, interrupted only by the rustling of leaves underfoot and the distant groan of branches swaying overhead. My ankle throbbed with every step, and more than once I nearly stumbled, but I forced myself onward because stopping meant surrendering to this place.

I had no idea how long I walked before I noticed a warm glow flickering somewhere ahead.

At first I thought my exhausted mind was inventing things, but the light remained. It was not the weak yellow shimmer of fireflies and not the pale wash of moonlight slipping through branches. This was warmer, steadier, unmistakably man-made.

A lamp.

Hope hit me so suddenly that I forgot to breathe.

Someone was there.

Someone had to be there.

Every painful complaint from my body became meaningless beneath the surge of adrenaline flooding through me. I started moving faster, dragging my injured foot as quickly as I could while keeping my eyes fixed on that glow as though it were salvation itself. Isaac barked behind me and ran after me, but I barely registered him. All I could think was that this nightmare was finally ending.

I was finally going to meet someone who could help me leave.

The closer I got, the clearer the shape became. A man stood among the trees holding the lamp at his side, his body half-shadowed by the darkness around him. Relief rushed into me so violently that my knees nearly gave way.

But then something inside me tightened.

There was something terribly familiar in the way he stood, in the stillness of his posture, in the quiet authority that seemed to spread from him even before I could see his face clearly. My steps slowed without my permission. The hopeful pounding in my chest turned uneven.

The man began walking toward me.

When he lifted the lamp higher, the light reached his features, and the air seemed to vanish from my lungs.

It was Reign.

I stopped breathing altogether.

For one fractured second I genuinely thought my mind had betrayed me from exhaustion, because Elliott had said Reign would be gone for a week. He had said it so casually, so certainly, that I had built my entire escape on that one piece of information. Yet there he was, striding through the forest as if the darkness itself answered to him.

My body refused to move.

I stood rooted to the ground while he came closer, and with every step his face became clearer, the hard set of his jaw, the storm gathering in those blue eyes, the unmistakable anger that made him look more terrifying than he had in the auction hall. The lamp in his hand cast shifting gold across his expression, but no amount of light could soften what was written there.

I had run for what felt like forever.

I had thrown myself off a terrace, limped through a freezing forest, nearly been hunted by fear itself, and chased a light thinking freedom was waiting for me.

Only to find him.

Reign stopped directly in front of me.

I could smell him before I found the courage to lift my eyes fully, that same masculine scent that had lingered in the room where I woke, the same presence that somehow always felt too large for the space around him. My pulse beat wildly against my throat.

He looked me over from head to toe, taking in the bruises on my skin, the dirt staining my dress, the trembling in my injured leg, and the ragged state of my breathing. There was no pity in his gaze. There was something far more dangerous than pity.

Possession.

When he finally spoke, his voice was low and controlled, but every word landed on me heavier than a scream.

“I forgot to tell you,” he said, “that no matter how far you run, this night still leads you back to me.”

My lips parted, yet not a single sound came out. Shame, disbelief, anger, and fear crashed into each other inside my chest until I could not tell which one was stronger.

He took another step, close enough that if I moved even slightly, I would collide with him.

“Do this again,” he continued, his eyes holding mine with suffocating steadiness, “and I will make certain you understand exactly what it means to defy me.”

My heart pounded so hard it hurt.

I did not know what terrified me more, the threat in his voice or the horrifying realization that after everything I had risked just to get away, I was once again standing exactly where I had started.

Trapped in front of Reign.