Chapter 22 — My Name Is Hallie

The man from the supply wagon recognized Hallie before she recognized him. His eyes moved from Grant to her, then sharpened.

“You’re Bellamy’s mate.”

Hallie stopped. The words landed differently here than they would have at Bellamy Creek. Not because they were false.

Because they were incomplete, and he spoke them as if they explained everything that mattered. Grant stood beside her. Not in front of her.

The distinction registered immediately. The visitor looked to him as though waiting for confirmation. Grant gave none.

Hallie set the folded inventory sheet in her hand against the edge of the wagon.

“My name is Hallie.”

The man blinked.

“I know.”

“Then use it.”

A small silence opened between them. The visitor’s gaze dropped briefly toward her hand, as if a ring should have been necessary to prove what Cedar Draw already knew.

“I didn’t mean offense.”

“I didn’t say you did.”

He looked uncomfortable now.

“That’s just how I know who you are.”

Hallie understood. That was precisely the problem.

Outside Cedar Draw, Austin’s mate was not merely a fact about her. It was a category.

A place in a structure. One that other wolves could understand without asking anything else. She could feel the bond even now, stretched across distance.

Alive. Unbroken. Fate had not changed because she married Grant.

Hallie had never claimed otherwise. The visitor shifted his attention toward Grant again.

“So Bellamy knows she’s here?”

Grant’s expression stayed steady. Hallie answered first.

“Austin knows where I am.”

The man looked back at her.

“And he allowed this?”

Something cold settled in Hallie’s stomach. Not fear. Recognition.

She had heard versions of that question all her life. Who allowed it? Who approved it?

Whose authority made the choice real? Hallie straightened.

“Austin rejected me.”

“I heard.”

“He chose another future.”

The man’s expression tightened. “But the bond—”

“Still exists.”

He stopped. Hallie let the answer sit there. Hallie met the truth head-on.

The bond was alive and the visitor could know it. The bond mattered. It was one truth among several.

“Yes,” Hallie said. “Austin is my fated mate.”

The visitor glanced at Grant. Hallie finally saw the question beneath his stare. Then what is Grant?

Hallie answered that too.

“Grant is my husband.”

The man stared. Hallie’s pulse beat hard, but her voice remained even.

“Both things are true.”

“You married him knowing the bond was active?”

“Yes.”

“And Bellamy accepted that?”

Hallie almost laughed.

“You keep asking what Austin did with my decision.”

The man flushed.

“I’m asking because that bond means something.”

“It does.”

“To every pack.”

“I know.”

Hallie glanced at Grant. He remained close enough that the back of his hand was only inches from hers where it rested near the wagon. Grant stayed where he was, hands at his sides.

The visitor had to keep looking at Hallie for an answer. The answer remained Hallie’s to give. Hallie looked back at the man.

“The bond means Austin and I are mates,” she said. “It does not mean I stopped being Hallie when he rejected the life we were supposed to build.”

The man frowned.

“That isn’t how most people will see it.”

There was no malice in the statement. That made it more useful. Hallie believed him.

Most wolves would look at the mate bond and see the oldest, clearest answer available. Fated. Biological.

Permanent. Grant’s marriage to her would look like the weaker claim because it was chosen. Hallie had once believed the same thing.

She knew better now.

“Then most people can learn to use my name.”

The visitor gave a short breath that might have been amusement.

“You make it sound simple.”

“It is simple.”

“No, it isn’t.”

Hallie considered that. He was right. The fact was simple.

Living inside it was not.

“No,” she said. “It isn’t.”

His gaze moved between her and Grant again. This time, he seemed less certain what he was seeing.

“Doesn’t bother you?” he asked Grant.

Hallie felt Grant’s attention shift. He could have answered. Instead he looked at her.

Not asking permission. Reminding the man, without a word, where the conversation belonged. Hallie almost smiled.

The visitor noticed. His brows pulled together.

“She speaks for herself,” Grant said at last.

Only that. The bond, Austin, and the marriage remained Hallie’s to explain.

The man nodded slowly. Hallie picked up the inventory sheet again.

“We still need the count on the last three crates.”

The visitor looked at the paper, then at her. Business. An ordinary task waiting on the other side of a conversation that had tried to turn her into someone’s fate before it used her name.

He checked the wagon.

“Three sealed. Same count as the first lot.”

Hallie marked the line. When she finished, he hesitated.

Then said, “Hallie.”

She looked up.

“I’ll remember.”

It was not acceptance. Not fully.

He still looked puzzled by her marriage. He still understood the bond more easily than he understood her refusal to let it define the boundaries of her life.

But he had corrected himself. Hallie accepted the correction and let the rest wait. The wagon rolled out of Cedar Draw a few minutes later.

Hallie watched until it passed beyond the nearest trees. Grant remained beside her.

“You could have answered him sooner,” she said.

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you?”

His dark amber eyes settled on her.

“He wasn’t asking who I chose.”

Hallie’s attention caught on his mouth for one stupid second. She looked toward the road before the second became noticeable.

“He didn’t understand.”

“He doesn’t have to understand yet.”

“Just use my name?”

“For a start.”

Hallie nodded. Outside Cedar Draw, people who had never met her would still reach for Austin’s name first. Inside it, some called her Grant’s wife; others knew her from the work yard.

Hallie shifted the inventory sheet higher against her hip. The next person who came looking for a mate or a wife would get the same answer. Her name was Hallie.