CHAPTER 13: HELP ME FORGET

EMBER’S POV

The second we leave the chaos, the world tilts.

Knox leads me through the lobby, hand possessive on my back. People part for us automatically—reporters, alphas, staff—all of them stepping aside like we're radioactive. Nobody meets my eyes, but I feel every single one burning into my skin.

I catch fragments of whispers: "That's her—" "Did you see—?" "The Lycan King—" "Her husband—"

Cameras flash. Someone snaps a picture two feet from my face and I blink, vision exploding with red dots.

We reach the elevator and Knox slams his palm against the button so hard the plastic cracks. When the doors finally open, he shepherds me inside and jabs the penthouse button. The doors slide shut, cutting off the white noise of the lobby in one clean motion.

Blessed silence.

No more questions. No more cameras. Just my reflection in the polished steel—wild hair, smudged mascara, purple fingerprints on my wrist.

My knees give out.

I slide down the wall until I'm sitting on the carpet, dress bunched around my thighs, hands trembling in my lap.

That's when it hits—the adrenaline crash, the humiliation, everything from the last hour replaying in brutal detail:

Gale's hand clamped around my wrist exactly where he always grabbed me. The sound of Knox slamming him into marble. My own voice, small and broken, saying five words that ended eight years.

Eight years of training myself to stay quiet and submissive. Eight years of telling myself it wasn't that bad, that Gale only got angry when I provoked him, that every broken glass and every bruise was my fault for not being a good enough wife.

Eight years, and I still flinched.

The shame is worse than the pain. It bubbles up until I'm shaking so hard my teeth chatter. Sapphire tries to help—she's always been the brave one, the one who swallowed down every hurt and hid it somewhere deep.

But there's nowhere to hide now. Not when every camera just captured my flinch in 4K.

Knox kneels in front of me, blocking out the overhead light. His eyes are human now but there's still gold at the edges.

He reaches for my injured wrist—slow, careful—but the memory of Gale's grip makes me jerk away instinctively, pulling my arm close to my chest.

"I'm sorry," I whisper. "I didn't mean to—"

"Don't apologize for him."

A sob escapes before I can stop it. Then another. And suddenly I'm crying—really crying—the ugly, gasping, mascara-running kind I haven't allowed myself in years.

Knox's arms wrap around me before I can pull away. Strong and certain, one hand cradling my head, the other braced against my back. He doesn't say anything, just pulls me into his chest and lets me fall apart.

I don't know how long we stay like that. Time becomes nothing. All I can do is cling to Knox, nails digging into his jacket, shivering while he holds me together.

When the worst passes, I'm left hollow. I try to pull away but Knox doesn't let me, just eases me back until I'm sitting in his lap, caged by his arms.

"Ember." His voice is low, careful. "Did he ever hit you?"

I freeze.

The question is so direct it takes me a minute to process.

"No," I say automatically.

Knox's eyes narrow. "Don't lie to me."

I can't hold his gaze. I look at my hands instead, at the half-moons where my nails dug into my palms.

"He never hit me," I say softer. "He just... he'd get angry sometimes. Really angry. He'd break things. Shout. Throw glasses." My voice gets smaller. "I'd try to clean it up and sometimes I'd get in the way and he'd—he'd grab me. Tell me to stop making things worse. That I was the reason he got so upset."

"Ember—"

"But he never hit me," I insist. "Not really. Just grabbed. Pushed sometimes. Nothing that left marks that lasted more than a few days."

Knox goes very still. When he speaks, his voice is lethal.

"That's still hitting you."

"It's not—"

"It is." His arms tighten around me. "Every time he put his hands on you in anger, every time he made you afraid, every time you had to make excuses for bruises—that's abuse, Ember."

The words hit me like acid. Abuse.

"He was just stressed," I hear myself say, automatic. "The pack, the treaty, hiding who he really was—it was a lot of pressure."

"I don't give a fuck how stressed he was." Knox's voice is pure ice. "He had no right to touch you like that. Ever."

Something dark and murderous settles in his expression. His eyes flash gold again, wolf rising to the surface.

"I should have killed him," he says quietly. "Should have crushed his throat when I had the chance."

"Knox—"

"Tell me everywhere he hurt you." His voice drops to something dangerous. "Show me the bruises, every mark, every time he made you bleed. I'll make sure he pays for all of it."

"Stop." The word comes out sharper than I intend. "Just stop. I don't want to talk about it."

He opens his mouth to argue but I cut him off.

"I said I don't want to talk about it!" My voice cracks. "Please. Just—stop."

Knox goes quiet. But something flickers across his face—pity mixed with hurt—and it makes guilt twist in my stomach.

"I'm sorry," I say immediately, softer now. "I didn't mean to snap. I just—" I take a shaky breath. "I really don't want to talk about Gale right now. I don't want to think about him or what he did or didn't do. I just want to forget."

Knox studies me for a long moment. Then he nods slowly, jaw tight.

"Thank you," I whisper, and my voice breaks on the words. "For back there. For everything. For—"

I can't finish. Can't get the words past the lump in my throat.

I reach up with trembling hands and pull him into a kiss—desperate, messy, tasting like salt and need.

He resists at first, hands on my shoulders, holding me back.

"Ember, you're not okay. You're trying to run—"

"So let me run!" The words tear out of me. "Isn't that what this whole arrangement is for? We're not here to process our trauma or cry about our problems. We have six days left and I don't want to spend them falling apart." My voice cracks, getting more desperate. "Please, Knox. Help me forget everything except you. Make it so I can't think, can't remember, can't feel anything but this."

Knox hesitates, and I can see the war in his eyes—the part of him that wants to fix this, to make me talk, to drag every secret into the light.

But I can't. Not now. Not yet.

"Please," I beg, and I'm not above begging anymore. My hands fist in his shirt, pulling him closer. "I need this. I need you. Don't make me think right now. Please."

Something breaks in his expression. He pulls me into a kiss—deeper, hungrier, all-consuming. When he finally pulls back, his eyes are dark with desire.

"We have six hours until the Christmas Summit dinner," he says, voice rough. "I'm going to take you to heaven and back in those six."

He stands, lifting me easily. My legs wrap around his waist as he carries me out of the elevator and into the penthouse.

"What about the dinner?" I manage.

"We'll make it." His mouth finds my neck. "But first, I'm going to fuck every memory of him out of your head until the only name you remember is mine."

He kicks the bedroom door open and lays me on the bed with surprising gentleness.

"Six hours," he repeats, crawling over me. "And I plan to use every single minute."

His mouth crashes onto mine and I let myself fall.

There's only Knox and the way he makes me feel like I'm worth something.

Like I'm worth everything.