He's Here - Cassia

He didn’t move right away. Just stood on the other side of the threshold, half-concealed by the snow-dusted trees. The quiet, the shadows, the weight of his presence; it all hit at once, like an old bruise pressed too hard. Her body went taut without her permission.

He hadn’t changed. If anything, he looked worse. Or better. Depending on whether you measured beauty by symmetry or threat.

His hair was still that inky black, messier now, longer at the sides. That jaw, Gods, that jaw, was a weapon, all hard lines and sharp edges, the kind that could cut or cradle. A charcoal henley stretched tight across his chest, the sleeves shoved up to his elbows like he couldn’t stand to be confined. Combat pants slung low on his hips, the fabric faded and dusted with ash. Heavy black boots dug into the dirt like he’d been waiting for a war to walk through the gates.

And then there was his face.

Brutal. Unforgiving. Built for battle. The kind of face people either ran from or swore their lives to.

There was a scar now, one she didn’t remember, carved from just under his left eye to the hard line of his jaw. Not fresh, healed, but raised, pale against sun-browned skin. A mark of survival. A mark that said you should’ve seen the other guy.

But it wasn’t the scar that made her chest tighten. It was his eyes.

One gold, one storm-grey. Twin storms caught in an eternal standoff, light and dark held in delicate, devastating balance. Eyes that had once looked at her like she was everything. Eyes that had burned when he cast her out.

Now they just burned.

Cassia’s breath caught in her throat, sharp and sudden, because seeing him like this, right in front of her after all these years, was like stepping back into a dream that had already ended in fire.

He was beautiful. But not in any way that was safe. He was beautiful the way lightning is; brilliant, wild, and always one second away from splitting the world in two.

And he was staring right at her.

There was no mistaking him. Not for a soldier. Not for a guard. Not for anything but exactly what he was. Alpha in every breath, every bone, every inch of space he occupied. It wasn’t something he wore. It was something he was. Innate. Unshakable. That brutal, merciless calm that only came from knowing you could tear a man’s throat out and not spill a single drop on your shirt. And yet… that same strength had once been tender, too. Hands capable of killing had once traced fire across her skin. Had once held her like she was made of something fragile and sacred.

That was the danger of Kade.

Not just what he could do, but what he had done.

His stance hadn’t changed. All that loose, deceptive ease. Shoulders relaxed, feet planted wide, one hand resting by his side, the other flexing slowly, like something inside him was stirring. A predator waiting for a reason. One breath away from the pounce. Still Alpha-hot. Still Alpha-wrong. Still carved from smoke and scars and the kind of fury that could end worlds.

Her chest locked tight, breath caught in her throat.

His name struck her harder than it should’ve. Her body knew it before her mind allowed her to speak it. Her bones remembered him before her heart dared to. Before her heart dared to forget.

She didn’t move. He didn’t either.

Still he didn’t move. The storm behind his eyes was unreadable, unreadable in that way only Kade could be, where every flicker of emotion was buried under a mask carved from stone. His mouth parted like he meant to say something. But no sound followed. Not even a growl.

And then his scent hit her.

Gods.

Leather. Cedar. Ozone. Still that same wild that used to fill her lungs, seep under her skin, drag her under and never quite let her go. It hit her like a punch of memory she’d tried to bury beneath dirt and distance. Like blood recalled in the bones. It hurt.

He still smelled like dominance. Thunder and danger wrapped in desire. Still carried the scent of the one who’d held her heart in one hand and crushed it with the other.

Her body betrayed her first; tightening, reacting, responding to the bond that had once tethered them together like gravity. Then her mind followed, dragging every scar to the surface. She remembered how he’d looked at her the night it all ended. How his voice hadn’t cracked when he cast her out. How his words had sliced cleaner than any blade.

He’d looked her in the eye and called her nothing.

And now?

Now she was standing at the edge of his kingdom, her children at her side, her pulse a war drum in her throat, and he couldn’t turn her away. Not this time.

She wasn’t here to beg. She was here to claim.

Kade still didn’t speak. The silence around him spoke louder than words ever could. His presence was enough to fill the space between them, heavy and unrelenting. But his eyes… his eyes had shifted. No longer fixed on her. They’d dropped lower, sharp and assessing, locking onto the small figures at her sides.

Leo stood tall, too tall for his age. Spine straight, mouth a thin line, his eyes a mirror, cool, unreadable, guarded. Nova, in contrast, leaned forward ever so slightly, tilting her head like a curious wolf cub sizing up a strange sound in the dark. Her gaze wasn’t afraid, just thoughtful, calculating, as if she sensed a puzzle without knowing the edges of the pieces yet.

Kade didn’t mask his reaction. He was studying them the way a predator might study something familiar yet wrong. Not threatening, just… impossible.

And then Nova’s voice broke the tension, soft and questioning as she tugged gently on Cassia’s coat.

“Mama,” she whispered, her tone laced with confusion, “why’s that man looking at us like that?”

Cassia didn’t answer right away. Her gaze remained locked on Kade, unflinching, steady. The cold fire in her stare didn’t flicker. Let him look, let him wonder, let him circle the edges of a truth that hadn’t yet hit him square in the chest.

When she finally spoke, her voice was quiet, soothing for Nova’s sake, but honed beneath like a blade hidden in silk.

“Because,” she said, her tone deliberate, unshaken, “he thinks he knows who we are.”

Her grip on the twins’ hands tightened just enough to feel their warmth anchor her in place. The pulse in her wrist beat steady, fierce and protective.

But he didn’t know.

And when he did, when the realization carved through the fog of instinct and memory, there’d be no undoing it.