Chapter 4

WRENLEY

By six in the morning, my entire life is sitting on a freezing concrete curb in three black trash bags.

I packed them by the light of my phone screen so I wouldn't have to turn on a lamp I no longer pay for. The first bag is clothes. The second is my swim gear, which is the only thing I own worth more than the bag itself. The third is everything else—some books, a phone charger, and a dead potted plant I kept meaning to water and apparently couldn't bring myself to leave behind.

I am sitting on the icy sidewalk next to the dead plant, and I am losing the war inside my own body.

The Pacific coast morning air is hovering somewhere around forty degrees, but the chill sinking into my bones has nothing to do with the weather. It’s the Fade. Without the proximity of a pack, and without the bond I rejected, my body cannot regulate its own temperature. My teeth are chattering so violently my jaw aches.

Shift, the dying wolf in my chest begs, her voice a ragged, desperate whine. Give me the fur. Let me keep us warm. Shift.

"No," I whisper through cracked lips, wrapping my arms tighter around my knees.

If I shift here, on a public street, someone will see. Animal control will be called. Cassian’s pack will hear the whispers of a rogue wolf in a human city, and they will come for me. I will freeze to death as a human before I let them drag me back to a life in a cage.

I close my eyes, fighting the violent tremors shaking my spine, trying to calculate how many miles I have to walk to find a 24-hour laundromat I can hide in.

Then, a pair of headlights sweeps across the dark street, blinding me.

The car doesn't just drive past. It slows down, the tires crunching against the frost-covered asphalt, and stops idling right in front of me.

My heart leaps into my throat. I push myself up against the brick wall of the building, my muscles coiled and ready to run, despite the agonizing pain in my joints.

The driver’s side door opens. A tall, broad-shouldered figure steps out into the dim streetlight.

It’s Aurel.

He is wearing gray sweatpants and a dark hoodie, his hair a chaotic mess like he just rolled out of bed. He looks at me sitting on the concrete then at the three trash bags and dead plant.

For a second, he just stands there, completely still.

I can see the exact moment something shifts inside of him. The easy-going, golden-boy charm I’m used to seeing on his face completely evaporates. His jaw hardens. His brown eyes darken, snapping onto me with an intensity that is so heavy, so fiercely protective, it makes the breath catch in my throat.

"What are you doing out here?" he demands, his voice dropping into a rough, commanding register I’ve never heard from him before.

"I'm a creep," I deflect, my teeth still chattering uncontrollably. "I love watching people go about their day while I sit here homeless."

He doesn't smile at the joke. He closes the distance between us in three long strides. The moment he is within arm's reach, his scent washes over me.

Instantly, the agonizing, freezing pain in my bones recedes. The dying wolf inside my chest lets out a long, shuddering sigh of relief, pressing herself as close to the surface of my skin as possible, greedy for his proximity.

It takes everything I have not to lean forward and bury my face in his chest just to stay warm.

"How long have you been sitting out here in the freezing cold?" Aurel asks, his eyes scanning my shivering frame. His hands flex at his sides, like it is taking a massive amount of physical restraint not to reach out and grab me.

"I'm waiting for someone," I lie. It’s the fastest excuse I have.

"No, you're not." He doesn't even hesitate. He walks straight to my pile of belongings, pops the trunk of his car with his key fob, and grabs the heaviest trash bag. "Get in the car, Wrenley."

"I am not going to your place, Aurel." I try to stand up, but my frozen legs betray me. I stumble, my knee buckling.

Aurel drops the bag. He catches me by the elbow before I hit the pavement. The spark of electricity that shoots up my arm is undeniable. I gasp, my eyes flying up to meet his. He feels it too. I know he does, because his pupils are blown wide, and a low, rumbling sound vibrates deep in his chest—a sound that is terrifyingly close to a growl.

Does he know? I panic, my heart hammering. Does he know what we are?

But he just blinks, shaking his head slightly like he’s trying to clear a fog. He doesn't let go of my arm.

"We have a guest room downstairs," he says, his voice thick and breathless. "It has its own bathroom. Nobody will bother you. And I need my Con Law tutor to not die of hypothermia. So get in the car."

It’s the worst manipulation attempt I’ve ever heard. But because I am literally freezing to death, and because my wolf is currently threatening a mutiny if I walk away from my second-chance mate, I don't have a choice.

I let him load my trash bags into his trunk.

Aurel’s house is massive. It’s a beautiful, sprawling craftsman near campus with thick carpets, silent doors, and enough square footage to house an entire pack.

He leads me to the downstairs guest room, hands me a towel, and tells me to sleep.

The second the door clicks shut, I collapse onto the plush mattress. The sheets smell faintly of him. My wolf purrs, curling up in the scent, and for the first time in an entire year, I pass out without keeping one eye open for an attack.

When I wake up, the room is flooded with afternoon sunlight.

My stomach gives a violent, hollow growl. I haven't eaten in twenty-four hours, and a werewolf metabolism burns through calories twice as fast as a human's. I drag myself out of bed and follow the smell of food down the hallway, padding barefoot toward the kitchen.

I walk through the doorway and freeze dead in my tracks.

Standing at the kitchen island, pouring milk into a bowl of cereal, is Jerry. He looks up. His eyes widen in surprise. "Hey. Swim team, right? From the party." He tilts his head, a charming, easy smile spreading across his face. "You're the new roommate?"

I can't speak. My brain is doing the math, and the math is a nightmare.

The guy I made a deal to win over. The guy I was planning to use as a shield against my dangerous attraction to Aurel. He lives here. He lives exactly twelve feet down the hallway from the bedroom I just slept in.

I am staring at Jerry, completely paralyzed, when I feel the air in the room shift.

I don't even have to turn around. My wolf senses him instantly. Aurel has just come down the stairs. He steps into the kitchen doorway behind me, a towel draped over his shoulder, his hair damp from a shower.

I watch Aurel look at Jerry. Then, I watch his eyes drag back to the expression on my face.

I can see the exact moment the realization hits him. I see him put it together. He realizes exactly who I meant when I asked for dating advice in the basement. He realizes the guy I want to win over lives across the hall from the room he just moved me into.

Aurel goes completely, deathly still.

He doesn't say a word. He just stands in the doorway, staring at me. And the look in his dark eyes isn't golden-boy charm, and it isn't friendly Roommate concern.

It is dark, possessive, and dangerous.