Chapter Three

There was nothing left for me here. There had been nothing left the moment Caelum opened his mouth on that dais.

I fought to hold back the tears but I couldn't.

I stood up from my bed and pulled out one bag. I wiped a tear and told myself, "It's for the better.” Just to console myself.

I saw Caelum's jewellery sitting on the dresser.

Then I was back there again. To the night he gave it to me.

"I want you to have something of mine," he said.

"Why?" I asked, blushing.

"I can't mark you yet and I just want you to know that I will never leave." He said it while brushing my jaw. "You'll always be by my side."

I smiled sheepishly and looked into his eyes. "You're so thoughtful and sweet."

"You bring out the best side in me," he said, as he clasped the silver necklace around my neck.

We kissed.

I snapped back.

I wiped my tears, grabbed the necklace from the dresser, and threw it out the window.

"You're a piece of shit, Caelum." I said, with so much disgust I barely recognized my own voice.

I sat down on the edge of the bed.

Why was I leaving everything behind because of a man? He wasn't worth it. But that wasn't really why I was leaving. I knew that. I had known it from the moment I found out.

"It's for my unborn child," I said out loud, to no one, to the quiet room, to myself.

I got up and went to the wardrobe to pack.

"Where are you going?"

I spun around. Aiden was standing in the doorway.

My stomach dropped. I hadn't told them. I hadn't figured out how.

"I'm leaving," I said.

The silence that followed felt like it lasted years.

Then Aiden said, "I understand." He paused. "But you should have told us first."

I sat down on the bed. He came and sat beside me without being asked.

"I was going to leave everything behind and start over," I said. "I was going to…"

"I know." He cut me off, but not unkindly. His voice was quiet and certain. "I understand how hard things have been for you. And I think you're taking a brave step."

Tears fell before I could stop them. He pulled me into his arms and held me there, and I sobbed until there was nothing left in me, until the weight of everything I was carrying finally, briefly, set itself down.

I woke up the next morning still in his arms.

"I fell asleep," I said, disoriented.

"Yes, you did." His voice was low and steady. "I stayed the whole night."

I pulled back and looked at him. "I love you so much."

"I know," he said simply.

I took a breath. "I'm going to tell Dad."

He nodded slowly. "That's good."

We were quiet for a moment. Then he said, "I'll miss you. So much."

"I'll miss you even more," I said, and hugged him as tightly as I could, like I could press the feeling into memory through sheer force.

After a long moment we separated. He cleared his throat, looked away for just a second, then looked back.

"I'm about to make breakfast," he said. "Today might be your last day here. You should eat something good."

I laughed. It was a small, broken sound. "Thank you, Aiden."

He gave me a faint smile and left.

I stood alone in my room, looking at the open bag on the bed, the empty dresser where the necklace used to sit, the window I had thrown it through.

I was about to leave everything behind. My father, my brother, the only home I had ever known and that wasn't fair to any of them.

But it had to be done.

After freshening up, I made my way to the balcony where my father was seated, staring out into thin air.

"Dad."

"My daughter." He looked up. "How are you?"

"I'm good, Dad." I paused. "I have something to tell you."

He looked at me like he already knew. "Sit. What is it?"

I sat down across from him and took a breath. "I'm leaving."

He held my gaze for a long moment without saying anything. Then, quietly. "Where?"

"New York." I'd thought about it. I turned it over in my mind for days. It was far enough. Big enough. Human enough that no pack would think to look for a lowborn wolf who had nothing left to prove and no reason to stay.

He didn't argue. He didn't try to talk me out of it or ask me to reconsider. He just said, "When?"

"Tomorrow."

He nodded slowly. Got up and came around the table and put both arms around me. I let myself lean into it for as long as I could afford to before I straightened back up.

There were things he didn't say. Things neither of us said. But his arms around me said them well enough.

I was his daughter and he was letting me go. Not because he wanted to, but because he loved me enough to understand that staying would break me in ways leaving never could.

I swallowed hard and pulled back.

"I love you, Dad."

"I know," he said. The same words Aiden had used that morning, and I wondered if that was just the way the men in my family loved. Simple and without condition.

He kissed my forehead and didn't say anything else.

Neither did I.

Some things don't need words.

The next morning, I stood in my room one last time with my bag in my hand.

I looked at my father from across the hallway. His eyes were wet. He looked back at me with a smile he was working hard to hold together.

Neither of us said anything.

After a long moment, I wiped my tears, gave him a faint smile, and walked away.

That was it. I was really leaving.

I walked out of the house and found Aiden already sitting in the truck, engine running.

"Get in," he said.

I put my bag in the back seat and then my eye caught something shiny in the grass below the window.

The silver necklace.

I walked over and picked it up, turning it over in my palm. The chain was cold and light, the same as the night he had clasped it around my neck and told me he would never leave.

"Guess you didn't mean what you said to me that night," I said quietly to no one.

I sighed, put it in my pocket and got in the truck.

Aiden drove me to the edge of Ashwood territory without a word and parked at the tree line. I got out, pulled my bag from the back seat, and turned to face him.

He looked like he was trying to hold back something enormous with nothing but his jaw.

"You call," he said. "Every week. I don't care what time."

"I will."

"And if anything…" He stopped. Looked away, looked back. "If you need anything. Anything at all. You call me first."

"Aiden." I said his name softly.

"I mean it, Sera." He said with a straight face.

"I know you do." I reached up and put a hand on his arm briefly, the way I used to when we were kids and one of us needed to be steadied. "Take care of Dad."

He pulled me in once, hard, and then let go before either of us could make it into something we couldn't walk away from.

I turned and walked toward the road without looking back.

The necklace was still in my pocket, cold against my hip.

I didn't know yet why I'd kept it.

Maybe someday I would.