Chapter 5

Madeline’s POV

A dark blur slammed into the rogue a split second before he reached me.

I dropped to the ground on instinct, curling my whole body around my daughter, shielding her with everything I had left as the two wolves crashed into each other in the dark just a few feet away. 

The sound was awful. All I could hear was snarling, bones snapping, bodies hitting the frozen ground hard enough that I felt it through my entire body. I squeezed my eyes shut and held on, praying to anyone who might be listening that we'd survive whichever wolf walked away from this violent display.

I could hear my own heartbeat over the noise, feel my daughter trembling against my chest, and I kept whispering to her without even meaning to, saying the same useless words over and over. 

“It's okay. It's okay.”

I didn't believe them myself, but I needed to say them anyway, like saying them enough times might just make them true.

It felt like it went on forever, but it probably only lasted a minute.

Then there was nothing but silence, heavy breathing, and the wet sound of something settling in the mud.

So I opened my eyes.

Only one wolf stood there, chest heaving, body slick with blood that clearly wasn't his. He shifted back into human form right in front of me, and for a second I couldn't do anything but stare. He had dark hair, and silver eyes that caught what little moonlight made it through the trees. There was blood on his knuckles and his jaw, dripping slowly onto the snow beneath him.

"You're safe," he said, breathing hard, holding both hands up like he could see how close I was to collapsing out of fear. "He's not getting up. You're safe now."

I didn't move. I didn't trust my legs to hold me even if I tried.

"Who…" My voice came out cracked and small. "Who are you?"

"My name's Roman." He crouched down slowly, keeping some distance between us, like he understood exactly how terrified I was and didn't want to make it worse. His eyes dropped to the bundle in my arms, the expression on his face changing immediately. "Is that a baby?"

"She's mine." I held her tighter against my chest, my instincts flaring up despite how exhausted I was, despite how much I owed this stranger my life. "Please. Please don't take her from me too."

"I'm not taking anything from you," he said, his voice gentle in a way I hadn't heard from anyone in longer than I could remember. "I just saved your life. I'm not about to ruin it a few seconds later."

What I didn't know was that the man crouched in front of me, blood still dripping off his knuckles, was Alexander's half-brother. I didn't know that he'd been kicked out of Ashwood Pack years ago, that he had every reason in the world to hate the pack I'd just been thrown out of, or that him helping me might have far more to do with what I could give him than any kindness in his heart. 

All I knew in that moment was that my daughter was alive, I was alive, and for the first time in hours, someone was looking at me like I was an actual person.

"Can you stand?" Roman asked.

"I don't know," I admitted, my voice breaking even more.

"That's okay." He didn't rush me. He didn't grab me the way the guards had, or even the way Alexander had. He just waited patiently until I managed to stand up again, and then he scooped me up like I weighed nothing at all, careful of the baby still wrapped against my chest. "I've got you."

His eyes lingered on my face for a second, as if he was trying to place something about me.

I didn’t notice it then. I was too exhausted to notice anything except the warmth of his arms and the fact that my daughter was still breathing.

He carried me through the trees, and somewhere in the distance I saw lights. Real lights and buildings with windows. A place that wasn't the forest or the cold dark room they'd locked me in to give birth alone.

"This is Thornveil Pack," he told me quietly as we got closer. "You'll be safe here. Nobody's going to hurt you or your child while you're on this land."

I wanted to ask why. I wanted to ask what a stranger possibly stood to gain from carrying a bleeding, broken woman and her newborn out of a forest in the middle of the night. But I didn't have the strength left in me to form the question, let alone brace myself for whatever answer he might give.

So I let my eyes close and let myself be carried. For the first time since I'd walked into that study and seen Harper's mouth on my husband's, I let myself believe, just a little, that maybe I'd survive this after all.

I had no idea then that the stranger carrying me to safety would become one of the most important people in my life.

SIX YEARS LATER

Alexander's POV

Six long years had gone by, and I still couldn't sit across from another woman without seeing Madeline’s red hair and amber eyes that weren't actually there.

I told myself it was guilt. It had to be guilt. There was no other reason I should still be thinking about her after six whole years.

I'd been telling myself that lie every single night for six years, right before I picked up my phone, called my search team, and asked the same question I'd asked a thousand times before, in a thousand different voices, hopeful and furious and finally, mostly, just tired.

"Anything at all this time?"

The question had become part of my life. Every few days, I asked it. And every few days, I got the same answer.

Nothing.

Six years of nothing, no trace, no sign, no whisper from any contact in any pack. It felt like Madeline Dawson had simply stopped existing the night I rejected her in front of the whole pack and chased her away immediately after. 

I’d told myself so many stories about why I needed to find her. Because I owed her an apology. Because I needed to know she was alive. Because I needed to know she was safe, even if she was far away from me.

Those were the reasons I gave myself, but none of them explained why my chest still hurt every time I remembered the look on her face when I rejected her.

I never let myself think about the real reason. Some things a man didn’t just say out loud to himself even after six whole years.

Harper was still at my side more often than not, patient in a way I used to find comforting and now mostly just found exhausting and annoying. And with every year that passed, I got a little better at pretending I'd made peace with what happened that night. But I hadn't. Not even close.

Tonight, for the first time in six years, the answer on the other end of the line was different.