All Chapters of Red Wolf's Guardian: Chapter 31 - Chapter 35

CoralWhen I awoke, Duncan was not in the room. I hated that he was right, but the physical intimacy was what I needed. It helped to resent me and to help me focus. I took the edge off the emotions that I was having a hard time controlling. My wolf and I were now very, very focused on one task; protecting wolves. Because at the end of the day, that’s what this really was about. It was about the red wolves and their protection over all of wolves. If the vampires were able to somehow hurt the red wolves, then it would hurt all wolves. It was not going to let that happen. None of us were.Duncan alerted me that he was doing some additional planning, so I took it as an opportunity go outside. I walked around the compound, taking in everything I could to help center myself. I approach the edge and I notice the stone barrier. The stones marked the edge of the compound. At first, I thought they were just old boundary markers—weathered rocks half-buried along the perimeter, placed there bac

CoralThe meeting didn’t end all at once. It thinned out. Chairs scraped. Wolves stood, hesitated, then moved like they weren’t entirely sure where they were supposed to go next. No one argued. No one panicked. It was quieter than that. The kind of quiet that comes after something has shifted and everyone is pretending they don’t feel it yet.I stayed where I was. My hand rested on the back of a chair, fingers curled into the wood without realizing it. I could feel the worn grooves beneath my palm—years of use, steady and unchanged. It grounded me more than anything that had just been said. At this moment, I needed to feel grounded. Ivy was doing her best to help me, but this was a lot for anyone, but it was teetering on too much for a red wolf who was just learning the true meaning of emotional control. A few wolves glanced at me as they passed. Some nodded. Some didn’t. None of them stopped. They weren’t afraid of me. They were thinking. That was almost worse. I was afraid of wha

CoralI didn’t sleep much that night. Not because I was afraid, but because I was aware. I was listening to everything around me. Taking it all in. I was becoming much more aware of the small things around me, the subtle changes in the air. It was strange to think that these changes had been happening all the time, and I just never recognized them. It is so interesting, and so scary, to think about all the little things that we miss all around us on a daily basis. The boundary sat at the edge of me, steady but present. Not loud. Not demanding. Just… there. Like a second heartbeat that didn’t belong entirely to me. Ivy and I sat, thinking about it. We felt it out, trying to see if there was a way to better understand it. I lay beside Duncan, listening to his breathing even out after he finally drifted off. I could feel the weight of his arm over my waist. Even as he fell asleep, he was still holding me tight. The security I felt with him was something that I never knew that I n