4

POV: Serena Vale

Cold leather brushes my knee; I hover at the open door like it might bite. One breath, two. A stranger-king says my name as if it belongs in his mouth, and somehow safety feels nearer here than anywhere else tonight.

“I shouldn’t,” I murmur.

“Get in,” Kai says, quiet as a steady hand.

One step becomes two before I realize I’ve moved. Darkness folds around me, soft and expensive, a hum underfoot like a held-in growl. Door closes; noise from the parking lot snuffs out. Dim cabin lights tint everything amber—his jaw, the ink on his forearm, my hands clenched together to keep from shaking.

“Seatbelt,” he says, not a command so much as concern dressed as habit.

Click. My heart is a drum trying to keep up with a song it doesn’t know.

We glide forward. Windows hold our reflections—me, raw-eyed; him, unfathomable. No destination offered, just motion. I wet my lips. “Why… why are you doing this?”

“Because you said yes,” he answers, gaze fixed ahead, voice even. He doesn’t fill the space with more. He lets me breathe.

Silence settles, weighty but not cruel. Lyria presses her warmth to the back of my mind, tail low, ears pricked. Storm, not danger, she whispers, unsure, alert.

Knuckles still white, I stare at the faint veins on my wrist. “Where are we going?”

“Not far,” he says. “Enough distance to see if anyone keeps pace.”

My head snaps up. “Keeps pace?”

His eyes cut to mine, then back to the road I can’t see. “Someone followed you after the ceremony.”

Skin tightens; a shiver ghosts down my spine before I can stop it. “Followed… me?”

“Yes.” The word lands like a measured stone. “I watched them watch you. Two separate times. After he—” A pause, sharp as a breath he doesn’t like taking. “After that.”

My fingers curl, nails biting palm. “You’re sure?”

“Enough to put you in this car,” he says.

Air thins; lungs forget their job. “Why would anyone—”

“Too many answers,” he says gently. “Not enough proof. For now, we assume caution and build proof later.”

Logic wants to be grateful. Emotion wants to unravel. I stare at the faint glow striping the dashboard. “I don’t even know you.”

“That’s true,” he agrees, unoffended. “You can still be safer in here than out there.”

Safer. The word unties something in my chest and knots something else. “I would’ve gone to a friend’s.”

“Your phone buzzed,” he replies. “You hesitated. That told me enough.”

Heat rises in my cheeks. “You were watching that closely?”

“I was making sure you didn’t vanish into a problem I could stop.”

Words jam in my throat. “So you… what? Parked and waited for me to decide?”

He considers, eyes steady. “I don’t push. I warn. People choose.”

A stuttered breath escapes before I can catch it. Lyria noses the thought like a curious pup. He means it.

Streetlights smear across his cheekbone as we pass beneath them; the car is a cocoon of hush and low vibration. “What did you see exactly?” I ask, voice thinner than I want.

“Two shapes that cared too much about your shadow,” he says. “One near the field gate, one by the faculty lot. Both looked away when I looked at them. Both stayed when you moved.”

“Could they have been students?”

“Maybe,” he allows. “But neither smelled like late-night sugar and adrenaline.”

“Smelled?” The word trips out, a startled laugh threading through it. “Of course. Right. Wolves.”

His mouth almost tilts; it doesn’t commit. “Wolves.”

Silence returns, this time needle-fine. I rub at my temple, and that’s all it takes—attention snaps to my face like a magnet finding metal.

“You were crying,” he says softly.

“I wasn’t.” Fast, defensive, useless.

“Serena.” My name in that tone gentles every sharp edge inside me.

“I’m—” I start, then give up halfway through the lie. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters to your body,” he says, voice gone lower, warmer. “Tears salt the air. Heartbeat shifts. Breath shortens. Muscles hold harm they didn’t consent to.”

Heat pools at the back of my eyes, traitor-bright. “You make it sound like science.”

“Some truths are easy to measure.”

I turn my face to the window, embarrassed by how much I want to believe him, to fold into the assurance like a blanket that smells like safety instead of smoke. “I wasn’t crying,” I repeat, more quietly, like repetition could rewrite footage.

“Look at me,” he says.

I don’t, and then I do because something in the way he asks erases refusal without taking choice. His hand lifts—not the palm, not a grab—and the back of it skims my cheekbone, careful as breath. Cool skin; warm spark. My lungs forget how to function and then remember all at once.

“Salt,” he murmurs. “And heat.”

My breath hitches, loud in the hush. Lyria goes bright in my mind, fur standing, paws digging into earth that isn’t here. Closer, she urges, not a plea, a knowing.

Kai’s pupils shade darker, a storm folding into itself. For a heartbeat, something primal looks out through him—old, relentless. His throat works, like restraint is a muscle he respects.

“Sorry,” I whisper, the apology spilling for everything—tonight, the bruise, the way my body responds to him like a tide to gravity. “I’m a mess.”

“You’re a person,” he corrects, hand dropping, heat lingering where he touched. “That’s different.”

I blink too fast. “Why were you at the school at all?”

He exhales, gaze finding mine like it expects to. “Because something told me I needed to be.”

A laugh snags on my tongue; it sounds closer to a sob. “Something?”

“My wolf.” No flinch in the admission. “Call it instinct. Pull. Premonition. A thread you don’t see until your hand is already around it.”

“So you just… listened and showed up to a high school ceremony?” I try to make it teasing; it comes out wonder and fear.

“I listened,” he says simply. “And I moved.”

A soft thud under the tires suggests a change I can’t name; all I know is the car eases, then slows. My pulse slams against my throat like it wants out. “Why are we stopping?”

“To check if any shadows stop with us.”

My stare drops to my lap; fingers knot together again. “And if they do?”

“Then we adjust,” he says. “I handle what approaches. You stay in the car.”

“I didn’t agree to—”

“You agreed to get in,” he replies, calm holding steady. “That’s enough for now.”

Air tastes metallic, the way it does before storms. Lyria presses her head to mine from the inside. He isn’t lying to us.

My throat tightens. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“Be here,” he says. “Breathe. Tell me if your fear spikes.” A beat. “Tell me if you want to leave and I’ll take you wherever you say.”

That last promise cuts clean through panic and plants something else in its place. My ribcage expands like it remembers how. “You’d just… let me go?”

“Wanting your safety is not wanting your obedience,” he says, as if it’s obvious, as if no one has ever twisted the two together and called it love.

Lights outside blur to a halt; the hum dies. Stillness arrives with a soft, decisive click. My heart responds like it heard its name.

His face turns toward mine in the dim, all planes and shadow and the kind of attention that doesn’t prod, doesn’t pry, simply sees. He leans in—not invading, not looming—closing inches like a man stepping to a whisper.

“Serena,” he says, voice barely above that, as if speaking too loud might change the truth itself. “My wolf reacted to you. And that shouldn’t be possible.”