Chapter 4

The moment I looked up, a black SUV was barreling straight at us. Tires dragged across asphalt, filling the air with the stench of burnt rubber, but it was too late to stop.

In that split second, I saw Dominic.

He came tearing across the street—no, not running. A half-shifted burst of speed, pupils blazing amber-gold, his face twisted with a terror I'd never seen.

"Lillian!"

Her name. He screamed her name.

He launched himself forward, swept Lillian into his arms, shielded her completely with his body, and the two of them rolled toward the curb.

The impact flung me the opposite way.

A dull, sickening thud. My body flew like a cut kite, slamming into the ground over a dozen meters away. The back of my skull cracked against the concrete curb. Pain exploded white-hot. Something warm slid down my temple. My vision blurred into a chaos of screams, horns, and scrambling feet.

Not one of those sounds belonged to him.

I forced my head up with everything I had.

A few meters away, Dominic had Lillian locked tight in his arms—one hand cradling the back of her head, the other gently patting her back. His pupils still burned wolf-gold, the instinctive response an Alpha only triggers when protecting someone vital.

"It's okay... I'm here." His voice was raw with fear, yet wrapped in a tenderness that crushed the air from my lungs. "Don't be scared, little moon. No one's touching you."

Little moon. In our world, that was the name an Alpha reserved solely for his true mate. More intimate than "I love you."

He had never called me that. Not once.

Lillian burrowed into his chest. Even from this distance, I could feel his wolf channeling calming pheromones toward her—warm, enveloping, like an invisible barrier sealing her inside the safest place in the world.

And I lay in a pool of my own blood, barely ten meters away, separated by what felt like an ocean. He didn't so much as glance in my direction.

The hollow mark on my neck pulsed with faint, burning pain. Deep inside, my wolf let out a long, keening cry—not a call for help. A lament.

As consciousness crumbled, an old memory broke through.

My twentieth birthday gala. Enemy assassins had infiltrated the estate. I was cornered at the end of a hallway, two shifted wolves closing in, claws gleaming cold.

Dominic burst from the darkness and threw himself in front of me without hesitation, taking a full-force strike in human form. Claws shredded his shoulder. Blood sprayed across my dress. Even after the warriors arrived and killed the attackers, he still wouldn't let go of me.

"Selena," white-faced, voice shaking, "are you hurt? Tell me."

That strike nearly tore his shoulder blade apart. He spent a full day and night in the medical wing. His first words when he woke were asking if I'd been scared.

The boy who'd shielded me with flesh and blood was now holding another woman, soothing her in that same trembling voice.

It wasn't that he'd stopped throwing himself into danger. He'd just changed who he was throwing himself in front of.

Darkness swallowed me whole.

When I opened my eyes again, an IV line trailed from the back of my hand and the sting of antiseptic burned my throat.

Dominic sat at my bedside. Shirt crumpled, face ashen, dark circles carved deep beneath his eyes.

He saw me wake, and his brow eased—for exactly one second. Then his voice cut like a blade.

"Why did you go looking for Lillian?" Barely restrained irritation. "I did what you asked. I've kept my distance. Why are you still going after her?"

I'd just been a heartbeat from death, and his first words weren't comfort. They were accusation.

"You call that keeping your distance?" My voice scraped out raw and foreign. "What was crashing her bonding ceremony, then?"

He went rigid. "You've been spying on me?"

"That video's been circulating through every pack in the Great Lakes. Do I need to spy?"

Silence. Then, defensive: "Her parents were forcing her into a bonding with an Alpha twenty years her senior. I'd already failed her once. I couldn't stand by and watch her be destroyed."

His volume climbed. "You're making a scene over something like this? Can't you show an ounce of empathy?"

Nails bit into my palms. The pain kept me lucid.

"If you care about her that much," my voice shook, but I forced every word out, "why not just admit it?"

"And what good would that do?" He lunged forward, hands slamming down on either side of the bed, caging me in. Bloodshot eyes, gold flickering unstable at the edges of his pupils—his wolf surging with his emotions.

"You're the one who forced me to choose, Selena. You."

"All these years together—what haven't I given you? The bonding ceremony, the Luna title, the respect of every pack in the Great Lakes. Who would dare disrespect you?"

A deep breath, fighting for control. "I just needed some space. I lost my way for a while, but I came back. And you? You won't let Lillian go. Are you trying to drive me insane?"

The tears finally broke free.

I wanted to tell him that his "space" was bought with my solitary agony. That his so-called return was nothing but a soulless shell. But every grievance, every rage, every shattered piece was crushed flat under a year's worth of exhaustion, and all that came out was silence.

Seeing my tears, his anger ebbed. He released the bed rail, pinched the bridge of his nose, softened his voice.

"I know you feel insecure. But I know my limits. I won't cross the line." He looked away. "Lillian is just a friend. Can you trust me this once?"

I recognized that tone—patience running on fumes.

I closed my eyes and said nothing.

Silence stretched. He seemed to take it as acceptance, and his voice finally eased.

"You've always wanted to see the aurora, right? It's all arranged. Next week—I'm taking you to Alaska. Whatever you want, just say the word."

I looked at him, a bitter twist at the corner of my mouth. Next week, I'd be gone from his life forever. But I said nothing.

Right then, his phone rang. Dominic glanced at the screen and shot to his feet.

"Get some rest. Something urgent came up." He was already heading for the door without looking back.

I saw the name on the screen. Lillian.

Another lie. But none of it mattered anymore.

I watched his retreating figure and felt something deep inside me go completely, finally still.

The boy who tore through ice and rock for me at sixteen. The one who cried, "What would I do if you died?" The Dominic Blackwell who once held me in his palms like I was his whole world—he was already dead.

The man standing before me would hurl himself into traffic for another woman, destroy a bonding ceremony to reach her, and walk away without a backward glance while I lay bleeding on the ground.

His heart hadn't been mine for a long time. And I should have woken up long ago.