"I'm sorry," I said again, my voice hardening. "I really don't remember you. And I have to go?—"
"Wait! Please, sweetheart, just—just hear me out." The voice cracked, wet with unshed tears. "I promised her. Before she passed. I sat by her bed and I held her hand and IpromisedI would look out for you. She was so worried, Ava. About you being alone. About you having no one."
My throat tightened. Iwasalone. Completely, devastatingly alone. Three years without family. Without pack. Without anyone who knew my real name, my real designation, my real self. Three years of twelve-hour shifts and frozen dinners and Netflix marathons that stretched until early morning hours because I couldn't stand the silence of my own apartment.
Three years of falling asleep in a pile of blankets that never quite filled the hollow space in my chest, no matter how many I bought, no matter how carefully I arranged them.
"What do you want?" I heard myself ask.
"I have a cabin," Carol said, her voice brightening with hope. "Up in the mountains. Powder Mountain, do you know it? Beautiful area—fresh air, gorgeous views, completely isolated. I'm getting a group together for a little ski trip next week. Nothing fancy, just some old friends reconnecting. And I thought... well, I thought you might like to come."
A ski trip. With a stranger who claimed to know my mother.
This is a trap.
"Get out of the city for a bit," Carol continued. "Breathe some mountain air. Rest. Heal." A pause, weighted with meaning. "You sound so tired, sweetheart. So... worn down. Your mother would have hated to see you like this."
"You don't know what I look like." I told her with a bit more bite than I intended.
"I can hear it in your voice. The exhaustion. The loneliness." Another pause. "The fear."
My blood ran cold.
"I should go," I said.
"Just think about it. That's all I ask. I'll send you the details—the address, the dates, everything—and you can decide. No pressure. No expectations." A soft, grandmotherly sigh. "It would mean so much to me, Ava. To honor your mother's memory. She loved you so much. She wanted you to be happy."
Low blow. Manipulative as hell.
It worked anyway.
BecauseGod, I was so tired of being alone. So tired of jumping at shadows and checking locks and sleeping with a knife under my pillow. So tired of this half-life I'd built, this existence that wasn't really living at all, just surviving, justenduring, day after day after day.
What was the point of running if this was all I had to run toward? "Okay," I said. "Send me the details. I'll... I'll think about it."
I could practically hear Carol's smile through the phone, wide and warm and somehowhungry. "Wonderful. I'll email everything tonight. I can't wait to see you, sweetheart. It's been far too long."
The line went dead. I stood in my cramped apartment, phone in hand, surrounded by the pillows and blankets and soft things that definitely weren't a nest, and tried to convince myself I hadn't just made a terrible mistake.
The hollow feeling in my chest pulsed like a second heartbeat.
Trap, the voice whispered.
Maybe, I whispered back.But maybe it's worth it. Maybe anything is better than this.
I didn't notice that the cashmere throw I couldn't afford—the one I'd bought in a fugue state, the one I slept with every single night—carried the faintest hint of a scent I hadn't consciously smelled in three years.
Honey. Sunshine. Fresh-cut grass.
Mason.
That night, I couldn't sleep.
I took two suppressants instead of one, washing them down with water that tasted like copper and desperation. It was dangerous, doubling up. The pamphlet that came with the pills warned against it in bold red letters:Do not exceed recommended dosage. May cause nausea, dizziness, and rebound symptoms.
I didn't care.
My whole body ached, a deep, bone-level throbbing that seemed to pulse in time with my heartbeat. My skin felt too tight, like I'd grown overnight and my flesh hadn't caught up. My breasts were swollen and tender, my nipples so sensitive that even the soft cotton of my sleep shirt felt like sandpaper. My lower belly cramped with a dull, insistent pressure that was achingly familiar.
