Maybe they got exactly what they asked for.
But sometimes, when you get what you want, you discover it was never yours to begin with.
Chapter 4
Wes
I can’t breathe in there anymore.
The common room feels too small, too full of doubt and suspicion that tastes like copper on my tongue. My hands shake as I push through the back door into the garden, desperate for air that doesn’t carry the weight of Thane’s accusations.
It’s Bree. It has to be Bree.
The hunger claws at my stomach, worse than it’s been in weeks, but that’s not what’s making me sick. It’s the way everyone looked at each other back there. The way Stellan went silent and Rhett’s fire started building under his skin.
Like they’re already planning for war.
I press the heels of my hands against my eyes, trying to stop the spiral before it takes me under completely. The garden feels different out here—lighter somehow, like it remembers what peace feels like even if I don’t.
“It’s her,” I whisper to the empty air. “I’d know if it wasn’t her. Wouldn’t I?”
“Would you?”
I spin around to find Gray standing in the doorway, still as stone except for his eyes. They’re too bright, too focused, scanning the garden like he’s cataloging every shadow for threats.
“Don’t,” I say, backing up a step. “Don’t you start doubting too.”
Gray steps into the garden, closing the door behind him with deliberate care. He crosses to me in three quick strides, and before I can say anything else, his hands frame my face and he kisses me.
It starts gentle—his lips soft against mine, thumb brushing across my cheekbone like he’s trying to memorize the feeling. But there’s something desperate underneath, the way his mouth moves like he’s trying to convince both of us that everything’s still okay. When he deepens the kiss, I taste the fear he’s trying so hard to hide.
When he pulls back, he wraps his arms around me, holding me against his chest with more force than necessary.
“I’m not doubting,” he says quietly, but his voice is tight. “I’m trying to think.”
I should feel better in his arms. Usually Gray’s solid presence calms me. But right now his muscles are coiled like he’s ready to spring into action at any second, and his heartbeat is too fast against my ear.
“About what?” I ask, pulling back to look at his face. “About whether the woman we’ve all been in love with for months is suddenly someone else? About whether we’re all losing our minds?”
“About whether I failed her.”
The words knock the air from my lungs. “What are you talking about?”
Gray steps away from me and moves further into the garden, his movements too controlled, like he’s fighting something underneath his skin. “I should have stopped it. Then it never would have been able to take hold.”
“Take hold of what?”
“Whoever’s wearing her face now.”
I flinch. “That’s still Bree.”
“I’m not sure it is,” Gray’s voice is quiet, deadly. “Because when she looked at me back there, for just a second, I thought it wasn’t her at all.”
The admission hangs between creating distance I don’t want. Because Gray doesn’t make mistakes about people. Gray sees everything, notices everything, remembers everything. If he’s questioning what he saw…
“No.” I shake my head, backing up until my shoulders hit the garden wall. “You’re wrong. You have to be wrong.”
“I hope I am.” Gray’s hands clench into fists at his sides. “But hoping doesn’t make it true.”
