"You didn't look for him," Dalvin said finally.
"No."
"Why?"
"Because protecting him mattered more than satisfying my curiosity. Because I knew that if I started pulling that thread, I might lead Vernon's people straight to him." I held his gaze, letting him see the truth of it. "Because keeping Eli safe was more important than knowing where he was."
Dalvin's composure cracked. Just for an instant, just a flicker of something raw and vulnerable beneath the anger and the fear. Then he pulled himself back together, rebuilt the walls, locked the door.
"I can't trust you," he said. "I can't trust anyone. Not anymore."
"I know."
"Then why won't you leave?"
"Because leaving you alone in this forest with Mercer hunting you isn't an option I can live with." I took a breath, steadied myself. "You don't have to trust me. You don't have to want me. But I'm not going to walk away and let Vernon's proxy drag you back to a man who hurt you for eight years."
Dalvin was silent. His jaw worked, muscles twitching beneath the skin, fighting some internal battle I couldn't see.
Finally, he stepped back toward the rocks.
"Don't follow me," he said. "Don't approach. Just... stay close enough to intercept Mercer if he comes back."
"I can do that."
"This isn't forgiveness. This isn't trust. This is just survival."
"I understand."
He held my gaze for one more moment, searching for something in my face. I didn't know if he found it. Didn't know if there was anything left to find after so many years of distance and failure.
Then he turned and disappeared back into the crevice between the boulders.
I found a new position, closer this time, with sightlines to both his hiding spot and the most likely approach vectors from the northwest. Settled my back against a tree and prepared to wait.
The argument had changed nothing and everything. Dalvin still didn't trust me. Still didn't want me. Still saw me as just another alpha trying to claim him.
But he hadn't run.
And for now, that would have to be enough.
***
Chapter 7
Dalvin
The heat was winning.
I'd held it off as long as I could, using every technique I'd learned during years of unwanted cycles under Vernon's control. Breathing exercises. Distraction. The cold stone against my back, a desperate anchor to reality. But biology didn't care about willpower, and my body had decided that forty-four hours was long enough to wait.
The fog rolled in slowly at first. A softening at the edges of my thoughts, a warmth that spread from my core outward, a hypersensitivity that made every brush of fabric against my skin feel like a brand. Then faster. Harder. Until I couldn't remember why I was hiding, couldn't remember what I was afraid of, could only feel the aching emptiness between my legs and the desperate need to be filled.
Slick soaked through my ruined pants. My nipples peaked against the torn fabric of my shirt, so sensitive that even the mountain air was a caress. Every nerve ending in my body screamed for touch, for pressure, for the weight of an alpha pinning me down and filling me up.
I pressed my forehead against the cold rock and tried to breathe.
Eli. I needed to think about Eli. My son, my reason, the only thing that mattered more than the fire consuming me from the inside out.
