Meemaw cackles.
The car door swings open, and Violet steps out, the sun hits her hair like a halo.
Like a knight.
Like a savior.
Like everything I never thought I deserved.
And my heart, my wolf, my entire being… kneels.
Chapter 24
Violet
The air smells like metal and wet earth. Jason is somewhere behind me—I can hear the subtle shift of his breathing, the way it catches like he can’t believe what he’s seeing.
I feel him through the ground, through the strange hum in my bones, through something deeper than anything I’ve ever had words for. But I don’t turn toward him. Not yet. I square my shoulders and lift my chin. The wind tugs at my hair as I speak loud enough for every wolf in the clearing to hear.
“My name is Violet Ashford, and I come in peace.”
Silence slams through the clearing. No laughter, no derision. Just stunned, bewildered, primal silence.
I was a human, a small, blind human, standing in the center of God knows how many wolves. Jason inhales sharply.
I don’t need sight to know his eyes are on me. I don’t need sight to feel the way his breath stutters in his chest, to know his wolf is there to protect me. But I keep facing forward. Because this isn’t just for him. It’s for all of them.
My voice stays steady, even though my heart tries to punch out of my ribs. “I don’t know your customs,” I continue, “your rules, or your politics. But I do know fear. And I do know bravery. And I know this…” I take one sure step into the clearingand movement hits my ears. Are the wolves taking a step back? “No one takes what is not theirs. Not people. Not safety. Not freedom.”
Something snarls. Not at me. At the truth.
A voice cuts the air. “You walk into the den of your enemy,” he growls, “and think asking for peace will save you?”
“No,” I say simply. I’m surprised my hands aren’t trembling. My breath isn’t shaking. I stand in the shadow of wolves with nothing but grit holding me upright. “I don’t think asking for peace will save me.” My jaw sets. “I think Jason will.”
The clearing erupts with growls, gasps, and snarls. A thousand instincts bucking at once. Behind me, Jason moves. A shiver tears through the earth. The wolves feel it. The alphas feel it.
I feel it like a tidal wave of heat at my spine.
Jason’s voice, low, dangerous, crumbling, comes from behind me. “Violet,” he chokes out, “don’t?—”
But I lift my hand slightly, stopping him without touching him. “I’m not afraid.”
The world goes still around me. Then, a ripple of confusion moves through the earth, claws scraping dirt, paws shifting, humans grunting, breaths catching. The smell of tension thickens until it’s sharp enough to taste, like the earth before lightning splits the sky.
I take a slow breath. “I’m here to clear Jason’s debt.”
A murmur sweeps through them—disbelief, insult, shock, curiosity. Someone growls. Someone else hushes them.
No one expected a human to speak pack law.
Beau steps forward beside me, still shaken, still sniffling. His voice cracks, but he doesn’t back down. “And I’m here to take responsibility for my part,” he calls out. “For real. I messed up. I’m sorry.”
Somewhere behind us, Jason’s breath catches. It’s a ragged, pained sound, like he sucked it back in halfway because he didn’t expect it to slip out.
Because he knows exactly what Beau is doing. He’s stepping into the spotlight, onto the chopping block beside me.
A voice slices through the clearing like a blade. One of the alpha’s. “And what,” he asks Beau, “do you think ‘responsibility’ means here?”
