"Hey."
"You okay?"
I think about it. Actually think, instead of the automatic fine that life teaches you.
"Yeah," I say. "I think I am."
He watches my face. Reading. Whatever he finds makes him pull me closer — forehead against mine, his breath warm. Not heat. Not the bond demanding. Just a boy holding a girl in the early morning because the night was hard and they're both still here.
The bolt slides. Leo is off the bed and against the wall before it's fully open. The overnight guy doesn't look in far enough to see him.
"Schedule change. Cal's running late. You're going to the lodge for breakfast."
The lodge. Where Gold House eats.
"Where's Sven?"
"Admin building. New staff arriving. Security specialist."
The security consultant. Len's recommendation. The person sent to manage me.
I follow him across the compound. Morning light hitting the mountain and turning the snow pink. I breathe it in. The cold, the pine, the particular smell of this place that has become — against every instinct I have — something close to home.
The lodge is nearly empty. I eat oatmeal.
Leo slides onto the bench across from me.
"Morning, Dorothy."
"You're going to get me in trouble."
"Probably." The almost-smirk. His hand finds mine under the table. The bond hums — steady, settled.
We head for the door. Leo behind me. The hallway between the mess hall and the exit — the same hallway where Gray and I collided during the ice storm.
I round the corner.
Someone is coming the other way. Fast. Head down, looking at a phone or something that isn't the hallway in front of them. I see dark hair and a field jacket and then the collision happens and it's not a brush or a stumble — it's a full-body impact, my chest hitting theirs, my feet tangling, and I'm going down.
Leo is right behind me. No room to stop. He slams into my back and the three of us go down in a pile on the lodge hallway floor — legs tangled, arms bracing, bodies pressed together in the graceless chaos of people who didn't see each other coming.
My palms hit the floor. Someone's knee is against my hip. Leo's chest is on my back, his weight pinning me, his hand grabbing for the wall and landing on my arm instead. The person underneath me is trying to push up and their hand closes on my shoulder and —
The bond detonates.
Not a flare. Not a surge. The full circuit — every connection I carry — fires at once. The contact with Leo and the stranger's hand on my shoulder and the braided bond that's been runningthrough me since last night — all of it ignites. Because of this stranger.
The mark blazes — a third arc branded into the skin of my wrist.
Leo gasps against my back. His body shudders. His eyes must be full amber because the sound he makes isn't human.
The stranger scrambles backward. I catch a flash — a man, dark hair, the fluid movement of a shifter —
The stranger freezes.His eyes lock on my wrist.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
The shift starts in my hands.
