Rykan lay on his furs, one arm tucked behind his head, his eyes tracing patterns in the darkness above him. The fire had burned down to embers hours ago, casting just enough light to turn the shadows into living things that breathed and shifted with every flicker. He should have been asleep. After fleeing the cabin earlier, he’d run for miles, trying to escape the need to return and claim Ember. The memory of her face, her eyes wide with wonder and delight as he pleasured her, had accompanied him the entire time.
He’d thought he’d regained control, but as soon as he returned to the cabin and caught the lingering sweetness of her arousal, his restraint had almost vanished. He’d intended to leave again, but she’d asked him to stay and he couldn’t refuse her. He knew he shouldn’t have left her the first time, still trembling from her climax, so this time he stayed. But he didn’t sleep.
She wasn’t sleeping either. He could hear her breathing—not the deep, even rhythm of rest, but something shallow and wakeful. He’d known that for the past hour, but he’d resisted the urge to speak because speaking would make this moment real in ways he wasn’t sure he was ready for.
The tension from earlier still hummed beneath his skin. He could still taste her on his lips, could still feel the ghost of her body pressed against his, could still hear the way she’d whisperedpleaseagainst his throat. The memory made his blood heat and his beast stir restlessly, prowling the edges of his control like a caged predator.
He had almost claimed her.
The thought filled him with a dark satisfaction that he couldn’t quite suppress. His beast had recognized her from the first moment—had known what she was to them before his conscious mind had caught up. And every day since, the bond had grown stronger, the pull between them impossible to ignore.
She would have let you,his beast whispered.She wanted it. You could smell her desire.
He could still smell it now, clinging to the air of the cabin like a promise, and he could still taste it on his lips. It made his fangs ache and his hands clench and his cock stir with renewed interest despite his exhaustion.
He was so lost in his thoughts that he almost didn’t hear her speak.
“Rykan?”
Her voice was soft, barely louder than the crackle of the dying fire. He turned his head towards her, though he couldn’t make out more than the shape of her body beneath the furs.
“Yes?”
“Why are you here? Alone, I mean. On this mountain.”
The question hit him like a blade between the ribs—sharp and unexpected, slipping past defenses he hadn’t realized were down. He stared at the ceiling, his jaw tight, his heart suddenly beating too fast.
“That is a long story.”
“I’m not sleeping anyway.”
No, she wasn’t. And neither was he. And the darkness made things easier somehow, made it feel like they existed outside of time, in a space where truths could be spoken without consequence. He was still silent for so long that she started to withdraw, and he heard the shift of fabric as she began to roll away.
“My father was the Alpha of our pack,” he said, and the movement stopped. Her attention sharpened, focused on him like a beam of light. “It was one of the largest packs in the northern territories. My father led it for almost forty years.”
“Led?”
“He died. Seven years ago.”
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly.
He made a sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. “Don’t be. He wasn’t an easy male to love. Or to mourn.”
He heard her shift again, this time towards him rather than away. “Tell me about him.”
Why?he wanted to ask.Why does it matter? Why do you want to know the ugly truth of what I am, where I came from, what I left behind?
But the words wouldn’t form. Instead, other words came, truths he’d buried so deep he’d almost convinced himself they no longer existed.
“My father took two mates in his lifetime. My mother was the first. She was…” He searched for the right word, for some way to describe the female he remembered. “Fierce. That’s what they say. She challenged him publicly before they mated. She told him he was arrogant and blind and unworthy of her respect. No one had ever spoken to him like that before.”
“What did he do?”
“He laughed. And then he claimed her in front of the entire pack.” A ghost of a smile crossed his face. “They say she bit him hard enough to leave a scar before she accepted the bond. He wore it proudly until the day he died.”
He could feel her curiosity, bright and warm in the darkness. “She sounds incredible.”
“She was. And she died when I was six years old.”
