For now, that was enough.
34
— • —
Andrea
Weeks passed and Finneas didn’t leave.
He kept showing up every morning with breakfast, kept asking me on dates I kept refusing, kept fixing things around Grandma’s house like he’d signed a maintenance contract nobody asked for. My belly grew while the nausea faded, the bump becoming visible enough that the woman at the grocery store started asking questions and I had to learn how to say “yes, I’m pregnant” to strangers without my voice cracking.
I was almost twenty weeks when the thought hit me, sitting on the porch one morning watching him drive away after breakfast. He had a company. He had a pack. He was a King, and he’d been living out of a hotel room in Whitebrook for over a month, running his entire kingdom from a café on Main Street, and at some point that had to catch up to him. You couldn’t rulefrom a distance forever. People needed their leader present. His company needed its CEO. His pack needed its King.
And I’d been letting him stay here, letting him settle into the rhythm of this place, without thinking about what it was costing him.
I brought it up that evening. He was on the porch, coffee going cold, watching the sunset do its thing over the mountains.
“You can’t stay here forever,” I said from the doorway.
He looked at me. “Why not?”
“Because you have a company. You have a pack. You’re a King, Finneas. You can’t run all of that from a café that puts hearts in the foam.”
“I’ve been managing.”
“Managing isn’t leading. And you know that.”
He was quiet. I could see him turning it over, the stubbornness in his jaw fighting whatever practical voice was telling him I was right.
“What if I gave it up?” he said.
I stared at him. “Gave what up?”
“The company. The pack. The throne,” he said it like he was listing groceries, casual, like these weren’t the three pillars his entire life was built on. “Someone else could take it. Luca’s been handling most of it already.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Why not?”
“Because you built that company from nothing. Because your father left you that pack. Because you’ve been King since you were twenty-four and you can’t just hand it over like it’s a library book.”
“I’ve sacrificed enough for that title. If staying here means stepping down, I will.”
I searched his face for the bluff, the performance, some sign that he was saying this to impress me. There was nothing. He meant it. This man was willing to throw away everything he’d spent a decade building because I was standing on this porch and he didn’t want to leave.
It terrified me. Not because I didn’t believe him. Because I did.
“No,” I said.
“Andrea...”
“No. I’m not going to be the reason you lose everything you’ve worked for. You’d resent me for it eventually, even if you don’t think so now.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“You would. Maybe not this year, maybe not next year, but someday you’d wake up and realize you gave up your whole life for a woman who told you she only wanted to co-parent.” I uncrossed my arms because my hands were shaking. “Your packneeds you. Those people depend on you. I’m not going to take that from them.”
“You and our baby are my priority.”
