I checked my watch. It was nearly 8 p.m., and I’d promised Adele I’d be back before 8. I needed to get home to see her before she went to sleep, to hold my daughter and remind myself why I’d survived.
I downed the rest of my wine and set the glass down with a small thud.
“I have to go now. But I really hope you respect my choice.”
Dimitri leaned back slightly, his countenance showing he’d conceded in the way his shoulders slumped, the tension leaving his frame. But in his eyes, there was still a fierce determination, something unresolved and burning.
Still, he said, “If this is what you want, Isabella, I’ll respect it.”
My wolf stirred at the way he said my name, but I shut her down immediately.
I stood, smoothing my dress. “Thank you, and have a good night, Dimitri.”
With that, I walked away, hoping to God I wouldn’t see him again, even if it’s all my wolf wanted at this point.
Chapter Ten
Dimitri’s POV
I stared out at the city through the floor-to-ceiling window of my office without really seeing any of it—the tall buildings, the bustling city, none of it. One thing clouded my thoughts. One woman. Isabella.
It had been a little over twenty-four hours since my encounter with her, and I hadn’t been able to think about anything else.
I remembered the moment I stepped into the executive lounge. Something felt different. My wolf had stirred, which was saying something, because I hadn’t felt him in five years.
I’d gotten used to the oppressive silence that had become my constant companion. Living without him had been torture, like walking around with half my soul ripped out, leaving nothing but a gaping wound that never healed. I could still shift—barely—but it was agony. It was like trying to force something out that didn’t want to come. Like dragging a blade from bone. My wolf was there but unreachable, locked away behind walls I couldn’t break through, no matter how hard I tried.
I’d read a few books at the pack library about my condition and scoured the internet for answers, but it all said the same thing: thebond between wolf and human was supposed to be unbreakable. Losing that bond usually meant death or madness.
And since I wasn’t dead—at least physically—and I wasn’t insane, I’d been living somewhere in between.
But the moment my eyes locked on Isabella across that ballroom, everything changed. It started with a stir. And then my wolf began clawing his way to the surface from the depths he’d been buried in for the last five years—as if trying to see something, to find something.
She’d changed. Gone was the tiny, delicate thing I remembered. In her place stood a woman—all sharp cheekbones and defined features that spoke of strength rather than fragility. Her figure had filled out into soft curves and full breasts that the elegant dress she wore did nothing to hide. I noticed the color of her eyes had changed from their usual green to hazel. Contacts, maybe. But even with all the changes, I could still recognize Isabella. My wolf could still recognize her as mine.
Even in the midst of all those people bathed in expensive perfume, I could still make out her scent. It had changed—sharper, mature, with an undertone of strength—but beneath it, I could still recognize the same familiar warmth that was Isabella. I’d clung to that scent for years, replaying it in my mind, desperate to remember every note.
I’d lost her hair tie—the only thing tethering me to her—one night when my mother had one of her cleaning fits and had the entire east wing cleared out. I hadn’t realized it was gone until it was too late. Since then, I’d been groping for any trace of Isabella in the mansion, in Ravencrest, anywhere—but my mother had managed to erase it all.
Still, I refused to let her memory fade. On those endless nights that felt like torment, when sleep refused to come, I’d go to her room. Her scent had long since vanished, but I could still feel her there, like an echo in the walls, in the sheets, in the air itself.
And when even that wasn’t enough, I’d end up in my study—the place where I’d bonded with her—sitting on the same chaise lounge, my hands tracing the worn fabric her fingers once clutched. It was the only part of the house that stillfelt…alive.
When my eyes landed on the woman in the yellow dress, I knew instantly it was her. Yellow had always been her favorite color. She’d always glowed in it—radiant, like sunlight made into flesh. No one wore yellow like Isabella did. And that is how I knew it was her without even seeing her face.
The curve of her back, the tilt of her shoulders, the graceful confidence in her posture—it all hit me like a punch to the chest. And the moment she turned and our eyes met, my wolf roared to life.
Five years of silence shattered in an instant as my wolf howled with recognition, with joy, with desperate, clawing need—the kind of bone-deep relief that comes from finding something you thought you’d lost forever. It was like learning to breathe again after years of suffocation.
Even now, I could still feel him pacing beneath my skin with a determination I hadn’t felt in years. Or ever. And now that I’d had a taste of that feeling again—now that I knew what it was like to be whole—I’d be damned if I let it slip away.
Now I knew why I hadn’t been able to find her all these years. She’d changed her name to Estelle Crawford.
But it didn’t matter. She was still my Isabella.
My beautiful Isabella. She’d shed the softness of youth and emerged sharp, refined. Her jawline was more defined. Her body was leaner but with curves that made my mouth go dry. The way she carried herself was confident and powerful, like she owned every room she walked into.
And every man in that hall had noticed. I’d seen the way they looked at her—the hunger in their eyes—and my wolf had snarled with possessive rage. Especially when I saw her goddamn date, Marcus William, or whatever the fuck he called himself. I’d looked him up when I got back home. The bastard ran a fledgling tech start-up—flashy branding, inflated valuations, the kind of company that survived on hype and angel investors. Not even remotely close to what Ravencrest Global was. To what I was. He was still a child playing at power while I built empires. And a woman like Isabella deserved to stand beside a king, not a man still learning to crawl.
