Page 26 of Alpha Charmed

All those touches I’ve been telling myself meant nothing.

The brewery door swings open.

Grandmother Peach is carrying a dish of cobbler and wearing an expression of knowing amusement that makes my stomach drop.

“Oh good. You’re discussing the wolf.” She crosses to our booth with the unerring aim of someone who always knows exactly where they need to be. “Excellent timing. I have additional commentary.”

“Of course, you do.” I take a fortifying sip of beer. “How did you know we were here?”

“The mist tells me things. Also, Zeph sent a messenger sprite forty minutes ago saying ‘intervention in progress, cobbler welcome.’” She slides into the booth beside Sakura and serves cobbler to everyone—still warm despite the walk from wherever she materialized from. “I never miss an intervention.”

“Then let him catch you.” She says it before I can deflect, before I can redirect to something safer. Grandmother Peach reaches across the table, her weathered hand covering mine with surprising warmth. “Let yourself be held. Just once. Just to see what it feels like.”

“And if it breaks me?”

“Then you’ll break.” Her grip tightens. “And then you’ll heal. And you’ll be stronger for it—not because you were strong enough to survive alone, but because you were brave enough to let someone help you stand.”

She rises and vanishes out the door before I can respond. The cobbler remains on the table, warm and impossibly fragrant.

The fireplace crackles. The beer shimmers in my glass. My friends watch me with expressions ranging from hope to concern to fierce protectiveness.

And somewhere outside, the mist curls in patterns I’ve never seen—golden and warm and anticipatory.

Later—much later, after more beer and more cobbler and more confessions I’ll probably regret in the morning—I walk back to the apothecary through streets thick with mist.

It swirls around my ankles like a living thing, responding to my presence in ways it never has. The color isn’t quite gold, but it’s not the usual silver either. Somewhere in between. Somewhere new.

Somewhere hopeful.

Marcus waves from the window of The Crescent Cup, the vampire’s knowing smile visible even through the glass. Thalia, his wife, appears beside him with an expression that suggests they’ve already heard about Girls’ Night and have opinions. Three centuries of marriage has given them both an uncanny talent for reading romantic tension.

I keep walking.

I think about Leire’s words. About Sakura’s gentle encouragement. About Zeph’s chaotic wisdom and Grandmother Peach’s quiet certainty.

I think about Caius.

About the way he looked at me in Mathilda’s cottage, like I was worth the years of standing still. About the way his voice dropped when he made promises he fully intended to keep. About the way my magic responds to his presence—not with instability, but with recognition. With want.

I’ve been cracking since Corwin died, maybe longer. And Caius has been there the whole time, steady and present and ready for me to stop pretending I was fine.

Maybe it’s time to stop pretending.

The apothecary is dark when I arrive, the wards humming their recognition as I approach. I let myself in, climbing the familiar stairs to my office, the weight of the day pressing down on my shoulders.

Mathilda’s journals await on my desk. The investigation awaits. Cordelia awaits, cunning and deadly and completely unaware that we’re closing in.

EIGHT

CAIUS

Sleep won’t come.

I’ve been staring at my ceiling for three hours, watching shadows shift as the moon tracks across the sky. The cabin is quiet—too quiet. The fire has burned down to embers, casting the room in shades of amber and gray. Outside, the forest breathes its usual nighttime sounds: wind through pines, distant owls, the occasional howl of a packmate on patrol.

None of it registers.

The wolf inside me will not settle—restless, precise, entirely done with patience. He knows what he wants. He’s always known. And after the past few days—after Mathilda’s cottage, after her hand in mine, after the way her armor cracked just enough to show me who she really is underneath⁠—