2. Eliana
ELIANA
T he gravel in my driveway crunches as if it's judging me. I stagger up the walk with all the grace of someone who's either tipsy or dizzy from drinking way too much alcohol. Not the fun kind of drunk—where I went way over my head and didn't stop drinking to ease out the pain—but I haven't been drinking anything but coffee, yet my brain feels foggy.
My rented cottage leans just a little more to the left than I remember. The once-white paint is curling off like it’s trying to escape, and a vine I never planted has wrapped halfway up the porch post like it’s laying claim.
“Still standing, huh?” I mutter, setting my bag down with a dramatic thud. “That makes one of us.”
The porch groans under my weight. So does the screen door, which I have to shoulder open like it owes me money. Inside, the air smells like disuse—stale wood, forgotten laundry, and something vaguely floral from a candle I definitely didn’t blow this morning before I left.
I close the door with my hip, drop my coat on the floor, and kick off my boots . The silence that follows is the thick, yawning kind—not peaceful, just empty.
“Miss me?” I ask the room, flipping on a light that blinks twice before holding steady.
No answer, obviously. The house has long since stopped talking back; it used to chatter all the time. Especially when I visited the Dew he wouldn't do it—not for anything in this world. But then I remember what Dad once told me: Everyone has a price at some point in their life. And I wonder—has this become mine?
The Alpha doesn’t get to react before it’s chaos. Growls, shrieks, the thunder of bodies colliding. I scream but no sound comes out. I try to move, but my limbs are locked, frozen in place by instinct or fear or heat—I don’t know.
I can only watch.
The trees spin. The earth tilts. My scent blooms hot and slick in the air, and for a moment, someone turns— smells me. This is when my world explodes. Then the clearing is chaos.
Snarls tear through the air like static. The ground trembles beneath my feet from the force of bodies colliding, claws raking, fists cracking against ribs. I can hear bone break— feel it in my own chest, like an echo of violence I can’t unsee.
And over it all: my scent.
It rises like smoke, saturating the air in a way that draws eyes—hungry eyes. Alphas on both sides with their nostrils flaring. Someone groans low in their throat, the sound tangled with need.
I want to scream. I want to claw the heat out of myself, tear my scent glands free just to stop the way they look at me.
But I can’t.
I’m not just a body in heat—I’m a ghost stuck inside a memory.
“Get back!” someone hisses.
A hand grabs my wrist—rough, urgent, dragging me through the brush. We stumble behind a fallen log. A face blurs into view, there’s panic wide in his eyes. “You have to get out of here—your scent—it’s pulling them—”
A flash of movement.
A growl like thunder.
Then he's gone.
I’m still kneeling, whilst shaking on the ground, because I'm drenched in my own scent. The pack I trusted, loved and grew with have now been torn apart. The Beta stands at the edge of the clearing, untouched. His face is pale, his shoulders stiff—but his hands?
His hands aren't shaking.
The betrayal splits through me like a knife to the ribs, deep and ragged and unforgivable. I lurch forward, but my body won't follow through. The heat has me locked down, paralyzed in the middle of the worst moment of my life.
"You did this," I try to shout, but it comes out broken.
He turns away, which is the last straw. Then, I fall backward into myself, the heat rising like a fever flood, and just before the memory releases me, I hear my Alpha's voice one last time—raw, furious, hurt.
"Eliana— run. "
I would if I could, but I'm stuck—not just in the grief of watching everyone I've ever loved be slaughtered, but in the knowledge that my Beta caused this mayhem.
If it hadn't been for him, we'd still be happy, just like we were from the start. There are so many questions running through my mind, but the one that takes precedence is: why?
Why would he do this to us?
Was everything a lie? D
id he never love our pack? And more than that did he ever love me?
It's as if the shock of it all always wakes me up. My fingers clutch the blanket. I'm still on the sofa, and the tea on the table beside me the mug is now broken.
The room is cold, but I'm on fire—every nerve raw, every breath ragged, like I've been screaming into a void. I'm soaked in my scent—thick and sticky with heat, panic, and grief. I haven't smelled myself like this in years.
My scent has changed too, because it has aged, deepened, frayed at the edges like old fabric stretched too thin. I sit up slowly, every muscle trembling.
"Shit," I whisper.
I press my palms into my face, trying to scrub the memory away, but it clings—like it happened only yesterday. If only it were a dream. If only none of it had ever been true. It’s a trauma that, no matter how hard I try to suppress it, remains fresh in my mind.
I rush to the bathroom, certain I'm about to be sick—but nothing comes. I brace my hands against the sink, breathing through the nausea until it passes.
Then I flip on the light and catch my reflection in the mirror. I look a mess. My hair clings in damp, tangled waves, my cheeks are flushed, and my eyes are glassy with everything I've been holding in.
"Get it together," I whisper, gripping the edges of the sink a little tighter. My scent still lingers in the air—thick with heat, panic, and old grief—calling for someone who isn't here.
I turn on the tap and splash cold water on my face. The shock cuts through the haze, grounding me. This isn't just another bad night—it's a warning. My suppression is slipping. My body remembers what my mind keeps trying to forget. I won’t be able to hold it off much longer. Next time, I might not wake up alone.
The thought doesn’t scare me like it used to.
I leave the bathroom and head to my bedroom—where I should’ve been sleeping all along. The couch is for reading, for setting me up for bed, not to be my bed through the night. I peel off my soaked shirt and toss it in the laundry basket. Wrapping a blanket around myself, I pace the room—once, twice, a third time—before finally lying down on the bed.
That’s when something catches my eye. It must have been there before I came home. Someone’s been in my cottage, and I didn’t even notice.
I rush to it, pick it up, and see my name written at the top. There’s only one person who writes like that—and who has access to the cottage.
My landlord.
My hands shake as I tear it open, even though the contents of the letter, aren’t going to be a surprise.
Notice of Eviction. Thirty days to vacate the premises.
I flop back onto the bed, the letter trembling in my grip. Of course this would happen now, when everything else is falling apart. The cottage I've called home for five years, gone. Just like that.
But as I stare at the legal notice, something shifts inside me. Maybe this isn't a disaster. I told Rebecca I'd go to the mountains. At the time, I said it thinking that I wouldn’t have to go, but it was clear from the time. My publisher canceled the contract, that the maybe would turn into a definite. The snowstorm isn’t as bad as they said it would be, so traveling won’t be an issue.
I stand up, suddenly feeling energized, so I pull my suitcase from the closet. If I'm going to leave, I might as well leave now instead of waiting thirty days. First thing in the morning, I'll pack up my car and drive to the mountains. No more waiting for inspiration to strike. No more hiding behind suppressants and old wounds.
Maybe something’s calling me forward, and leaving here will mean that I can write more than just one chapter or maybe just head to Millbrook and see if this new pack could give me something new. I know one thing for sure, I'm not a shattered mug with cold tea. I'm still here. And I'm not done yet.