Chapter 13
Dante
The road was a ribbon of black asphalt cutting through the endless dark of the pine forest.
My truck’s headlights carved a path through the night, illuminating flashes of snow-covered branches and the occasional reflective eyes of a deer. The heater hummed low. The tires crunched on the packed snow.
Beside me, Arabella was quiet.
She had her knees pulled up to her chest, her feet resting on the dashboard (a habit that usually drove me crazy, but tonight, I let it slide). She was watching the trees blur past, her head resting against the cool glass of the window.
We were escaping.
Technically, it was a "mental health day." I had told Coach Vane I had a migraine. He bought it because I looked like death warmed over. Arabella had skipped Halloway’s lecture.
We just drove. No destination. Just away. Away from the scouts, the pressure, the eyes.
"Where are we going?" she asked softly, her breath fogging the glass.
"Does it matter?" I asked, keeping my eyes on the road. My grip on the steering wheel was loose for the first time in weeks.
"No," she decided. "As long as you don't drive us off a cliff."
I glanced at her. In the dashboard lights, her profile was etched in soft blue. She looked peaceful.
"I know a place," I said. "Up near the pass. My dad used to take me there."
The mention of my father hung in the air. I rarely spoke of him casually. Usually, his name was a warning or a confession.
Arabella turned her head to look at me. "Your dad?"
"Yeah," I said, my throat tightening. "Before... everything."
I turned off the main highway onto a narrow logging road. The truck bounced over the ruts, the suspension groaning. We climbed higher, the air getting thinner, the snow deeper.
I parked at a lookout point.
It was breathtaking. We were above the clouds. The moon was full and bright, illuminating a sea of jagged peaks that stretched endlessly into the horizon. Below us, the valley was a bowl of darkness.
I cut the engine.
Silence rushed in, absolute and heavy.
"Wow," Arabella whispered.
"Yeah," I agreed.
We sat there for a long time, just watching the mountains. The quiet wasn't awkward; it was a balm. It was the first time in days my head didn't hurt.
"Why did he bring you here?" she asked finally. She didn't look at me; she gave me the privacy of the view.
"To howl," I said.
She turned to me then, her eyes wide.
I let out a short, dry laugh. "Sounds cliché, right? The Wolf and the Moon. But it wasn't about the moon. It was about the noise. Down in the valley, near the humans... we have to be quiet. We have to suppress the instinct to vocalize. It builds up pressure in the chest."
I rubbed my sternum absently.
"Up here," I continued, "there's no one to hear you. You can scream. You can roar. You can let the monster out for five minutes, and the mountains don't judge you."
"Did it help?" she asked.
"For a while," I said. "Until the monster got too big for the mountains."
I unbuckled my seatbelt and turned in the seat to face her. The cab was small, intimate.
"You asked me once why I was so afraid," I said quietly. "Why I treat myself like a loaded gun."
"You told me about your mother," she said. "About the accident."
"I told you the facts," I corrected. "I didn't tell you the truth."
I looked down at my hands. They were large, scarred, capable of violence.
"I was there, Arabella."
She went still.
"I was twelve," I whispered. "Old enough to have shifted for the first time. Old enough to understand what a mate bond was. My parents... they were obsessed with each other. It was intense. Volatile. My dad was a good Alpha, but he was possessive. Jealous."
I swallowed hard, the memory tasting like ash in my mouth.
"That night... there was a party. Some rogue wolf from a visiting pack hit on my mom. Just a comment. Harmless. But my dad... he snapped. He went into a rage. He took her home. He wanted to claim her. To remind her who she belonged to."
I looked up, locking eyes with Arabella. I needed her to see this. I needed her to see the rot at the core of me.
"I heard them," I said, my voice cracking. "I was in my room down the hall. I heard the fighting turn into... something else. And then I heard the scream. It wasn't a human scream. It was the sound of bones breaking."
Arabella covered her mouth with her hand. Tears welled in her eyes.
"I ran in," I continued, forcing the words out. "The door was locked. I broke it down. And I saw him. He had shifted. Fully. He was massive—bigger than me. And he was... he was on top of her. But she wasn't moving."
I closed my eyes, fighting the nausea.
"He was still in the frenzy. He didn't even realize she was dead. He growled at me. He tried to protect his 'kill'."
"Oh my god," Arabella whispered. She reached out and grabbed my hand, squeezing it hard.
"I challenged him," I said. "A twelve-year-old pup against a full Alpha. It was suicide. But I didn't care. I just wanted him off her. He swiped at me—that's where I got the scar. He would have killed me too."
"What happened?" she asked.
"My uncle—Coach Vane—arrived," I said. "He heard the noise. He tranquillized my dad. Dragged him off. But it was too late."
I opened my eyes.
"I watched my mother die because my father loved her too much," I said. "That is the legacy. That is the blood that runs in my veins. It's not just anger, Ara. It's consumption. When we love, we destroy."
I pulled my hand away from hers, unable to bear the comfort.
"That's why I push you away," I said harshly.
"That's why I treat this like a transaction.
Because I feel it. Every time I look at you, I feel that same possessive rage he had.
I want to lock you away. I want to kill anyone who looks at you.
And I am terrified—terrified—that one day, I'm going to hurt you just to keep you. "
Silence filled the truck.
I waited for her to recoil. I waited for the look of horror. I waited for her to tell me to drive her home so she could pack her bags and run back to Seattle.
She didn't move.
She just looked at me. Her expression wasn't fearful. It was sad. Profoundly, devastatingly sad.
"Dante," she whispered.
She unbuckled her seatbelt. She moved across the console, ignoring the gear shift digging into her hip. She climbed into my lap.
I froze, my hands hovering at her waist.
"What are you doing?" I rasped. "Did you hear me? I'm a monster."
"You're a survivor," she corrected fiercely. She wrapped her arms around my neck and pressed her forehead against mine. "You were a child who tried to save his mother. You are a man who has spent ten years punishing himself for a crime he didn't commit."
"It's in the blood," I insisted.
"No," she said. "Biology isn't destiny. Your father lacked control. You have so much control it's crippling you. You're not him."
She pulled back to look me in the eye.
"You've never hurt me," she said. "In the library? You asked. In the dorm? You stopped. Even when you were in pain, even when the instinct was screaming at you... you put me first. That's not consumption, Dante. That's love."
The word hung in the air. Love.
She hadn't said it before. Neither had I.
"You don't know," I whispered, shaking my head. "You don't know what it feels like inside my head."
"Then show me," she said. "Howl."
I blinked. "What?"
"We're on the mountain," she said, gesturing to the window. "You brought me here. Do it. Let it out. Scream at the moon. Scream at your dad. Scream at me. Just... stop holding it in."
I stared at her. She was serious.
I looked out at the moon. The ancient, indifferent moon.
I felt the pressure in my chest. The years of silence. The grief. The rage.
I opened the truck door. The cold air rushed in.
I stepped out onto the snow. Arabella followed me.
I walked to the edge of the cliff. The wind whipped my hair.
I closed my eyes. I reached down deep, past the Machine, past the Captain, into the dark, wounded center of the wolf.
I let it out.
It started as a groan, low and guttural. Then it built. It rose up my throat, tearing at my vocal cords.
I roared.
It wasn't a human sound. It was a primal scream of anguish. It echoed off the canyon walls, a jagged, terrifying sound that went on and on until my lungs were empty.
I collapsed to my knees in the snow, gasping for air.
Silence returned. But it felt different now. Lighter.
I felt a hand on my shoulder.
Arabella knelt beside me. She didn't say anything. She just wrapped her arms around me from behind, resting her cheek against my back.
I turned around and pulled her into my arms. I buried my face in her neck, breathing her in.
"I love you," I choked out.
The words felt like stones leaving my mouth. Heavy. Real.
"I love you, Arabella. And it terrifies me."
"I love you too," she whispered against my chest. "And I'm not scared."
I held her tighter.
"You should be," I murmured. "But I promise... I promise I will never be him. I will cut my own heart out before I hurt you."
"I know," she said.
We stayed there in the snow for a long time, just holding each other under the moonlight.
Eventually, the cold seeped in. We went back to the truck.
I didn't start the engine right away. I turned the heater on, then pulled her back into my lap.
This time, the kiss was different. It wasn't about hunger. It was about healing.
I kissed her slowly, reverently. I tasted the salt of my own tears on her lips. I used my hands to memorize the shape of her face, her shoulders, her waist.
"Stay with me," I whispered against her mouth. "Not just tonight. Stay with me through the draft. Through the chaos."
"I'm not going anywhere," she promised.
"Even if your dad finds out?"
"He can't stop me," she said. "I'm twenty-one. And... I think I just found my grit."
I smiled weakly. "Yeah. You did."
"So," she said, tracing the line of my jaw. "What happens now?"
"Now," I said, "we go back. We win the championship. I get drafted. And then..."
"And then?"
"And then I take you away from here," I said. "We go to Seattle. I buy a house. A big one. With thick walls."
"And a bakery nearby?" she teased.
"And a bakery," I agreed. "And maybe... maybe a yard. For the pups."
She went still. "Pups?"
I froze. I hadn't meant to say that. The wolf had slipped it in.
"Hypothetically," I added quickly. "Eventually. If... if the biology works out."
She didn't pull away. She smiled. A soft, secret smile that made my heart stutter.
"Hypothetically," she agreed. "I like dogs."
We drove back down the mountain in silence, but the truck felt different. The darkness wasn't oppressive anymore. We were a team. We were mated in everything but name.
But as the lights of the university came into view, a knot of dread formed in my stomach.
We had made promises on the mountain. But down here, in the valley... promises were harder to keep.
And I had a feeling that the hardest test was yet to come. The "Third Act" of our lives was waiting, and it didn't care about love. It only cared about tragedy.