Chapter 13
Oakley
We were three hours north of Ironclaw, deep in the wilderness where the cell service died and the snowdrifts were taller than my truck.
I had kidnapped her. Technically.
After practice on Friday, I had looked at Faye—at the dark circles under her eyes, the tremor in her hands when she taped my wrist—and made a command decision. We needed to disappear.
I told Varon I was going to my family’s cabin for the weekend to "rehab in isolation." He bought it because he knew the cabin had a state-of-the-art cryotherapy tank. I didn't tell him I was bringing a plus-one.
The cabin wasn't really a cabin. It was a sprawling, modern glass-and-steel structure perched on the edge of a frozen cliff overlooking Lake Superior. It was cold, sterile, and silent. Just the way the Thornes liked things.
But tonight, with a fire roaring in the massive stone hearth and Faye curled up on the white leather sofa, it felt... different. It felt lived in.
"So," Faye said, blowing on the rim of her mug of hot chocolate. She was wearing one of my old hockey jerseys—it swallowed her whole, reaching her knees—and thick wool socks. "This is where the magic happens?"
"This is where my father comes to brood and check stock prices," I corrected, poking the fire with an iron rod. "I usually hate this place. It's too quiet. But the isolation seemed necessary."
"It is," she agreed, looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the black expanse of the lake. "I feel like we're on the moon."
I walked over and sat next to her, resting my arm along the back of the sofa. My fingers played with the ends of her hair. "You okay? You've been quiet since we crossed the bridge."
"Just thinking," she murmured.
"About what?"
"About how easy it is," she said, turning to look at me. "To run away with you. I should be worried about my exam on Monday. Or about Dr. Aris finding out I'm gone. But I'm not. I'm just... here."
"Here is good," I said. "Here is safe."
"Is it?" She searched my face. "Your dad owns this place, Oakley. Doesn't it feel like we're walking into the belly of the beast?"
"He hasn't been here in two years," I said, my jaw tightening at the mention of him. "He prefers the penthouse in Chicago. The wilderness reminds him too much of what we are."
"What you are," she repeated.
"Animals," I said flatly.
Faye set her mug down on the coffee table. She shifted, tucking her legs under her, turning her full attention to me.
"Tell me," she said softly.
"Tell you what?"
"About him. About your mom. You mentioned it once—in the training room—but you stopped. You said he broke her."
I stiffened. The fire crackled loudly in the silence.
This was the one door I kept locked. The room in my mind where I stored the memories I couldn't look at directly.
"Faye, you don't want to hear this. It's ugly."
"I handle ugly," she reminded me. "I've seen compound fractures. I've seen you after a loss. Talk to me, Oakley. Please. I need to understand why you're so terrified of turning into him."
I looked at her. Her eyes were wide, hazel pools of empathy. She wasn't asking for gossip. She was asking for the map to my minefield so she could walk through it without getting blown up.
I let out a long breath, leaning my head back against the sofa. I stared up at the vaulted ceiling.
"My mother was human," I began, the words feeling heavy and jagged in my throat. "Her name was Sarah. She was... soft. Like you. She was an artist. Painted landscapes."
"She sounds lovely," Faye whispered.
"She was. And my father was obsessed with her. It wasn't love, Faye. I know what love looks like now, and that wasn't it. It was possession. She was his prize. His beautiful, fragile bird that he kept in a gilded cage."
I closed my eyes, the memory surfacing like oil on water.
"I was ten," I said. "It was winter. Like this. We were at the main estate. My father was under pressure—some pack territory dispute, I think. He was stressed. The Wolf was close to the surface."
I felt Faye’s hand land on my knee. A warm anchor.
"He came home early. He smelled another scent on her. It was nothing—she had gone to lunch with a male gallery owner to discuss an exhibit. Totally innocent. But to a Feral Alpha? It smelled like betrayal."
I paused, swallowing the bile that rose in my throat.
"He lost it. He shifted in the house. A full, violent shift. He destroyed the living room. Furniture, paintings... everything."
"Oh god," Faye breathed.
"I hid in the closet," I confessed, my voice barely a whisper. "I heard it. I heard the furniture breaking. I heard him growling. And I heard her screaming. She was trying to calm him down. She kept saying his name. 'Elias, please. Elias, look at me.'"
I opened my eyes, turning to look at Faye.
"He didn't hurt her intentionally," I said, the lie I had told myself for years crumbling. "Or maybe he did. I don't know. He swiped at her. Claws. It wasn't a kill strike, but for a human... it was catastrophic."
Faye’s hand tightened on my knee. Her face was pale.
"She survived," I said quickly. "Physically. But the trauma... it broke her mind. She couldn't look at him anymore. She couldn't look at me. Because I looked like him. I smelled like him. Every time I walked into a room, she flinched."
"Oakley..."
"She left a year later," I finished. "Moved to Europe. I haven't seen her since I was twelve. My father... he erased her. Burned her paintings. Forbade us from speaking her name. He said she was weak. He said she couldn't handle the fire."
Silence descended on the room, heavy and suffocating.
"That's why," I whispered. "That's why I hold back. That's why I count my breaths. That's why I don't let myself get angry. Because I have his blood, Faye. I have his temper. And if I ever did that to you... if I ever made you look at me with that fear... I would put a bullet in my own head."
Faye didn't speak. She moved.
She crawled across the sofa and climbed into my lap. She wrapped her arms around my neck and buried her face in the crook of my shoulder. She held me tight, rocking me slightly.
"You are not him," she said fiercely into my neck. "You were the boy in the closet, Oakley. You weren't the monster. You were the victim."
"I have the monster inside me."
"And you keep him on a leash," she argued, pulling back to cup my face. "You have never hurt me. You have protected me. You have treated me like an equal, not a prize."
"But the risk..."
"Life is a risk!" she cried, tears standing in her eyes. "My dad stepped off a curb and blew out his knee and lost his dream. Accidents happens. Tragedies happen. But loving someone? That's a choice. And I choose you. Monster and all."
I stared at her. This small, fragile creature who had more courage in her pinky finger than my father had in his entire empire.
"You choose me?" I choked out.
"I choose you," she confirmed. "Every day. Until you give me a reason not to."
I broke.
I pulled her against me and kissed her. It wasn't sexual. It was desperate. It was a kiss of gratitude, of relief, of overwhelming love. I poured everything I couldn't say into it.
Thank you. I love you. Stay.
We stayed like that for a long time, just holding each other while the fire burned down to embers.
"Do you think..." I started, hesitating. "Do you think we could have a future? A real one?"
Faye pulled back, resting her forehead against mine. "What do you mean?"
"I mean after the draft," I said. "If I go to Detroit, or Chicago, or wherever. Would you come? You could get a job with the team. Or open your own clinic. We could get a house. Not a glass cage like this. A real house. With a yard. And a dog that isn't a wolf."
She laughed, a wet, sniffly sound. "A dog would be nice. Maybe a golden retriever. Something dumb and happy to balance you out."
"Hey," I protested weakly.
"I would come," she said softly. "I'd follow you anywhere, Oakley. As long as we're together."
"Together," I echoed. It sounded like a prayer.
For a moment, I let myself believe it. I let myself imagine a life where I wasn't just the heir to the Thorne legacy, but just Oakley. A guy with a job and a girl and a dog.
But even as I held her, a cold draft swept through the room, rattling the glass panes.
The storm outside was picking up again.
And deep down, I knew the peace couldn't last. My father was still out there. The draft was coming. The secrets were piling up.
But for tonight... tonight, I had her. And that was enough.
"Take me to bed, Wolf," she whispered.
"With pleasure, Mouse."
I carried her to the master bedroom, leaving the ghosts of my past by the dying fire.