Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Sienna
The café is one of those quiet places on the edge of the human town, with mismatched chairs, steam curling off a battered espresso machine, and a cinnamon-roll smell baked so deep into the walls that it feels like a hug.
I chose it because I can be anonymous. Nobody here knows me or cares who I am, and right now, that is exactly what I need.
Ethan slides into the seat across from me with two cups in his hands.
“Cappuccino for the lady,” he says, pushing one across. “Extra foam. Violet told me.”
“Of course she did.” I wrap both hands around the cup just to have something to hold on to. As the warmth sinks into my palms, I make myself look at him. “Ethan, I’m sorry.”
His eyebrows lift. “For?”
“For”—I gesture uselessly at the air between us—“jumping on you like that. In Lucas’s office. I practically knocked you over.”
He laughs. It is such a normal, easy sound, and my chest aches because I haven’t heard a laugh like that directed at me in a while.
“Sienna, it’s fine.”
“It’s not fine.” I try not to let my embarrassment show. “We’ve met, what, three times?”
“Four.” He grins. “The budget review in April. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the budget review.”
My face feels hot. “I try very hard to forget that.”
“That hurts me.” His mouth tugs up at the corner. “I wore my good tie.”
I huff out a noise that is almost a laugh. It feels strange in my throat. Rusty. My wolf does not stir inside me, and I am grateful because she has been snarling and then going silent in turns for days, and I do not need her weighing in on this.
“I threw myself at you like you were my long-lost brother,” I say, dropping my eyes to the foam on my cappuccino. “I’m embarrassed. That is not how I conduct myself with colleagues.”
“Darius explained the situation to me.”
My head snaps up. Ethan is watching me with those calm, steady eyes he has. Not pitying. Just attentive.
“He sent me to check on you,” he says. “I should have led with that. I didn’t want you to feel like I was hounding you.”
“Oh.” My face is really burning now. I look back down at the foam.
Of course Darius sent him. Of course Ethan didn’t wander up to Silvercrest on a whim.
Nobody pops by another pack’s territory for fun.
I knew that, in some distant corner of my mind, the second I saw him standing in Lucas’s office.
But the rest of me was so grateful to see someone from home that I didn’t register his true reason for coming and made up that tale about having invited him.
“Darius should have told me you were coming. Or at least let Alpha Steele know.”
“As you said, you’re allowed visitors, Sienna,” Ethan says with a small smile. “Don’t worry too much about it. But I have to say, I’m relieved to see you. You are very important to Violet, and that’s why Darius doesn’t want to see you hurting. You seem to be doing better than they expected.”
“I can do my job.” I frown. “I told Darius I wouldn’t let him down.”
“Yeah, but being rejected by your fated mate is very painful, Sienna. Darius knows that from personal experience, after all. Being in such close proximity to both Alpha Steele and his intended is not good for you.”
“I know.” I take a sip of my coffee. “I appreciate all of you looking out for me. And I am so happy to see someone from home. I needed this. I didn’t realize how isolated I had begun to feel ever since the rest of the Moonvale team left a week ago.
The Silvercrest folks are nice, but with how complicated things are with Lucas, staying here is not easy. ”
Ethan leans forward. “Then go home. Look, Darius didn’t just send me to check up on you.
If you want to hand over this project, I’ll take it.
I’ve read the merger brief. I can handle this.
You can be back in Moonvale in two days.
” He lifts one shoulder. “You’re not trapped here, Sienna.
I want you to know that. You don’t have to put yourself through all this. ”
I lift my head and meet his gaze. “I want to stay. I want to prove to myself that I won’t be felled by this.
Lucas orchestrated it all to drive me out, Ethan.
The constant push and pull, giving me hints of hope…
He wanted to teach me a lesson and send me home crying with my tail between my legs.
” My jaw is hard, my insides cold. “I will not give him the satisfaction. I will see this assignment through and go home with my head held high, my pride intact.”
Ethan stares at me as I speak and then smiles slowly. “I can respect that. When you do come back, though, I think I may want to court you.”
I blink. “What?”
He folds his hands behind his head, grinning. “There’s something about a strong woman that gets me all worked up. You and I might be a match made in heaven.”
I chuckle. “Stop it.”
He studies me with an intensity that makes me look away, flustered.
“I’ll stay for two days,” he says. “I promised Violet I’d keep you distracted. And I can do the additional work of showing Alpha Steele that you, Miss Carter, are in very high demand.”
I grin at that. “I think he has an idea. After he announced his engagement, I went out and partied. I came back wrecked. I wouldn’t be surprised if he thought I went out and got laid.”
Ethan’s eyes widen. “Sienna, you—”
“I was a woman scorned.” I shrug, ignoring the spasm of pain inside my chest. “He may not want me, but it did his pride some serious damage that his fated mate went out and found another man.”
“Did you, though?” Ethan asks in a hushed voice.
“Of course not! But I let him think it.”
“Strong and vindictive.” He grins. “Just my type.”
Being flirted with like this makes me feel slightly better. The knot of tension I’ve been carrying in my stomach for the past few days eases, and I give him a genuine smile.
“I’m really happy you came, Ethan. We may not know each other very well, but you have no idea how comforting your visit is.”
He smiles warmly. “I’m glad.”
We end up going to dinner after coffee, and while I don’t feel any butterflies in my stomach when I look at Ethan, I silently thank Violet and Darius for sending him here.
When we get back to the estate, I see Lucas’s office light still on, his silhouette in the window.
I look away and keep walking, my arm looped through Ethan’s.
Two nights later, I stand on the steps of the estate house as Ethan is about to leave.
He grins up at me. “Don’t go falling in love with anyone else for the next couple of weeks. I intend to wear you down when you return. You have no idea how good I look in tux.”
I laugh. “I make no promises.”
He comes back up to my step and cups my face with both hands, his voice warm and low. “Look after yourself. You’re not alone, Sienna. Don’t forget that.”
I nod, feeling slightly sad. Having Ethan here has been a huge comfort.
I watch his car disappear down the long driveway. The taillights shrink, and the gates swing closed behind him. The quiet that settles over the estate afterward is heavier than any I have known.
I walk back to my room on legs that feel borrowed. Alone again, the momentary distraction gone, I’m back to who I was.
I close the door softly behind me and stand in front of the full-length mirror by the armoire. The woman looking back at me is wearing a perfectly pressed, cream-colored blouse. Hair in a neat twist. Presentable. Professional. Unaffected.
I know how I look from the outside. I’ve been working on it.
But I am only a husk.
I lift one hand and watch the woman in the mirror lift hers, too. She makes the gesture with a smoothness that does not match what I feel, which is nothing. A small, dry nothing, like the inside of me has been scoured out with sand.
My wolf does not even lift her head when I focus inward.
She is curled tightly behind my ribs, nose tucked under her tail, where she has been since the day Lydia took Lucas’s hand in the conference room.
The deliberate humiliation of having our fated mate choose another in front of us broke her in a way I don’t know how to mend.
I used to roll my eyes at the way older pack members spoke about fated mate bonds.
The stories were always the same. My grandmother had one: “You’ll know when you meet him.
Your soul will know him. It’s the most beautiful thing.
” I always smiled politely and thought, “Sure, but I am also perfectly capable of choosing my own mate, thank you.”
I did not understand.
I had no idea that a bond could hurt like this.
That when a fated mate rejects you, he does not just walk away; he reaches inside you, takes out a piece of you, and leaves a hollow where it used to be.
That your wolf, who is the oldest and truest part of you, can go so quiet, you begin to wonder if she is still alive in there at all.
Fairy tales. That is what I thought those stories were. Pretty, romantic, harmless fairy tales.
This is not a fairy tale.
I turn away from the mirror before I can start hating the woman in it.
I change out of my work clothes into soft, gray leggings and an oversized sweater, gather my hair into a messier knot, and pad downstairs in slipper socks to raid the kitchen. Drinking some water should help. My throat has been raw for days, and I keep forgetting to stay hydrated.
The estate is quiet at this hour. Most of the household has gone to bed, and the corridor lights are low. My feet make no sound on the runner.
I am reaching for the door to the butler’s pantry when Lydia opens it from the other side.
We both stop. For one awkward beat, we just look at each other.
Her hair is down around her shoulders in a way I almost never see it. She’s holding a glass of milk, and she looks like any other woman in any other house, caught between tasks. The gold of her informal engagement band glints at me from her left hand. I don’t look at it.
“Sienna.”
“Lydia.” I gesture vaguely past her. “Just getting a glass of water.”
“Of course.”