Chapter 8 - Ronan
I see her on my way to my office in the pack hall, sitting in the bakery window, laughing with Emma and Cara over coffee. I nearly do a double-take, only settling when I spot Tom sitting nearby—though if she were going to escape, I doubt she would stop for coffee.
She’s laughing, and it’s one of those real laughs that takes over her whole face, with her head tipped back and nothing held back.
The ones she gives to other people here, but never me.
It feels deliberate, and I guess I can’t blame her.
The smile still stops me dead, though, and my wolf zeroes in on it, refusing to back away.
He’s furious. At first, he was frustrated by having his mate so close with my refusal to claim her, and now he’s furious at my increased distance.
He doesn’t understand that I need to be able to bond with her for the magic, but keep my head clear.
I can’t allow myself to be weakened by the full mate bond.
I force myself to keep moving, but the sight of her stays with me all day.
By evening, I’ve made my decision. My wolf is on the edge, winter is coming, and the window I’ve spent years prying open will close when the weather shifts.
My ships will be exposed, and the patrols will tighten.
I’m done waiting for her to soften toward me. I don’t have time.
So I decide to step things up and head up to see her.
I know there’s a half-finished chess game ready and waiting, and I tell myself the tension I feel is mainly the thrill of the chase, the anticipation of seeing my plans come to fruition, and the knowledge she only needs to be slightly willing for this to work—that I can work with.
She seems na?ve despite her sharp tongue, and I can use that.
Halfway up the hill, I see Bram coming down, later than usual.
He’s a great kid, but right now he’s got a faraway look I recognize when men are too busy thinking about girls.
He snaps out of it when I approach and tells me that Selene has eaten and that he’s only running late because the cook made too much and she made him have some.
He’s rambling like someone who has been caught doing something he shouldn’t, so I let him talk and linger longer than I should, asking him about the boat he’s building with his friends.
Bram is a great kid and will make a fine beta one day, once he learns not to get so flustered.
Lingering was a mistake; I just didn’t realize it at the time.
The second I reach the cabin door, I know the wards are down. The low hum that should be there isn’t, and although the door initially looks closed, it swings open when I touch the handle. I step inside and immediately sense the cabin is empty.
Of course it is. She’s been waiting for her moment, and clearly, she either found it or Bram handed it to her.
My wolf surges, coming up so fast I have to lock my jaw to force the shift back down.
I stand in the doorway for a moment, taking a deep breath, and let myself settle into feeling nothing.
Nothing at all. Because feeling angry will only slow me down. Then I go after her.
I let my wolf surface just enough to catch her scent—even without it, I’d know she was heading for the tree line, though if she thinks that’s a weak spot in our defenses, she’s going to be disappointed.
I break into a jog, her scent wrapping around me like a floral embrace, and for once, I let my wolf indulge in his mate’s presence because it makes it easier to track her down.
I could do it blindfolded at this point.
I don’t pause to raise the alarm, because the idea of the border guards catching her, putting their hands on her, is more than I can handle at the moment, so I run her down in the dark.
I find her at the very edge of the forest, half crouched against a tree, hands up, lips already moving in the way a witch does when reaching for her magic.
She’s only just begun, I can tell, because although my wolf can see the aura of her magic swirling around her, her body is only half cloaked.
I traverse the tree line before using my shifter strength to speed up, closing the distance in seconds and grabbing her wrist. Whatever magic she had left in reserve dies in a scream of frustration.
She whirls around to face me, a look of pure indignation on her face as if she can’t believe I found her—the cloaking spell is still gently wrapped around her, and her frustration at how close she came to fully enacting the spell is written all over her face.
What she doesn’t realize, though, is that it wouldn’t have mattered.
My wolf thinks she’s his mate, so he’d have found her, cloaking or no cloaking.
She turns and twists in my grip with everything she has, but gets nowhere.
If anything, I tighten my grip. Not to be cruel, but she needs to understand how this is going to go.
I tell her to stop, but she doesn’t until she wears herself out, and I just stand there watching her energy fade until she sags against the tree and glares at me.
“Are you done?” I ask, keeping my voice low, because my wolf is right on the edge. If I let her see how close he is, she’ll only get more frightened, and right now, I want her compliant.
“Not really,” she snaps. “What did you expect? That I’d just live here forever because you said so? I’m not going to just give up.”
“Yes, you are,” I tell her calmly. “This won’t happen again.”
She begins to argue. I see the moment her defiance rises, and my wolf isn’t having any of it.
“Do you know where you are? How far are you from anywhere you might recognize?” I say.
“Do you know that out there are the real rogues, the ones I can’t help?
Do you know what they would do to a bond witch?
They wouldn’t worry about the willing part. ”
If I thought that was going to be the final word, I’m mistaken. Her eyes flare as she straightens. “You are no better,” she snaps. “You want me to help you start your personal war? What makes you think you’re any different from those so-called rogues out there?”
“Oh, I am different,” I tell her, stepping closer and pressing her against the hard lines of the tree. “Maybe not better, but definitely different. But I don’t want you harmed, and that can’t be said for the men out there.”
“Right,” she scoffs. “But this is still a cage, and people in cages tend to want to escape. You can dress it up however you want, but you don’t get to kidnap me and then pretend you’re keeping me here for my own protection.”
It’s a fair hit, and I don’t argue, though I feel my jaw working, itching to try and make her understand…
understand what, though? There’s nothing I can really say that won’t make me a liar, so I don’t argue.
“Hate the cage if you want, but at least you’re alive. You wouldn’t last the night out there.”
She opens her mouth to say something, but I don’t give her the chance.
I’m done standing out here arguing over something she has no control over, anyway, and I won’t have the patrols coming by and finding me arguing with a captive over whether she should be a captive or not.
I pull her to me and begin walking her back along the tree line toward the lights of the cabins, my hand locked around her waist. She stumbles along beside me, clearly wanting to walk rather than be dragged.
“You know,” I tell her as we go, my grip on her tight.
“Your coven did an excellent job hiding you while you grew up, mainly out of fear, of course. But the secret is out now. When we took you, that was over; the secret slipped. Plenty of alphas in this state know where you are now. They’re watching, they’re waiting. ”
I feel the moment that lands, and I feel the way her body tenses next to me.
I almost feel bad for her, laying out the very real threat that doesn’t just come from me, but a raft of other men who would want her for their own ends.
I wonder briefly how well her coven prepared her for the reality of her bond magic.
Suddenly, she stops walking, and I let her. She turns to me, and I see a fear dawning on her face that looks different; I don’t think it’s about her.
“What happens to Bram?” she asks. “He didn’t let me escape.”
It stops me where I stand. She’s out here in the dark with her one chance to escape in pieces, and the thing she’s most bothered about is whether the boy who clearly left her door unlocked because his head was in the clouds will get in trouble.
My foolish wolf settles a fraction under the weight of her softness, and I want to roll my eyes, but I don’t, because the truth is, I’m glad she cares about Bram enough to ask.
“Bram is mine to deal with,” I tell her. “Not yours. But he’ll be fine. Longer training, extra chores. But I don’t break my men over one mistake. That’s the difference between what you want to think of me and what the reality is here. Remember that.”
She doesn’t reply, but she does nod, which is good enough, and she lets me pull her along as we begin walking down the hill again toward town.
Her cloaking spell has evaporated completely now, and she’s not fighting in my grip anymore.
I realize she’s shaking slightly, and I know it’s not fear—I think it might be adrenaline wearing off, but then I realize how icy cold her hands are.
“You’re freezing,” I say.
“I’m fine,” she lies.
I let the lie go as we’re almost at the road now, and she automatically turns to walk toward the path that leads to her cabin, but I maintain my grip on her waist, and we continue on toward the main street. She looks at me with confusion. I don’t owe her an explanation, but I give her one anyway.
“You’ll be with me, in my cabin,” I tell her. “Where can I keep an eye on you?”
“Absolutely not,” she says, planting her feet in the dirt and trying to fight the inevitable. “You can’t just make me stay with you.”
I laugh; I can’t help it. It’s not filled with humor, but it still slips free. “What do you think this is? A negotiation?” I ask. “I’ll have your things brought down.”
I can tell she wants to argue, but she knows I’m right.
There is no room for negotiation here; this is not a debate.
I can also feel her hands shaking more as the cold night settles in her bones, and I notice the way she stumbles despite me holding her waist. Without thinking too deeply, I stop and lift her into my arms, hooking an arm under her knees.
She mutters at me to put her down, but there’s no heat behind her words, and I carry her the rest of the way to my cabin.
My cabin sits at the top of the rise, just off the main street, and with a clear view down to the docks. On a clear night, I can see the lights from the island ports from the porch, which has served as a reminder to keep going on many a long night.
I left the fire burning, so it’s warm when we walk in, and the low lights bathe the entrance hall in a soft light that makes it look homely.
The structure was already here when we started building the settlement, but Ryder and I built extra rooms, redid the roof, and added the porch.
We were going to live here together, but after a couple of years it became clear we needed space—or rather, Ryder wanted more space for his books, and he wanted to be down by the water’s edge, so I helped him build a new place right by the beach.
And now I have more space than I need and a very impressive kitchen that I barely use.
It still makes me happy, though, because every time I use it just to make coffee, I think how happy it would have made our mother to see that we have these comforts—even if I only use the stove to reheat leftovers.
I set her down, and she stands wearily, shifting away from me, embarrassed, I think, that she let me carry her at all.
She looks around, and I see the space through her eyes.
I wonder if she found it easier to hate me when I was just an abstract monster, a kidnapper.
Not a man with a warm home, a coffee machine, and pictures on the walls, even if I didn’t actually choose them or hang them myself because Tristen does all the caring.
She stands there, half-frozen, her eyes scanning the windows and the exits, quickly mapping the environment, trying to work out the potential escape routes and weigh up the threat. I’m the threat.
“This way,” I say.
She hesitates, but then follows, weary but clearly cold and too spent to argue.
I take her down the hall and open the door to the spare room that always has a bed made because Lottie, the cleaner for the pack hall who insists on tidying up my cabin too once a month, keeps everything ready for a guest, though I’m never sure who she thinks I’ll have to stay.
It’s a simple room, but comfortable, and I watch the exact moment she registers that I haven’t taken her to my room, and the way her shoulders drop with relief.
“I’ll have those windows fixed with wards by morning,” I tell her, “but even if you tried to escape, you wouldn’t clear the security system, magic or not, so don’t even try.”
She nods and glances around, her teeth worrying her bottom lip, making her flush even more pink, which I try not to notice. “Where’s your room?”
I grin, letting my canines show. “You want to know where my room is?” I ask, watching as she blushes, shaking her head, a denial on the tip of her tongue.
I incline my head. “Across the hall. I won’t bother you in your sleep.
You have my word. I’ll have your things brought down, so get comfortable. ”
She takes it all in with her jaw set, and she doesn’t argue, which I suspect is costing her something because there’s a fire burning in her eyes.
“I hate you,” she says. There’s no heat to the words, though, just exhaustion, and something else she’s holding back.
“I know,” I say, turning away before my wolf riles me up any further.
He’s happier than he’s been in over a month of her being here, all because she’s now under the same roof.
And that’s exactly why I didn’t want it to happen, but I’ve had my hand forced, and here we are.
She’s a distraction I can’t afford, but if I have to keep her close, then I’m just going to have to use it to my advantage.
I’ve never failed to tire of a woman once I’ve had a taste of her—the sooner I fuck her, take the bond magic, and realize that she’s nothing special, the sooner I can get back to concentrating solely on the island.