Chapter 9 - Selene
I wake up warm and far too comfortable, and that’s the first thing that’s all wrong about this. I shouldn’t be snuggled up in this bed.
The feeling nags that I shouldn’t be comfortable here, that there’s something wrong about all this.
The light seems different, the mattress is softer, and there are sounds beyond the room that don’t fit.
Then I wake up a little more, and as the sleepiness fades, it all comes rushing back in one ugly wave.
My wasted escape attempt, the tree line, his hand closing around my wrist, the magic slipping through my fingers, along with my chance of freedom, and the humiliating walk back down the hill.
The fact that he had to carry me at one point.
I’m in Ronan’s cabin. I escaped, and I failed. And then I proceeded to sleep better than I have in years, under the roof of the shifter who kidnapped me. It’s like I’ve got a death wish.
I turn my head and spot a bag sitting by the door and a stack of books I recognize on the side table.
Someone must have packed up the cabin and brought everything down.
Ronan must have brought them in while I was asleep, and I didn’t even notice; the thought unsettles me and makes me blush at the same time, which feels unnerving.
I force myself to get up because lying here feeling sorry for myself isn’t a plan, and if I’ve learned anything recently, it’s that I need to make better plans.
The room itself gives me nothing useful.
The window already hums with freshly enacted wards, the bed is large and undeniably comfortable, with genuine heating, which is rare in these old cabins, and there’s a surprisingly nice bathroom with my belongings waiting to be unpacked.
The expectation that I’ll be staying a while hangs in the air.
I dress quickly in a comfortable matching pants-and-top set, wash my face, and rifle through the bag until I find the brush and toiletries.
No need to look as rattled as I feel. When I’m satisfied I look presentable, I walk the room, running my hand along the seams of the wards, looking for weaknesses I know won’t be there.
When I get to the door, I try the handle, surprised to find it unlocked, and step out into the quiet hallway.
The cabin looks bigger than it did last night, and in some way worse for being so nice.
I turn the corner, and it opens up into the main room, with a long table and beautiful reclaimed flooring, a kitchen at the far end that he has clearly spent money on but hardly ever uses; it looks spotless, like something out of a photoshoot with the large picture window behind it overlooking the docks and ocean beyond, the island just visible in the distance.
I can just picture him standing there, looking out at the one thing that has driven him his whole life—even when he’s standing in this beautiful kitchen, with everything he’s built all around him, I bet he still can’t just enjoy it.
I walk through the main room, past the bookshelves that are stacked two deep.
I spot one that I recognize from the shelves in my coven’s library, a guide to coastal herbs, and it makes me wonder why a rogue wolf would care to own it.
Perhaps it’s Ryder’s; Ronan doesn’t strike me as much of a reader, though looking at all these books, perhaps I’ve got that wrong.
Resting my hands on the smooth surface of the kitchen island, I run my fingers along the grain and consider that it would be so much easier if his home were cold, dark, and scary to match the things he has done to me.
Instead, it feels warm, lived-in, and a little lonely, in the way the walls feel a little too quiet.
And finding myself feeling sorry for him, thinking of him looking out at that damn island from his own kitchen window, makes a person so much harder to hate than if he were just a straight-up monster.
“There’s coffee,” he says, behind me.
I turn too fast. He’s walking in from the porch with the cold wrapped around him, his dark hair damp, sleeves shoved up his forearms, and my stupid heart starts racing at the sight of him. I tell myself it’s fear, but I know that’s a lie.
“I don’t want your coffee,” I tell him.
“That’s a lie,” he says, crossing to the barista-style machine in the corner, the only thing that looks well used in the kitchen. “You’ve been awake for half an hour. I heard your heartbeat change.”
Damn wolves and their unfair advantages. “Well, that’s deeply invasive.”
“So is tricking a kind boy into leaving the door unlocked, or trying to break wards I spent all night installing,” he says, pouring two cups and holding one out for me. “Truce? It’s only a coffee.”
I take it because I’m never going to win a standoff without caffeine, even if I don’t want to admit wanting it.
I take a long, restorative sip, hoping that he’ll just vanish before I’ve finished drinking so I don’t have to deal with him right now.
Unfortunately, not only is he still there, but the coffee is so good I also make an embarrassingly contented sigh before I can stop myself.
“You approve,” he grins.
“Clearly a good coffee machine, zero skill required,” I retort.
He shrugs, clearly amused, and leans back against the counter, his arms folded in a way that annoyingly highlights his well-built frame, which I stubbornly refuse to think about, and says, “Emma told me you like rich coffee, and I pay attention, especially to things I mean to keep.”
“I’m not a thing,” I snap.
“No,” he agrees, “but you are mine to look after now, and if that includes supplying decent coffee, then I’m happy to oblige.”
He doesn’t wait for a reply, simply turns and pulls a fresh loaf from a bag before arranging a range of honey and preserves on the table. He slides a plate over to me. “Eat. Can’t have you fainting if you’re going back to the clinic today.”
“The famous Ronan charm I’m so used to,” I say, taking the plate.
“I tend to save my charm for those who don’t bite.” He delivers the words perfectly straight, but there’s a glint of humor beneath the surface, and I have to look down and concentrate on the bread to stop myself from smiling.
That’s the whole problem, right there. I should have a cutting remark for every single thing this man says.
Instead, I find myself having to swallow a smile, enjoying his coffee, and sleeping well under his roof.
I tear a piece of bread off and force myself to eat it just to give me something to do; a distraction from myself.
He’s watching me, and I feel every second of it.
Eventually, he puts his own cup down and the tinge of humor from before fades into something more business-like.
“Here’s how this is going to work,” he says.
“You’ll sleep here, eat here, and during the day you can still go out—with a guard, of course—to the clinic, the bakery, or whatever it is you do.
But you don’t even try a stunt like last night, and you don’t go out after dark.
This cabin has security that goes far beyond wards. ”
“And if I do—go out, I mean,” I say, carefully, “after dark?”
“You won’t try me on this,” he says with no heat to his words at all.
“You know you could be locked in a cell right now, you know this isn’t a punishment—not how you’re being kept, at least. You know you wouldn’t have made it through the tree line last night, even with your cloaking.
And I’m sure you’d rather spend the day helping at the clinic or having coffee with some of the very nice people here than being locked in a room, alone. Take the win, witch.”
He’s right, and I hate how right he is, and I hate even more that he seems to read my mind. “You’re making it very hard for me to be angry with you, you know that?”
“I’m aware,” he says, the glint returning to his eye. “I’m counting on it, actually.”
And there’s the truth that’s hanging between us. He’s not even trying to hide it. I know exactly what he wants, and I should be fighting it harder. I am fighting it, but at the same time, I feel myself being drawn to him like a magnet, and I can’t seem to stop myself.
“You’re staring,” I say.
“I am,” he replies, not even slightly sorry.
“It’s rude,” I tell him, color creeping up my cheeks.
“So is breaking my heart by trying to leave just when I thought we were getting along well,” he replies, his lips curling in one of those half-smiles. “We all have our flaws.”
“You’re very sure of yourself to think the kidnapped won’t want to escape,” I say quietly.
“True,” he says, “but I know you don’t want Bram getting in trouble over you. You’ve made friends here, and you see the good. You could have fought me last night—you would have lost, obviously—but you didn’t, because you know you’re better off in here than out there.”
I open my mouth but find I have nothing to say to that, so I drink my coffee and say nothing instead, and he at least has the grace not to gloat, though I can see the victory shining in his eyes.
A knock at the door saves me from having to find a better method of deflection.
He pushes off the counter and goes to answer it, and I hear a woman’s voice on the step.
She’s talking quickly, her tone high and frightened, something about her boy and a fever that came up overnight.
I drift toward the hall without meaning to, my coffee still in hand, and I watch as he talks to her.
He’s different with her. Not soft, exactly, because I’m not sure Ronan knows how to be soft, but steady and so certain that I watch as she visibly begins to calm.
She explains that she can’t find Emma, and he tells her that Emma was expected at the docks this morning for a new delivery of medical supplies.
He’ll have her sent to the boys’ home immediately, and someone else will handle the delivery.
He assures her that her boy will be tearing around the settlement again in no time.
She takes his hand, and he lets her hold on; he doesn’t make her feel foolish for being so afraid.
I almost offer to help, having tended enough fevers in my coven, but I hesitate.
I’m not one of them; the woman doesn’t know me, and I linger back in the shadows until she leaves.
I watch as he pulls out his phone and calls someone, presumably Emma, talking in a hush about the boy and what needs to be done. He hangs up, firing off another text before he turns and catches me watching.
“What?” he says.
“Nothing,” I reply quickly, turning back into the kitchen.
But it isn’t nothing, and he knows it. In the middle of trying to hate him, a scared mother turned up on his doorstep, and he calmed her, and sent her back to his bedside with help on the way. He’s a true alpha, out here in the middle of nowhere, and it feels less and less like rogue territory.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he says, finally.
“You do, do you?” I reply.
“Sure,” he says, eyeing me carefully. “You’re seeing me as a person, a leader, and you’d prefer I stay the villain. It would be easier, wouldn’t it?”
“Easier for you, I guess,” I say, knowing I should shut this conversation down, but I can’t help myself.
“I don’t care about easy. I gave up on that long ago,” he says, something moving behind his eyes, there and then gone just as quickly.
“That woman trusts you,” I say. “They all do, everyone I’ve met here.
People don’t think you’re a monster, and they don’t seem like rogues, either.
” I don’t know why I’m pushing it; with every word, I feel like I just tip my own hand, and I think any desire to understand him better is actually just part of the trap.
“People here would follow whoever fed them and kept them warm,” he shrugs. “That’s not the same as trust; that’s acceptable terms. Don’t go thinking I’m all virtuous, Selene.”
“I think you talk a good game,” I reply. “The cold version of yourself you want me to see, a man that only cares about one thing…revenge. But you care about these people, you’ve hung pictures on the walls, you’ve made a real home here.”
My words seem to land, and he goes still for a moment, but then smiles, slow and a little dangerous. As though I’ve done something far more interesting than just dig a little too deep.
“Careful,” he says softly. “You sound like you want to get to know me.”
He walks back toward the kitchen with his empty cup, and for a moment, we’re close. Too close. His chest brushes my shoulder, and his height and heat feel all too apparent. Everything in me goes incredibly still.
I’ve never even been kissed, and yet I suddenly feel a certainty overtake me, and I want him to touch me again more than anything.
The intensity of it almost knocks me over, because I’ve spent twenty-two years keeping men, and everyone else, at a polite distance, raised by my coven to be wary of everyone.
And I’m pretty sure they meant to be wary of men like Ronan most of all.
Neither of us says anything, and I’m too embarrassed to even look in his direction.
I feel all the humor and conversation die, as though all the air has just been sucked out of the room.
I wonder if, for all his talk, he’s not unaffected by all this, either.
That whatever strange pull I feel, he feels it, too.
Or is this just more manipulation? I’m not so sure.
When I finally look up at him, I can see that he’s noticed my reaction.
Of course he notices. His gaze drops to my mouth and comes back up to my eyes, unhurried, unashamed.
He doesn’t step back, and neither do I. I remember what he said about being able to hear how my breathing changed when I woke up, and I wonder what my breathing is telling him now. My cheeks burn at the thought.
“You should go and get dressed,” he says, low, and there’s a depth to it that wasn’t there a minute ago. “While I’m still being patient.”
The word patient is what breaks the spell. The word, tossed down so lightly, reminds me exactly what this is. It’s a plan, a strategy, and I’m in his crosshairs. None of this is real.
I step back so fast, I stumble. He doesn’t reach for me, but I see his fists ball, like he’s holding himself back.
“I’m not one of your strategies,” I tell him, proud that my voice comes out steady despite my turbulent feelings.
“No,” he says, watching me retreat. “But you want to be. And that’s the part you’re going to have to make your peace with before I get my hands on you.”
The thought of his hands on me makes me head spin, but I refuse to let him see it. “You’re the one who needs to make peace with not getting what you want. Consider it character building.”
It’s a good line to exit on, and I almost believe it myself.
I take my coffee and what’s left of my pride back down the hall to my room and shut the door. I lean against it, my heart racing, and hating that he’ll be able to hear it.