Chapter 14
Olivia
Isaw Elias first this time.
A few days had passed since Jake’s shift. With my patient feeling better, I could stay out later now.
I spotted Elias along the trail that broke open toward the road, half-shadowed by a Douglas fir like he’d chosen the exact spot for how it would look.
His hands were in his pockets, and he swayed back and forth casually. Waiting.
The fog hung low, thick along the ground, curling around his boots. Despite the friendliness of his face, something about him felt off. Like he didn’t belong there.
He was facing the road with a distant gaze.
I almost turned back.
On the night of the attack, Caleb told me about other wolves in the area. He name-dropped Elias’s last name: Voss.
“Our rival pack.”
I hadn’t dealt with it yet. One, I was mostly in shock because of the whole “werewolves are real thing” and, two, I wanted to figure things out on my own.
Seeing him here now, however, I hesitated. What exactly was I supposed to say to him?
I took a slow breath.
Why run now?
The past few weeks, I managed to pull teeth in order to get answers. It finally worked, at least somewhat.
Besides, there was something Elias said from a long while back that was still with me.
“Let’s just say there are people who aren’t too happy with them.”
I kept running. I let my rhythm hold. Let my breathing stay even, controlled, like I hadn’t seen him. This was still just a run on the Ashwoods’ turf. I wasn’t the one who looked weird passing by him.
The gravel shifted under my shoes. The sound was too loud. Too sharp in the quiet.
Elias didn’t move at first. But I soon heard his footsteps join mine on the gravel.
Seeing him now — knowing what I knew — felt like rereading something I’d once trusted at least slightly and catching the line where it had always gone wrong.
It explained everything. His general curiosity. It explained why he was so keen on poking holes in whatever regard I had for Caleb and the rest of the family.
I remembered all the ease he had. The way he stood like nothing in the world could push him out of place. I’d thought it was confidence.
Now it felt like control.
I dared a glance at where Elias was standing. He was right at the edge of Ashwood land. Not over it. Not even close enough to pretend it might’ve been an accident.
Exactly at the line.
I was getting closer. Five yards. Four. Finally, I passed him.
For a moment, I thought he would stay where he was. Instead, I heard the gravel a little behind me start to kick up. His shadow stretched beside him.
My pulse hammered. I kept my face straight ahead. Look at anything, I thought. Just not at him.
Elias was now right beside me. I glanced over before I could stop myself.
Elias grinned and lifted his chin.
“Morning,” he said.
I didn’t answer that. I kept jogging.
"It's been a few days," he said.
"Has it?"
"You've been staying closer to the estate."
“A little.”
Elias’s gaze moved over me — quick, assessing, not pretending it wasn’t.
I let my exhale run long, steady. “You’ve been keeping track.”
His mouth curved slightly. Any day before this, I would have found it endearing. Now I just found it unnerving.
“Something like that,” he said. “I take it then you’ve finally grown accustomed to the Ashwoods. Caleb. His family.”
My nostrils flared. Even if I wanted to show no reaction, the way he said Caleb’s name just rubbed me the wrong way.
“All their little secrets?”
I stopped hard.
Elias ran past me by just a few steps before turning around.
“Cut the crap, Elias,” I said.
His expression didn't change. He merely shrugged.
“I’m sorry, did I say something wrong?” he asked.
I swallowed. “You’re right,” I said. “I know what you are. I also know now why you’ve been ‘running into me’ whenever you have the chance.”
“Go on,” Elias said. “Say it.”
“You’re a werewolf.”
Elias’s smile only grew wider. He clapped slowly. “I was wondering when you’d figure it out,” he said. He wagged his finger at me. “I’ll admit. I’m rather impressed. The Ashwoods are a hard nut to crack.”
I crossed my arms. I only noticed then how much my legs were shaking. I focused on being angry.
“If you were so bent on me learning about the Ashwoods,” I said. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”
This time, Elias laughed.
I wanted to say it was a mocking laugh. Something to point out what a stupid question it was. But mostly, it sounded amused.
“Would you have believed me?” he asked. “You’re in the medical field. For all I know, you would have me admitted for delirium!”
I bit my inner cheek. I hated that he was right.
“That doesn’t explain why you’re here, though,” I said. “You’re rivals to the Ashwoods, aren’t you? I’m not that caught up to speed on wolf lore, but I would say trespassing is a bit of a no-no, don’t you?”
“I was on the line earlier, not past it,” Elias teased. “Just so we’re clear.”
“Why are you here?” I repeated.
Elias tilted his head slightly one way, and then the other.
Finally, he shrugged. “If I’m honest?” he said. “I was curious about you.”
“Because I’m with Caleb?”
This time he scoffed. “Because you’re fascinating,” he said. “You have to admit, not everyone stays when they know the truth.”
He chuckled. “But you did.”
Elias moved back toward me. “But now that we have that out of the way…”
I flinched, but held my ground.
I tried to move back as Elias closed the gap between us. He paused just inches before my face. He then backed away slightly and opened his arms.
“You can ask me anything," he said.
I raised my brow.
“Just like that?”
"I won’t hurt you." A beat, timed too perfectly.
Elias gestured for us to continue walking. I followed.
"You know about fated mates," he started a few minutes later. We were making our rounds along the inner path this time.
"Yes."
"So, you know what you are to Caleb Ashwood."
The word yes stuck somewhere in my throat. Not because I didn't know — but because saying it out loud, in front of him, was something else entirely.
“I have an idea. Broad strokes and such.”
Elias bobbed his head in acknowledgement.
“‘Broad strokes’,” he said with a chuckle. “How very typical of him.”
I squinted. “So what can you tell me then?”
Elias walked a little further along before giving me his answer.
“You may already know this part,” Elias said. “But I think it’s worth exploring a little further. That bond of yours? It doesn’t wait. It doesn’t ask. His wolf decided first.”
I remembered my discussion with Caleb. How he always sounded so… apologetic whenever he mentioned the bond.
Elias looked at me. "Does that not bother you?"
I kept my face neutral. Harder than it should have been. It was an answer I'd been trying to avoid.
If the bond did something to Caleb — if it acted on him, on his body, on his instincts — then how much of what he felt was him?
“You’re assuming the bond is all there is,” I said.
“I’m saying you don’t know where the bond ends and he begins.”
I didn't answer.
Elias let the silence sit for a moment. Then, he shifted. Not physically — just the quality of his attention. The harsh smugness of his gaze softened. His grin lowered into a smaller, but more earnest smile.
"I've been watching you for weeks,” he admitted. “I know how that sounds. But I have. And what I know — what I chose to understand — is that you’re worth my attention."
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that I like you, Olivia.”
Every part of my body wanted to stop running then and there. But I knew the moment I let my guard down, I was giving someone I didn’t trust the upper hand.
“Why would you even say that?” I said. “We’ve only passed each other a couple times in town.”
“We’ve flirted.”
“You flirted,” I said.
Elias almost retorted, but instead, he took a small breath. “That doesn’t change anything. You know what does?”
He held my gaze.
“The fact that this is my choice.”
The clarity in his voice, his lower tone, his lack of flourishes and jokes… all of it landed differently than anything he'd said before.
“What does that have to do with Caleb?” I asked.
“Everything!” he insisted. “I like you not because fate drew an arrow and put your name at the end of it. But because I paid attention, and I made a decision."
I kept very still.
Elias’s feet began to slow down. So did mine. The fog continued to surround us. Part of me was thankful it was blocking most of my expression.
"He loves you because it’s an instinct," Elias said simply — almost gently. "I want you because you’re… funny. And pretty. And honestly, it’s fun to tease you.”
“That’s not love, either,” I said.
“But it could be,” he insisted. “If you gave it a chance. It would be, without question, a chosen relationship. I merely thought you deserve to know that.”
He dug into his pocket.
He pulled out a slip of paper. The bright red ink glared against it, showing a cellphone number. A devil’s handshake.
“If you change your mind,” he said. “Or are finally brave enough to ask what you don’t want to.”
The fog shifted somewhere to my left. A branch cracked in the tree line behind him — a deer, probably, or the wind, or something I wasn't going to think about. I focused on the ground between us.
Elias jogged away.
I wanted to say he didn’t know what he was talking about. That he didn’t know Caleb.
Didn’t know what I’d seen — the restraint, the way Caleb held himself back when it would’ve been easier not to, the way every step he’d taken toward me had felt… chosen.
I almost said that.
But the problem wasn’t that Elias sounded convincing. It was that I didn’t have a clean answer.
I made my way back to the inner jogging track.
I ran faster than I needed to.
Not a sprint. Just enough to keep my body busy, lungs working, legs burning lightly by the time I looped past the ridge and back toward the estate.
Does Caleb love me, or does his wolf tell him to?
That was the easy part — or at least the uncomplicated part. Caleb proved time and time again that he was dedicated to me. Bond or not, it was something real.
And, while Elias wasn’t the one who asked the question, the discussion let another one bubble toward the surface.
One that I was too scared to ask myself, but one I knew I had to.
And what about me?
What I felt had been building since the morning I found him face-down in my backyard. I felt it when my hands were on his chest.
It prickled at me when we met at the doorway.
And from there, it grew from firelit evenings, discussions about Jake, shared pain after he rescued me from wolves.
When he kissed me, he kissed me like a man who'd been holding something back for years and had finally, finally let himself stop. That was real, too — I'd felt it.
But reading a feeling and understanding its source were different things. I knew that the body produced real sensation for complicated reasons. Grief felt like a weight in the chest. Adrenaline felt like love. Biology didn't wait for context.
The Ashwood gate came into view and I slowed to a walk, breathing through it. There was a version of this that was fine. The bond wasn't something he'd chosen for me, but it wasn't something he'd chosen for himself either.
We were both in it without having asked to be, without having been consulted, without any say in the matter at all. That could be okay.
The word “love” stayed.
I didn’t know how much I liked that.
However, Caleb was different when I saw him again.
He was in the kitchen when I came in, standing at the counter with a coffee cup, reading something on his phone. His hair was still damp like he'd showered not long ago. He looked up when he heard me.
"Good run?"
"Yep.”
My chest tightened at my own shortness.
Caleb set the phone down. I moved over to make my own cup of coffee.
Normally, Caleb would join me at the table the moment I did. Instead, he finished his at the counter, and put it down.
"I'll be in the study," he said. It didn’t seem addressed to anyone in particular.
My mood soured more than I wanted it to.
I wanted to chalk it up to a bad day. But I'd noticed it starting a few days ago. Just like before the night I was attacked, Caleb was pulling away.
I told myself it was nothing.
I drank my coffee and went to check on Jake.
The oddities piled up.
Over the course of the week, Caleb was on his phone more. He would shut himself in his study when he wasn’t doing patrols.
Donovan took turns with him in exiting rooms, going outside, and closing doors no one was allowed to open.
I tried to distract myself with helping Jake, but even he didn’t need my attention that much. Instead, he began going to the library to read about things.
He still did me the courtesy of getting his vitals checked, and we still had lunch together. But there were no more garden walks, and no more evening readings.
I think what truly bothered me was that it wasn't a development. It was a regression.
This was exactly how I felt before all the secrets peeled back.
I didn’t know what it meant.
Was there just a busy season?
Or was there the chance something was being hidden from me once again?
The evening settled in slowly.
The fire was already lit when I got there. Same chair. Same blanket folded over the arm. His chair across from mine. Only now, it was empty.
I sat anyway.
The fire crackled softly. A log shifted, sending a brief spray of sparks up the chimney. It should’ve felt familiar, yet it only made me feel lonelier than ever.
I thought about the story Caleb told me in this room, weeks ago now, when the fire burned low like this and the chairs were the same distance apart. When we were closer, somehow.
He told me that story to tell me who he refused to be.
I let my head fall back against the chair and closed my eyes. I waited. He never came.
After a couple of hours, I finally retired.