Chapter 4
Arabella
Mostly my fear.
I sat in the front row, my pen hovering over my notebook, but the ink had dried on the tip minutes ago. Professor Halloway—a dry, brittle human man who studied shifters as if they were bacteria in a petri dish—was droning on about the Sociological Impact of the Pack Hierarchy on Modern Economics.
It should have been fascinating. It was exactly what I had fought my father to study. It was the reason I was the only human allowed in this program, the reason I endured the stares and the whispers.
But I couldn't hear a word he was saying.
All I could hear was the echo of a deep, gravelly voice in a dark library.
I’m going to ruin you. For anyone else but me.
I shivered, the sensation rolling down my spine like a drop of ice water. It wasn't a cold shiver. It was hot. It was a phantom touch, a memory of how close he had been, how his massive body had blocked out the world, how his scent—smoke and pine—had invaded my senses.
Dante Moretti.
He was a problem. A six-foot-five, two-hundred-and-forty-pound problem with glowing eyes and a scar that made my fingers itch to trace it.
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to force the image of his lips away. Stop it, Arabella. He’s a predator. You’re a liability. He said it himself—he’d consume you.
"Ms. Thorne?"
The voice cut through my spiraling thoughts like a knife.
My eyes snapped open. The lecture hall was silent. Thirty pairs of eyes were boring into the back of my neck. Professor Halloway was standing directly in front of my desk, holding a sheaf of papers. He looked down at me over the rim of his spectacles with an expression of profound disappointment.
"I... I'm sorry, Professor?" I stammered, my face heating up.
"I asked if you were planning to join us in the present, or if you preferred to remain in the realm of fantasy," he said dryly. He dropped a paper onto my desk.
It landed with a heavy thwap.
I looked down.
There was a lot of red ink. And at the top, circled three times, was a letter.
D-
My stomach dropped through the floor. The air left my lungs.
"This is... this is my midterm paper," I whispered.
"Indeed," Halloway said, turning his back on me to address the class.
"Ms. Thorne provides us with an excellent example of the fundamental disconnect between human observation and shifter reality. Her thesis on The Beta’s Role in Conflict Resolution is...
technically grammatically correct. But it lacks soul.
It lacks grit. It reads like a fairy tale written by someone who has never seen a wolf snap a bone. "
A few snickers rippled through the room. I felt tears pricking the corners of my eyes—hot, humiliating tears.
Halloway turned back to me. "You are here on a special dispensation, Arabella.
Your father pulled a great many strings.
But this program requires more than nepotism.
It requires understanding. You write about shifters like they are noble savages from a romance novel.
You don't understand the violence. You don't understand the hunger. "
He leaned in, his voice dropping so only the front row could hear.
"If your field study doesn't show a drastic improvement in... authenticity... by next week, I will be recommending to Dean Vance that your placement be revoked. We have a waitlist of shifters who actually understand the subject matter."
He walked away.
I stared at the red D-. The ink looked like blood.
Revoked.
If I lost this spot, I went home. Back to Seattle. Back to my father’s pristine, suffocating mansion where I was treated like a glass doll. Back to a life of charity luncheons and "appropriate" suitors who wore sweater vests and didn't have scars.
I couldn't go back. I would suffocate.
I shoved the paper into my bag, ignoring the burning stares of my classmates, and waited for the clock to run out.
The Ice Garden was my sanctuary because it was the one place on campus where nothing was expected to grow.
It was a massive, Victorian-style glasshouse on the edge of the science quad.
But unlike the botany greenhouse, which was humid and lush, the Ice Garden was kept at a crisp twenty degrees Fahrenheit.
It housed rare alpine flora—ice orchids, frost ferns, flowers that only bloomed in the heart of winter.
It was beautiful. It was silent. And it was empty.
I pushed through the heavy glass doors, the cold air hitting my face like a slap. I didn't mind. The cold grounded me. It numbed the burning humiliation in my cheeks.
I walked down the central path, my breath misting in the air, until I reached the stone bench by the frozen koi pond. I sat down, pulled the crumpled paper out of my bag, and stared at it again.
Lacks grit.
How was I supposed to get "grit"? I was a human. If I got close enough to see the "violence," I’d probably end up in the hospital. I was studying monsters from behind a safety glass, and Halloway was failing me for not climbing into the cage.
I let out a frustrated sob, crumpling the paper in my fist.
"I hate this place," I whispered to the frozen fish. "I hate the snow. I hate the wolves. I hate..."
"You hate the quiet?"
The voice came from behind a wall of frost ferns.
I jumped, nearly sliding off the bench. My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs.
I knew that voice. Low. Resonant. gravel-wrapped-in-velvet.
Dante.
He stepped out from behind the foliage.
He looked... tired.
That was my first thought. The terrifying Alpha, the monster of the ice, looked exhausted. He was wearing a grey hoodie with the hood pulled up, and sweatpants. He wasn't wearing a coat, despite the freezing temperature of the greenhouse.
But what caught my eye wasn't his face. It was the way he was walking.
He was limping. heavily.
He favored his left leg, grimacing slightly with every step. In his hand, he held a bag of frozen peas—generic brand—pressed against his knee.
He stopped when he saw me. His amber eyes widened slightly, then narrowed as he took in my red, puffy eyes and the crumpled paper in my fist.
"Arabella," he said. It wasn't a growl this time. It was just... an acknowledgment.
"Dante," I sniffed, quickly wiping my eyes with the sleeve of my sweater. "I... I didn't know anyone was in here."
"It's the only place cold enough," he murmured. He gestured to the bench. "Mind if I sit? My knee is killing me."
I stared at him. Dante Moretti was asking for permission?
"I... sure." I scooted to the far end of the bench, putting as much distance between us as possible.
He sat down with a heavy sigh, extending his left leg and pressing the frozen peas onto his knee joint. He hissed a breath through his teeth, his head tipping back, exposing the thick column of his throat and that jagged scar.
"What happened?" I asked, before I could stop myself.
He opened one eye to look at me. "Game against Washington. That human center I checked? His skate caught me in the gap between my pads. Deep bruise. Maybe a tear."
"Have you seen the medic?"
"Elena?" He snorted. "If I go to Elena, she benches me. If I get benched, the team morale collapses. We’re in the playoffs, Arabella. The Captain doesn't get hurt."
"So you're hiding," I said.
"I'm managing," he corrected. He shifted the peas. "What about you? Why are you crying in a freezer?"
I looked down at the ball of paper in my hand. I tried to hide it, but he was too fast. His hand shot out—fast, so fast—and snatched the paper from my grip.
"Hey!" I protested.
He ignored me, smoothing the paper out on his thigh. He read the grade. He read the comments.
His eyebrows—dark, thick, expressive—shot up.
"D-minus?" he read aloud. "Lacks grit?" He looked at me, a flicker of amusement dancing in those golden eyes. "You're failing Folklore?"
"I'm not failing," I defended weakly. "I'm just... struggling with the practical application."
"You're writing about Betas like they're peacekeepers," Dante said, scanning the text. "Betas aren't peacekeepers, Arabella. They're enforcers. They keep the Omegas in line so the Alphas don't have to kill them. It's not diplomacy. It's bullying."
"Well, the textbook said..."
"The textbook was written by a human in 1950," he scoffed, handing the paper back. "Halloway is a prick, but he's right. You write like a tourist."
The truth stung more than the grade. Tears welled up again, unbidden. I hated my fragility. I hated that he saw it.
"I am a tourist," I whispered, my voice trembling. "I'm a human, Dante. I can't be part of the Pack. I can't run in the woods. I can't... I can't understand what it feels like to have a wolf inside me. And if I don't figure it out by next week, I get kicked out."
I put my face in my hands, taking a shuddering breath.
"And if I get kicked out, I go back to my father. And I... I can't go back."
Silence stretched between us. The only sound was the hum of the cooling units and the faint crunch of Dante adjusting the bag of peas.
Then, I felt it.
Warmth.
Not the crushing heat of his body, but a gentle, hesitant warmth.
His hand settled on my back.
It was heavy. His palm covered the entire space between my shoulder blades. He didn't rub circles; he just held me there, grounding me.
"Your father," Dante said, his voice low, vibrating through his hand into my spine. "The Liaison. He keeps you in a cage, doesn't he?"
I nodded against my palms. "A glass one. He thinks the world is too sharp for me."
"He's wrong," Dante said.
I looked up, blinking through my tears. Dante was watching me intensely. The amber in his eyes had softened to the color of warm honey.
"You walked through a blizzard to deliver meds to a monster," he said softly. "You stood up to Markus at the party. You came into the archives alone." He tilted his head. "You're not fragile, Arabella. You're just... uneducated."
I gave a watery laugh. "Thanks."
He smirked. It was a small, lopsided thing that transformed his face. It made him look younger. Less like a god of war and more like a guy.
"I have a problem too," he admitted, looking away from me, staring at a frozen orchid.
"Your knee?"