Chapter 23 Imani
IMANI
The apartment building looks smaller than I remember.
Tolin pulls into the parking lot and cuts the engine, but neither of us moves right away.
I stare up at the second floor window that’s been mine for the past two months.
The blinds are crooked because I never bothered to fix them.
The window box I meant to plant flowers in sits empty, waiting for a spring that I won’t be here to see.
“You okay?” Tolin asks.
“Yeah.” I unbuckle my seatbelt. “Just thinking about how this place never really felt like home. It was just somewhere to sleep.”
He takes my hand, squeezes it once. “Let’s get your stuff and go.”
We climb the stairs to the second floor, and I dig my keys out of my pocket. The lock sticks like it always does, and I have to jiggle it twice before the door swings open.
Tolin steps inside first, and I watch his face as he takes it in.
The secondhand couch with the sagging middle cushion that I got from a thrift store for forty dollars.
The folding table I use for eating, working, and everything else because I couldn’t afford a real dining set.
The bare walls with not a single picture or piece of art.
The kitchen with mismatched dishes and a refrigerator that hums too loud.
He doesn’t say anything. Just turns in a slow circle, his expression unreadable.
But I can feel him through the bond. The sadness. The quiet anger. The fierce protectiveness building in him, his bear close to the surface.
“It’s not much,” I say, trying to keep my voice light. “But it was mine.”
“Imani.” His voice is rough.
“Don’t.” I hold up a hand. “Don’t feel sorry for me. I made it work. I survived.”
“You did more than survive.” He crosses the room and pulls me into his arms. “But you’re never living like this again. You understand me?”
I let myself lean into him for a moment, breathing in his scent, feeling his heartbeat against my cheek. Then I pull back and pat his chest.
“Come on, grumpy bear. Help me pack.”
He doesn’t move to help, though. Instead, he wanders through the small space like he’s cataloging every detail. He opens the refrigerator, finds it mostly empty. Checks the cabinets, sees the mismatched plates and single pot I own. Runs his hand along the folding table, testing its wobble.
I grab some boxes from the closet and start packing my clothes. I don’t have much. A few work outfits, some casual clothes, pajamas. It all fits in one box with room to spare.
“You know,” I say as I fold a sweater, “I need to pay you back.”
He looks up from where he’s examining my pathetic little bookshelf. “What?”
“Double pay.” I raise an eyebrow. “That was the deal. Double pay for cleaning your cabin and stocking your pantry.”
“Our cabin,” he corrects. “And I don’t want that money back. It’s yours.”
I roll my eyes.
“Why not?” I put my hands on my hips. “You didn’t let me do a single thing I was hired for. I didn’t clean your cabin. I didn’t prep for your hibernation. I didn’t do any actual work.” I tilt my head. “You paid me for nothing, Tolin.”
He shrugs, completely unbothered. “So?”
“So that’s not fair.”
“Life’s not fair.” He’s already moved on, poking his head into the bathroom, probably judging my tiny shower and chipped tile. “You came. You stayed. That’s worth more than double pay.”
“That’s not the point.”
“It’s exactly the point.” He emerges from the bathroom and crosses the room to me, tipping my chin up with one finger. “I’d pay ten times that to have you in my life. The money doesn’t matter.”
I want to argue more, but the look in his eyes steals the words right out of my mouth. He means it. Every word.
“Fine,” I mutter. “But I’m putting it on the record that you’re impossible.”
“Noted.”
I go back to packing while he continues his exploration.
When I open my closet to grab shoes, I see the shoebox on the top shelf.
I hesitate, then pull it down and sit on the edge of my bed, lifting the lid.
Inside is every dollar I’ve managed to save since moving to Shadow Wolf Creek.
Crumpled fives, wrinkled twenties, a few fifties I was particularly proud of.
I count it out, then add my last paycheck from Shadow Suds.
Five hundred and twelve dollars.
Tolin appears in the bedroom doorway, watching me.
“What’s that?”
“My savings.” I look up at him. “I’ve been putting away whatever I could since I got here. For furniture. For making this place feel like a home.” I laugh softly. “For the green chair.”
He sits beside me on the bed, the mattress dipping under his weight. “The one at Cozy Corner.”
“Yeah. Four hundred and forty-nine dollars. I finally have enough.” I run my fingers over the bills. “I was going to buy it piece by piece, you know? One thing at a time. The chair first, then maybe a real table. Eventually a couch that doesn’t try to swallow you when you sit down.”
“Why the chair first?”
I’m quiet for a moment, trying to find the words.
“Because it was beautiful,” I finally say.
“This deep emerald green velvet. The kind of chair you see in magazines, in homes that belong to people who have their lives together. Every time I walked past that store, I’d stop and look at it through the window.
And I’d think... someday. Someday I’ll have a home nice enough to deserve a chair like that. ”
Tolin doesn’t say anything. Just reaches over and takes my hand.
“I know it sounds stupid,” I continue. “Getting so attached to a piece of furniture. But it represented something to me. Building a life. Creating a home you never want to leave.” I swallow hard.
“I’ve never had that. Not once in my entire life.
I wanted to build it for myself, one piece at a time, so I’d know it was real. So I’d know no one could take it away.”
“It’s not stupid.” His voice is low, rough with emotion. “It’s not stupid at all.”
“I have enough now.” I close the shoebox and hold it in my lap. “I can finally start.”
He’s quiet for a long moment. Thoughts and emotions churn inside him, visible in the stillness. Then he takes the shoebox gently from my hands.
“This money is yours,” he says. “For emergencies. For whatever you want. But you’re not spending it on furniture.”
I open my mouth to argue, but he keeps talking.
“I’m buying the furniture. All of it. The chair, a real couch, a dining table that doesn’t wobble, a bedroom set that doesn’t squeak.
Everything you need to make a home.” He sets the shoebox aside and takes both my hands in his.
“You’ve spent your whole life taking care of yourself, Imani.
Building from nothing, piece by piece, because no one else was going to do it for you.
But you’re not alone anymore. Let me do this. Please.”
“Tolin...”
“I know you don’t need me to take care of you.
You’ve proven that a hundred times over.
But I want to. I want to give you everything you’ve ever dreamed of and more.
” His eyes are intense, burning into mine.
“You talked about building a home you never want to leave. But I need you to understand something.”
“What?”
He cups my face in his hands, his thumbs stroking my cheeks.
“You already have that. You’ve had it since the moment I claimed you.
” His voice drops, thick with emotion. “Home isn’t a cabin or an apartment or a fancy chair, Imani.
Home is you. Wherever you are, that’s where I want to be.
I don’t care if we live in a mansion or a cardboard box. As long as I have you, I’m home.”
Tears blur my vision. They spill down my cheeks, hot and fast, and I don’t even try to wipe them away.
“Damn it, Tolin.” My voice breaks. “You can’t just say things like that.”
“I can and I will.” He pulls me into his lap, wrapping his arms around me, letting me cry against his chest. “Every day for the rest of our lives, I’m going to remind you that you’re loved. That you’re wanted. That you have a home that no one can ever take away.”
I cling to him, sobbing like a fool, years of loneliness and longing pouring out of me. He just holds me through it, stroking my hair, pressing kisses to the top of my head, letting me fall apart because he knows he’ll put me back together.
When the tears finally slow, I pull back and wipe my face with my sleeve.
“I’m a mess,” I say with a watery laugh.
“You’re beautiful.”
“I have snot on my face.”
“Still beautiful.”
I smack his chest lightly, but I’m smiling. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Probably.” He brushes some loose curls from my face. “But I’m your ridiculous. You’re stuck with me.”
“I know.” I take a shaky breath. “Okay. Fine. You can buy the furniture.”
“Was there ever any doubt?”
“I like to pretend I have some say in things.”
He grins, and it transforms his whole face. Still grumpy, still scarred, but lighter somehow. Happier than I’ve ever seen him.
“You have say in everything,” he tells me. “Except when it comes to me taking care of you. That’s non-negotiable.”
I roll my eyes, but I’m too happy to really argue. “What about the lease? I can’t just abandon the apartment.”
“Ronan will handle it. There’s a clause for fated mates. The clan has agreements with most landlords in town.”
“Of course there is.” I shake my head. “Shifters think of everything.”
“We’ve had a long time to figure out the logistics.” He stands, pulling me with him. “Now come on. Let’s finish packing so we can get out of here.”
It doesn’t take long. My whole life fits into four boxes and two suitcases. Clothes, books, a few kitchen items I want to keep. Everything else I leave behind. The sagging couch. The folding table. The memories of lonely nights and empty walls.
I don’t need any of it anymore.
When we carry the last box down to the truck, I pause at the bottom of the stairs and look back up at the building one more time.
“Any regrets?” Tolin asks.
“No.” I mean it. “That place was never home. Just a stop along the way.”
“Where’s home now?”
I turn to face him, this grumpy, impossible, wonderful man who turned my life upside down in the best possible way.
“Wherever you are,” I tell him. “That’s home.”
He kisses me right there in the parking lot, soft and sweet.
“Let’s go,” he says when he pulls back. “Tomorrow we’re going furniture shopping. And you’re getting that damn green chair if I have to buy the whole store.”
I laugh, climb into the truck, and don’t look back.