Chapter seven
Gabriel
The house is quiet, finally. The quiet that settles after something violent has burned itself out.
I lie on my back, staring at the ceiling, tracking the rhythm of Miles’s breathing where he’s curled into my side.
Even in sleep, he clings—one hand fisted in my shirt, one leg thrown over both of mine, as if body weight alone could anchor me to this bed, to this life.
It works. He’s heavier than he looks, and right now, he’s all that keeps me from getting up and pacing until the floors go thin under my feet.
His breathing is stable, but the rest of him is twitchy.
He mutters in his sleep sometimes, little gasps and stutters that catch in his throat.
I know the shape of his nightmares. When to hold him tighter.
When to let go before he starts drowning in it.
I know every scar on his ribcage, every warning sign, every nervous habit—right down to how he chews the inside of his cheek before he spirals.
I know what it took to bring him back from the edge. How easy it would be to lose him again.
The girl sleeping in the guest room is a threat to all of it.
I should be asleep, it’s late. Past two, according to the glowing numbers of the clock on the dresser.
I hear a noise. Outside, I think. Garrett is probably still asleep, which means Cyrus is prowling the property, restless, burning off whatever it is that keeps him from shutting down.
I envy him, sometimes. How he can just move, act, do, without running the calculus first.
Miles shifts again, restless, his face tucked into the hollow between my shoulder and neck.
He makes a sound—a high, almost kittenish whimper—and I know without looking that he’s dreaming of the old house, the one where memories burn.
He never talks about it, not directly, but I’ve read the police report.
I know what happened there. His old alphas locked him in a closet before they offered him to their killers as payment.
I know the smell of that kind of terror.
I remember what he looked like when I found him in the crawlspace after.
Half-dead, blood in his hair, his scent so scrambled with panic and pain I couldn’t even tell what he was underneath all the rot.
But he healed. We healed him. Medicine and time, yes, but mostly the hard daily work of showing up. Feeding him, holding him, teaching him that he could say no and have it mean something. He’s still learning. Every day is a test.
When he woke up this afternoon, he cried so hard I thought he’d choke.
It took both Garrett and me to hold him down, to get him to believe he was safe, that we weren’t angry, that nothing had changed.
He begged, over and over, for us to send the girl away.
He begged me to promise it. I did, because it’s true.
Or it was. Or it has to be, because if it isn’t, then everything I’ve built here was a lie, and I don’t know who I am if I can’t keep my word.
Thirty days. She has to go in thirty days.
I run my hand over Miles’s back, slow, deliberate.
His skin is hot under the shirt, and I feel the raised ridge of the scar that crosses his shoulder blade.
He flinches a little, even asleep. It never stops surprising me, how little it takes to set him off sometimes.
A voice in the hallway, a stranger’s scent, the low rumble of a car engine outside—he notices everything, and every change is a threat.
I keep him close because it’s the only way I know how to keep him safe.
Except I can’t, not from this.
And even like this, even with him right here, I think about her. That’s the problem. That’s the line I shouldn’t be crossing.
And I already did.
Lily.
I think her name and my stomach clenches.
I’ve spent all day telling myself that I don’t care, that the bond is a chemical trick, that I can ignore it because my loyalty is stronger than biology.
But the truth is, I haven’t stopped thinking about her for a single second.
Even now, with Miles pressed to me, I can smell her.
It’s faint, but I know the shape of it: the bright, almost green scent of ozone and the softer, sweeter note underneath, like the first cut of a peach in summer.
It’s on my shirt, in the sheets, even in the air here, at the farthest edge of the house.
I can’t get rid of it. I can’t stop wanting it.
Miles shifts against me, pressing closer, and for a second it should be enough.
It should ground me. It doesn’t. Underneath him, under everything, I still catch it—her.
That’s the part I don’t know how to fix.
I drag a hand down my shirt, like I can get rid of it, like it’s something physical I can wipe away.
It doesn’t work.
I’m not an idiot. I know what the registry is like for an omega like her.
I know how it wears them down, how it turns even the strongest into something brittle and panicked.
When I saw her this morning, it took everything I had not to go to her.
Not to touch her, or soothe her. I could see her trying to make herself small, standing near the window like she could step through it and disappear.
I wanted to tell her that it would be okay, that I would take care of her.
But that isn’t my job. She isn’t mine. She can’t be.
Miles stirs, pulling me back. He lifts his head, eyes still closed, and mumbles something against my chest. I make out two words: “don’t leave.
” I brush his hair off his forehead, kiss him there, and settle him back down.
He relaxes, his body going heavy again. I feel every ounce of his trust, every year of work it took to get him to let me hold him like this.
That’s the thing nobody ever talks about.
The effort it takes to get an omega to trust you after they’ve been broken.
How much it costs to hold onto that trust when every single day the world tries to rip it away.
I tell myself that’s why I made the promise. That’s why I can’t take Lily in, even if I want her so badly my teeth hurt. It isn’t noble. It’s practical. Honest. If I lose Miles, I lose everything.
Still, I can’t stop replaying that moment, the second I caught Lily’s scent.
It hit me like a freight train. I’ve felt attraction before, but never like that—never with that kind of force, never so total.
I know what a scent match is supposed to feel like, and I know what it means for an alpha to reject it.
But I also know what it would do to Miles if I even tried to explain that to him.
If he found out that I wanted her, that I wanted her more than I’ve ever wanted anything, he would never come back from it.
So I compartmentalize. I make a plan. I go over the facts, just like I always do: I have a month to get Lily settled somewhere safe.
I have to find a pack that won’t hurt her, that won’t use her up and spit her out.
She’ll get over the bond, eventually. Maybe I will too.
The important thing is to keep Miles whole. The rest is just background noise.
I let myself look at the clock again. 2:15.
If I get up now, I can check the security feeds before anyone wakes up.
I can make sure Cyrus hasn’t decided to drown his feelings in whiskey, that the girl is still in her room.
I can start the day before the rest of them and maybe find five minutes to myself.
But I don’t move. I stay right here, letting Miles’s weight pin me to the bed, letting the memory of Lily’s scent churn in my chest, letting myself feel every inch of the trap I’ve built.
Because that’s the other thing nobody ever talks about: how the things you build to protect the people you love can turn into cages before you even realize it.
***
The best thing about the home gym is that nobody expects you to talk.
You come here to move, to sweat, to bleed a little if you have to.
The weights are old, the mats are scuffed, the windows stained with years of condensation and dust because no one bothers to clean them.
When I was a teenager, before I figured out how to turn anger into strategy, I’d spend hours in here just hitting things until I couldn’t feel my hands.
Now, it’s more about routine. Structure.
Burning off whatever’s left after a sleepless night.
I’m halfway through my second set on the bench when I hear the door open.
I know who it is before I look up. Garrett doesn’t move like the others—he’s quiet because he’s considerate.
He’s the only person I know who can fill a room with presence without raising his voice.
Sometimes I forget he’s an alpha at all, the way he sidesteps conflict, how he smiles through things that would make anyone else punch a wall.
He comes over and sits on the bench opposite mine, water bottle in hand, not saying anything for a while. I finish my set, rack the weights, and take a towel to my face. The silence is companionable, but I know it’s not going to last.
“You’re going to hurt yourself,” Garrett says finally. “You already did this circuit yesterday. And it’s four in the morning.”
“Better than sitting around.” I keep my tone neutral. “Plus you’re here at four in the morning, too. Miles is asleep. Thought I’d get ahead of the day. How’d you know I was here?”
“You’re my lead. I know you.” He’s silent for a minute, then: “You know, you don’t have to do this alone.”
I look at him, and he’s got that expression he gets when he’s about to say something I won’t like. He’s gentle about it, but it still hits rough.
“She’s faded,” he says. “Lily. You know that, right?”
I don’t answer. He doesn’t need me to.