Chapter 15 Kara
THE COTTAGE FELT DIFFERENT now, like it had finally decided to stop trying to kill me and instead settled into something that actually resembled a home. And somehow, along with it, I felt like I was finally finding my place in this town.
I stood in the middle of the room with my hands on my hips, surveying everything like I was personally responsible for the transformation.
Which, okay, I wasn’t, since Octavius had done most of the heavy lifting.
But still, I had contributed. I had supervised, after all, which was a very important role, if you asked me.
I bent down to pick up a stray sock from the floor, tossing it onto the growing pile of laundry I was determined to “organize,” even if that mostly meant shoving things wherever I could find space.
As I moved through my home—cleaning, adjusting, straightening things that didn’t technically need straightening—my thoughts drifted, like they had been doing a lot lately, to the man who had come out of nowhere: the octopus shifter I was hopelessly, undeniably in love with.
The last few nights had been incredible.
Every evening, he stayed over, and I had a feeling our little adventure on the porch a couple nights ago had something to do with that.
Though I knew that wasn’t the only reason he kept coming back.
I knew he cared about me just as deeply as I cared about him.
It showed in the little things—the way he always made sure I had a proper meal, the way he asked before touching, even when he didn’t have to, and the quiet, almost reverent way his gaze lingered on me when he thought I wasn’t paying attention, like I was something rare, something precious he wasn’t quite sure he was allowed to hold.
It was strange, realizing how different he felt to me now. When had he gone from the broody, slightly intimidating octopus shifter who showed up uninvited during a storm to the person I looked forward to seeing more than anything else? When had he become the brightest part of my days?
I paused, resting my hands against the edge of the table as the thought settled deeper in my chest. Because it wasn’t just him who had changed—I had, too.
I wasn’t looking over my shoulder anymore. I wasn’t bracing for the next thing to go wrong. No one was watching me, no one was controlling me—aside from my very possessive, eight-tentacled lover, that was.
But even that felt different from the den.
With him, there were no expectations, no conditions.
He never asked anything of me except to be myself when we were together.
And after wearing a mask for so long, after hiding behind that careful, practiced poker face, it had become far too easy to forget who I was... who I used to be.
But with Octavius, I was starting to remember.
I had always been fiercely loyal. I mean, that was how I had gotten myself into that situation to begin with.
But even then, I had been brave. I took risks without thinking twice, threw myself headfirst into things most people would hesitate over.
Back then, nothing had really scared me—until Zavier had nearly broken my spirit.
But now, I was finding that version of myself again. Piece by piece, day by day, with Octavius’s help.
Because of that, tonight I wanted to do something for him. Something that might make his stomach twist just a little, sure, but I was confident enough in my skills now to give it a real try. Because tonight... I was cooking dinner.
I pushed off the table and moved toward my small kitchen, determination settling in as I took in the ingredients spread out before me.
Everything was prepped and organized—well mostly—and I was absolutely determined to pull this off.
Because if I had to hear one more subtle jab from Octavius about my previous culinary skills—or lack thereof—I was going to lose it.
He was coming over again after work tonight, and I was going to prove, once and for all, that I could actually make a decent meal.
“Okay,” I muttered to myself, rolling up my sleeves like I was about to take on something life-altering. “How hard can it be?”
I stared down at the ingredients then at the dusty cookbook that had apparently come with the house, bracing myself as I officially began my redemption arc in the kitchen.
I started chopping the vegetables carefully—because I absolutely did not need to lose a finger—and as I worked, I found myself smiling for no reason at all.
I could already picture it: him walking through the door, that look on his face when he realized I had actually cooked something that didn’t involve the microwave, followed by his inevitable skepticism.
But then he’d taste it, and he’d eat his words—literally—as that suspicion melted into impressed approval.
That was the goal, anyway.
As time went on, the stress started to build, mostly because my culinary adventure wasn’t exactly going well. I stood there, staring down at what was supposed to be a meal and currently looked more like a crime scene involving vegetables, sauce, and what I was pretty sure was overcooked rice.
“Okay,” I muttered to myself, poking at something that definitely wasn’t supposed to be that color. “We can fix this. We can absolutely fix this.”
I tried stirring the rice with the sauce, attempting to scrape the burnt parts off the bottom. Then I added more sauce, because obviously the solution to everything was more sauce, hoping to loosen it enough to make it salvageable.
“Why is it doing that?” I whispered to absolutely no one as the mixture bubbled in a way that felt aggressive, like it had taken one look at me and decided to fight back.
I stood there for a second too long, wooden spoon in hand, staring at the pan like I could will it into behaving.
Maybe if I just... stirred it differently?
I tried again, slower this time, like I suddenly knew what I was doing. I was in the middle of another desperate attempt to salvage it when a knock sounded at the door, and my head snapped up instantly, my heart jumping straight into my throat.
Crap.
I glanced toward the door, then to the clock, then back to the absolute disaster in front of me. He was early. On any other day, I would’ve been thrilled, but right now? He was about to walk in and see the evidence of my very short and very tragic career as a chef.
“Oh no, no, no, no,” another knock echoed through the cottage, and I panicked. “I—just a minute!” I called back, my voice pitching slightly higher than I meant it to as I scrambled to hide my disaster.
I turned off the stove and immediately started moving things around—pushing pans aside, shoving ingredients out of sight, tossing the worst offenders into the sink like that somehow erased the evidence.
“Alright,” I muttered, flattening my dress like that might somehow fix everything. I looked like a perfect 1950s housewife... if you ignored the fact that I was failing in the kitchen, but at least I looked cute doing it.
I quickly ran my fingers through my hair, aiming for presentable even if dinner was a lost cause, then rushed to the door, forcing a smile onto my face as I reached for the handle, already bracing myself for whatever teasing comment Octavius was about to make about my “progress.”
I pulled the door open, and my smile fell instantly, my heart dropping straight into my stomach. Because standing outside my cottage wasn’t the shifter I had been trying to impress. No...
It was Hugo.
For a split second, my brain refused to process or accept what I was seeing. The shark shifter I had stolen from, the one whose pearl now hung around my neck, now stood on my doorstep. He wore an unsettling smile, his sharp teeth catching the light in a way that promised nothing good.
“Hello, Kara,” he said smoothly. “Fancy seeing you here.”
My throat went dry. “W-what are you doing here?” I managed, my voice betraying me as my heart pounded harder with each passing second.
He tilted his head slightly, as if amused I even had to ask. “I think you know exactly what I’m doing here.”
My pulse roared in my ears as my grip tightened on the door, fighting the instinct to slam it shut and run—a plan I would almost certainly fail at against someone like him.
“How did you find me?” I demanded.
His smile widened, showing off those sharp teeth yet again. “Well,” he said casually, like we were discussing nothing more than the weather, “considering my pearl went missing, and that same pearl just so happens to grant someone access to this town...”
His gaze flicked down to the necklace at my throat.
“It was a decent starting point. And then,” he continued, almost lazily, “an old friend reached out to me the other night. Said they saw someone wearing a pearl that looked suspiciously like one of mine. So I put two and two together and decided to come see for myself.”
My heart was pounding so hard I could barely hear myself think. “Does Zavier know I’m here?” I asked, my voice shaking, already knowing the answer.
Hugo’s smile sharpened. “Of course he does. In fact, he hired me to come and bring you back.”
He reached into his coat and pulled out a piece of paper, but the moment my eyes landed on it, I knew it was more than that. It wasn’t just paper—it was a contract. My contract. The one signed in blood, confirming that I belonged to Zavier.
“He owns you, remember?” he said, his tone almost casual. “And since he’s not allowed to enter the town, temporary ownership was transferred to me. I’m the only one who can move in and out freely, so it’s time to go, Kara, so I can get paid and we can be done with this.”
For a split second, I froze, unsure if I had heard him correctly, because everything I had been trying to outrun had just caught up to me all at once. My mind went blank, panic crashing in before I could think of anything else to do. So I did the one thing I had promised myself I wouldn’t do again.
I ran.