Chapter 7

I tried to stay away from anything that looked like a Pack function for two weeks. It didn't matter. The Blackwood Foundation Gala fell on a Saturday in May and Ashford Pack was a founding donor. My father made sure I had a name card at the main table.

"You'll go," my mother said at breakfast. "Eleanor Ashford's son does not skip the Foundation Gala."

"Mother —"

"You'll go. You'll smile. You'll shake hands. Then you'll come home."

I went.

I wore a plain black suit. No tie. I kept to the edge of the ballroom and drank water that looked like something stronger. I nodded at the cousins I hadn't seen in four years. I let Caleb run interference whenever a great-aunt tried to ask me about marriage. I was doing fine. I was almost at the hour mark.

Then Ethan stepped up behind me.

He didn't touch me. He didn't have to. His scent hit first — smoke, pine, the old familiar Alpha note that went straight under my skin. The Mark at my throat warmed. I set my glass down slowly so I wouldn't drop it.

"Milo."

"Ethan."

"Walk with me."

"No."

"Now, or I'll say it louder."

I walked with him.

He led me through the side door into a smaller lounge. Black velvet couches, low lamps, nobody else there. He closed the door. He leaned against it with one shoulder and looked at me like he had all night.

"Did you know," he said, "that when I was seven years old my mother had a pair of ruby earrings made. Matched stones. One for each ear." His voice was level. "I lost one of them the year I turned twenty-three. Somewhere in the Crescent Club, on the night I was drugged out of my mind by a rival Pack's heir. I spent four years assuming it was gone forever."

My chest went cold.

"You know what's funny," he went on, "is that the pair isn't a pair anymore if one stone is gone. It's just one red stone and a memory." He tilted his head. "Do you know where the other one is, Milo?"

I did.

It was wrapped in silk at the back of my safe in the bedroom I hadn't slept in for four years. The single red stone I had pocketed in a panic the morning after the Crescent Club, because it had been lying on the sheet and I had not known what else to do.

"No," I said.

"Liar."

"Ethan, drop it."

He pushed off the door. He came closer. He reached up and touched the side of my neck — right over the Mark, gently, like he was checking on a bruise. "Bring it back to me," he said. "That's all I'm asking. Bring me what's mine."

Not the earring. Not only.

I did not go home that night. I drove, instead, to a small hotel on the west side and slept with the phone on airplane mode. I told myself I was thinking. I was not thinking. I was waiting for sunrise.

At seven-ten the next morning my phone lit up with twenty missed calls from the Academy.

The head teacher's voice was careful. "Mr. Ashford, Theo was picked up by his father about twenty minutes ago. We assumed it was pre-arranged."

"What?"

"Mr. Blackwood had all the correct Pack credentials. Theo was very happy to go with him."

I was out the door before she finished the sentence.

The text came in while I was driving. Silvermoon Hotel. Room 1001. Your pup is safe. He's eating pancakes in the downstairs café.

I broke three traffic laws getting there.

The downstairs café was empty except for one round table by the window. Ethan was sitting with Theo on his knee, cutting a pancake into small squares. Theo had syrup on his chin. He was telling Ethan, very seriously, about how Great Bunny fought the Moon Dragon and won. Ethan was listening like it mattered.

Theo saw me first.

"Daddy! Fry Uncle gave me pancakes."

"Hey, pup." My voice didn't shake. I was proud of that. "Go finish eating at the counter. I need to talk to your — to Mr. Blackwood."

Theo slid off obediently. The waitress came for him. Ethan set the knife down and wiped his fingers on a napkin, unhurried.

"Upstairs," he said.

"Ethan —"

"Upstairs. Or we do this in front of the pup."

Room 1001. Again. The door closed and he had me pressed into the mattress before I could draw breath to argue. He was not rough, this time. He was patient. That was worse. He pulled my wrists over my head. He slid one hand down my back, along my hip, and stopped on the silver burn scar.

His fingernail traced it. Slow circle.

"When did you learn to play the little-bunny game, sweetheart?"

I closed my eyes.

Four years of running. One ruby stone in a safe. One pup eating pancakes downstairs. One Mark at my throat that had never really closed. He had me. He had known since the mirror. He had just been waiting for me to stop pretending.

"Let me go," I whispered, already knowing the answer.

His mouth was at my ear. "No."