CHAPTER FOUR

The room stank of iron and secrets. Old blood in the wood floors, cigarette smoke curling in the air, and that thick, heavy tension that stuck to your skin like sweat in a heatwave. Moonlight bled in through cracked blinds, slicing shadows across the floor and painting silver lines up the bedposts.

She was there. A ghost. A curse. A storm.

Lying unconscious in the middle of it all, wrapped in a threadbare blanket, bare skin just visible beneath.

Zach stood near the doorway like he’d wandered into a dream he didn’t ask for. He didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Just stared at her like she might vanish if he looked away. Her face was soft, peaceful even. But everything about her screamed wrong.

No, not wrong.

Dangerous.

“Tell me I’m not hallucinating. Is any of this even real?,” he muttered.

Zeke leaned against the battered couch, arms crossed over his broad chest. His shirt clung to him, soaked from the rain they hadn’t even noticed falling on the drive here. His dark hair stuck to his forehead, eyes shadowed and unblinking.

“You’re not,” he said. Voice low. Rough. “She’s real.”

Zach let out a breath that felt like it had knives in it. “And this pull we’re feeling?”

“Same.”

He finally looked at Zeke. “You touched her?”

Zeke shook his head, eyes flicking back to her. “Can’t. Won’t.”

Zach’s lip curled. “What, scared?”

“No,” Zeke said evenly. “I just don’t trust what’ll happen if I do.”

Zach chuckled darkly. “That’s new. Big bad Zeke showing restraint.”

Zeke’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t rise to it. He just looked at her again, like she was a ticking bomb made of silk and shadows.

“She’s not normal,” Zeke said. “She’s... something else.”

Zach moved closer to the bed. Not too close. Just enough to feel the pull. It was like gravity. Pulling him closer to the body that laid on their bed; like an undeniable thirst to hold her in his arms. Like the moment before lightning strikes.

“I feel like I’m already breaking,” he muttered.

Zeke glanced at him. “You think this is a mate bond?”

Zach shrugged, staring at her with a fire he didn’t know how to name. “I think this is the beginning of something we can’t control.”

Zeke didn’t disagree. This wasn't something even Zach couldn't explain.

---

The silence in the room stretched like a drawn bow. Zach paced, boots creaking over warped floorboards. Every now and then, his eyes drifted back to her with his thoughts drifting off. He couldn't come to any conclusion, he just ended up with more questions.

No name.

No past.

No idea why she felt like she was already in his blood.

“She is from the rival pack. That much we know,” Zach said finally. “But there's something about the way she smells... it’s familiar. Old. Like war and fire and something older. Like i smelt it somewhere.”

Zeke’s brows lowered. “She was there.”

Zach stopped. Turned. “What do you mean?”

Zeke didn’t blink. “That night. The last battle. Before it all burned. I smelled it then. In the trees. In the smoke. She was there. Just standing there.”

Zach’s stomach twisted. He remembered that night. Everyone did.

The blood moon. The traitors. The fire that roared so high it turned the sky red.

He remembered the screams. The way the alphas turned on each other, all teeth and betrayal. He remembered carrying bodies out of the woods. Digging graves with his bare hands.

“She survived that?” Zach asked.

Zeke didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. Even he doesn't have the answer to that.

Zach dropped into the old chair by the window. It groaned beneath him, but held. He looked out, past the cracked glass and into the night. Rain slicked the world in silver. Every shadow looked like a threat.

“She’s going to bring it all back,” he said.

Zeke nodded. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Maybe we should call Agrish.

The moment the words left Zeke’s mouth, Zach stood. Fast. Too fast.

He had Zeke pinned against the wall before either of them could think.

Zach’s hand fisted in Zeke’s collar, voice a low, dangerous growl. “Say that bastard’s name again. I dare you.”

Zeke didn’t flinch. “You really think we can do this alone?”

“I think if Agrish so much as breathes near her, I’ll rip his lungs out.”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t have let her end up here.”

Zach’s eyes flashed, but he let go, stepping back like the contact burned.

Zeke straightened his shirt. “He’s dangerous. But smart. We’ll need him.”

Zach shook his head. “No. We protect her. No one else touches her. Not him. Not the Council. Not even fate.”

“She could tear us apart.”

“She could save us.”

Zeke laughed once. Bitter. “You think we deserve saving?”

“I don’t care what we deserve,” Zach said. “I care what she means.”

Zeke left the room soon after. Said he needed air. Zach let him go.

But Zeke didn’t need air.

He needed time to think.

He walked the halls of the safehouse like a ghost, every footstep echoing with memories. The war had left too many scars. Not all of them visible.

He leaned against the cold wall just outside, head tilted back, rain dripping down his temples.

The war had started because of lies.

It ended in blood.

Zeke remembered the way the Alpha’s voice cracked when he gave the kill order. Remembered the way brothers turned on brothers.

And somewhere in that smoke, he’d felt her.

Now she was here. In their house. In their territory.

In their bones.

His phone buzzed. Stacy.

He answered.

"I need clothes, food. Something soft. Don’t ask questions."

A pause.

"Is it her?" she asked.

Zeke didn’t respond.

The silence was answer enough.

---

Inside, Zach sat on the edge of the bed. Close enough now to see the faint freckles on her shoulder. The slow rise and fall of her chest.

She looked peaceful.

He didn’t believe it.

He remembered her scent now. The faintest trace from years ago. Moonlight and ash. He’d thought he dreamed it.

He didn’t dream.

“I have no idea what you are,” he whispered. “But you’re mine. I can feel it. And I don’t know whether to worship you or run from you.”

He closed his eyes, fighting the rage building in his chest. Not at her. At everything.

The Moon Goddess.

The prophecy they’d buried.

The war that never really ended.

“Please,” he whispered. “Don’t be the end of us.”

She didn’t answer.

But the room felt colder.

Like fate had just made its move.

And now the storm was waking up.

---

The pack was waiting. The rival pack was waiting. Fate was waiting.

And the girl under the blankets—unknown, untamed, unnamed—held all the power to set it all on fire.

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