"No." He agreed simply, something dark and knowing flickering in his pale eyes, then released my hand to climb out of the truck. "Come. There's someone I want you to meet." He said,his voice soft in the pre-dawn stillness, holding out his hand to help me down.
I followed him past the main building to a large enclosure at the back of the property, set apart from the others. The fence was higher here, reinforced with additional mesh, and warning signs dotted the perimeter. Silas ignored all of them, moving to a spot where the chain-link met a concrete observation platform.
"Stay here." He held up a hand, his pale eyes serious. "Don't move. Don't speak. Just watch." He instructed, his voice dropping into something low and steady that made my instincts sit up and pay attention. I nodded, pressing my back against the cold concrete, making myself small and still the way Marguerite had taught me when we'd watch herons fish in the shallows. Patience. Stillness. Respect.
Silas moved to a gate I hadn't noticed, working the lock with practiced ease, and slipped inside the enclosure. My heart stuttered—whatever was in there required this much security, and he was just walking in like it was nothing.
Then I saw her.
She emerged from the shadows—a gray wolf, lean and scarred, one ear torn ragged and her muzzle silver with age. She was massive, easily a hundred pounds of muscle and teeth and wild instinct, and she was watching Silas with eyes that glowed amber in the growing light. He didn't approach her. Didn't call to her or extend his hand or do any of the things I'd seen people do with animals. He simply lowered himself to a crouch, making himself smaller, less threatening, and waited.
Minutes passed. The sky shifted from gray to pink to pale gold, and still Silas didn't move. Neither did the wolf. They watched each other with the patience of creatures who understood that time was meaningless, that trust couldn't be rushed, that some things had to be earned in silence.
Then, finally, the wolf moved.
She approached him in a wide arc, never coming straight on, always keeping an escape route open. Her nose twitched, reading his scent the way I might read a tarot spread—looking for truth, for threat, for intention. She circled him once, twice, and then settled onto her haunches about three feet away.
Silas still didn't move. Didn't reach for her. Just sat there, breathing slow and steady, his pale eyes never leaving hers. The wolf huffed once—a sound that might have been acknowledgment or annoyance—and then lay down, her scarred head resting on her massive paws, her amber eyes finally closing.
Only then did Silas move. He rose slowly, carefully, and made his way back to the gate, slipping through with the same silent grace he'd entered. When he reached me on the observation platform, something in his expression had shifted—softer, somehow. More open.
"Luna." He said quietly, coming to stand beside me, his shoulder brushing mine as we both watched the wolf through the fence. "Found her three years ago. Leg caught in an illegal trap. Half-starved. Feral with pain and fear." His jaw worked, the muscle jumping beneath his stubbled skin. "Took six months before she'd let me in the enclosure without trying to take my throat out." He paused, his pale eyes distant. "Another year before she'd rest while I was there." He finished, something like pride warming his rough voice.
"She trusts you." I said softly, leaning into his side, feeling the warmth of him seep through my thin shirt as we watched Luna's sides rise and fall with slow, peaceful breaths.
"She tolerates me." He corrected, but there was no bite to it. "Trust takes longer. Maybe forever, with the wild ones." He turned to look at me then, his pale gray eyes catching the first rays of true sunlight, and I felt pinned by his gaze in the best possible way. "You remind me of her." He said quietly, reachingup to brush a strand of hair from my face, his calloused fingers lingering against my cheek.
"Feral and half-starved?" I raised an eyebrow, a smirk tugging at my lips as I fought the urge to lean into his touch, my skin tingling where his fingers traced my jaw.
"Wild." He said simply, his voice dropping lower. "Wounded in ways most people can't see. Still fighting." His thumb traced the line of my cheekbone, his pale eyes tracking the movement with that intense focus that made me feel like the only person in the world. "You don't trust easy. Neither does she. When you do..." He trailed off, his gaze dropping to my mouth.
"When I do?" I prompted, my voice coming out breathier than I'd intended, my heart hammering against my ribs.
"It means something." He finished, his hand sliding from my cheek to cup the back of my neck, his touch firm and grounding. "Gumbo's the same way. Patient. Watchful. Testing everyone who comes close to you." His thumb stroked the sensitive skin below my ear, making me shiver. "He let me sit beside him on the dock. Didn't hiss, didn't posture. Just watched." Something shifted in his expression—satisfaction, maybe. Belonging. "Predators recognize each other." He added, his voice a low rumble that I felt more than heard.
"You've been watching me." I said it without accusation, a statement rather than a question, my fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt as I held his gaze. I'd known since the beginning—felt his eyes on me from the shadows, tracking my movements through town, cataloging my habits.
"Yes." No shame, no apology. Just truth, stripped bare. "The way I watch wounded things. Looking for what's broken. What needs protecting." His grip on my neck tightened slightly, not painful, just present. "I've been watching since you brought me that hawk. Since you looked at my scars and didn't flinch." He leaned closer, his breath warm against my forehead. "Beenwaiting until I was sure." He murmured, his lips brushing my hairline.
"Sure of what?" I asked, my hands finding his chest, feeling his heart pound beneath my palms like a caged thing fighting for freedom, steady and strong and so much faster than his calm exterior suggested.
"That you could handle what I am." He pulled back just enough to meet my eyes, letting me see everything he usually kept hidden—the darkness, the violence, the desperate hunger for connection that he'd buried under silence and stillness for so long. "I'm not soft, Artemis. Not gentle. The things I've done..." His jaw clenched, shadows moving behind his pale eyes. "I don't know how to be what people want. What they expect." He admitted, the words rough like they'd been dragged out of him.
"I don't want soft." I rose on my toes, bringing my face closer to his, close enough to count his eyelashes, to see the ring of darker gray around his pupils. "I don't want gentle. I want real." I fisted my hands in his dark shirt, feeling the lean muscle beneath, the coiled tension he kept so carefully leashed. "I want you, Silas. Exactly as you are." I told him, fierce and certain.
Something cracked behind his eyes—a wall crumbling, a dam breaking. He made a sound low in his throat, not quite a growl, not quite a groan, and then his mouth was on mine.
The kiss was nothing like Harper's passionate intensity or Remy's playful hunger. This was deliberate. Thorough. Consuming. He kissed me like he was mapping unknown territory, learning every ridge and valley, claiming each inch with methodical precision. His hand stayed firm on the back of my neck, holding me exactly where he wanted me, and I let him—surrendered to his control in a way I'd never surrendered to anyone.
A purr started in my chest—low and involuntary, the omega response I usually kept locked down tight. I didn't want to lock it down. Not with him. Not now.
He let out a low rumble in response—low and long and so deep I felt it in my bones. The sound did something to me, unraveled something I hadn't known was wound tight, and I found myself tilting my head back, baring my throat to him without conscious thought.
He went completely still.
For a long moment, neither of us moved. The sun was fully up now, painting the clearing in shades of gold and green, and somewhere in her enclosure Luna had risen to watch us with amber eyes. I kept my throat bared, my pulse hammering visibly beneath my skin, offering him the most vulnerable part of me with trust I hadn't planned to give.
Then his mouth found my neck. Not biting—not yet, not that. Just his lips pressing against my pulse point, his tongue tracing the sensitive skin, his teeth scraping gently against my scent gland in a way that made my knees buckle. He caught me easily, one arm wrapping around my waist to pull me flush against him, and then he was scent-marking me with deliberate, devastating intent.
