The world did not end with a roar, but with a suffocating, splintering groan of ancient timber. Then came the crushing silence of ash and earth.
I was suffocating. The air in the cellar was thick, choked with the acrid scent of burning cedar and the metallic tang of blood. My lungs burned, clawing for oxygen that didn't exist. Above me, the floorboards of the cabin had become a tombstone, a heavy, charred mass of debris pinning Luca down just inches from where I crouched in the dark.
"Beatrice."
His voice was a gravel-grind of agony, distorted by the weight pressing against his spine. It was a terrifying sound—a Alpha stripped of his strength, his bravado replaced by the primal instinct to keep me breathing.
"Don't move," I gasped, my voice barely a tremor. I scrambled through the debris, my fingernails tearing against the cold, damp stone of the cellar wall. My hands found him, trembling as I traced the line of his shoulder. He was solid, terrifyingly warm, and drenched in a slick, hot wetness that I knew, with sickening certainty, was his blood. "Luca, look at me. You have to move."
"I am... exactly where I need to be," he rasped, a hollow, breathless laugh escaping his lips. Even in the wreckage, his possessiveness was a physical weight, pressing into my chest. "Safe. You’re under me. The roof won't touch you so long as I’m here."
"I don't need you to die for me!" I screamed, the sound echoing off the stone walls. My heart was hammering a frantic, uneven rhythm against my ribs—that strange, flickering ache that had plagued me since the woods, the sensation of something dormant beneath my skin beginning to coil and wake. "Get up. I can pull you out. Just shift, use your strength—"
"I’m tapped out, little wolf," he growled, his hand snaking out from the darkness to find my face. His fingers were searing, calloused, and trembling. He dragged his thumb across my cheek, smearing soot and sweat. "You have no idea how much I’ve spent just to keep the world from taking you tonight."
He was delirious, but the grip he had on my chin was steel-bound. He forced my face toward his in the gloom, his eyes—that piercing, predatory amber—finding mine even in the suffocating dark. He was cornered, broken, and yet, he still dominated the space between us.
"Why?" I hissed, my fear curdling into a white-hot resentment. I grabbed his wrists, trying to pry his hand away, but he didn't budge. "Why me? Why bring me here, why trap me in this life, why destroy my world just to keep me in yours?"
"Because you were never meant for the world you left," he whispered, his breath hitting my lips, hot and heavy. "You belong to the mountain. You belong to the pack. You belong to me."
He pulled me closer, an aggressive, desperate tug that brought our bodies flush against each other. The proximity was a violation of every boundary I had fought to maintain. My breath hitched, my body betraying my mind as I felt the dangerous, electric heat radiating from him. My pulse didn't race—it thrummed, a deep, primal vibration that answered his proximity with terrifying familiarity.
"You're obsessed," I choked out, my voice failing as he shifted, his chest heaving against my own.
"I’m starving," he corrected, his voice dropping to a low, guttural vibration that I felt in my very marrow.
He leaned into me, his forehead resting against mine. The danger of the situation—the fire still licking at the edges of the cellar trapdoor above, the structural groans of the ruin—all faded into the background. There was only the heat of him, the smell of pine and blood, and the raw, unvarnished intensity of his stare.
He moved his head, his nose brushing against my ear, his stubble grazing my skin like a coarse caress. A shiver tore through me, not of cold, but of a terrifying, mounting arousal that made my skin feel too tight.
"If we die here," he murmured, his teeth grazing the sensitive skin beneath my jaw, a sharp, possessive warning, "you’ll still be mine. I’ve claimed you in every way that matters, Beatrice. You felt it. The bite. The change. You aren't just a biologist anymore. You’re mine to break and mine to mend."
"I hate you," I breathed, though the words lacked their usual conviction. I gripped his tunic, pulling him tighter, my own body moving against his with a fluid grace that wasn't entirely my own.
"Tell me that again," he dared, his hand sliding into my hair, pulling my head back to expose my throat. "Tell me you hate the way your blood sings when I touch you. Tell me you hate that you’re finally starting to understand why I’ve waited all these years."
He didn't wait for an answer. He crashed his mouth against mine—not a soft, romantic gesture, but a violent, consuming collision. It was an angry kiss, a desperate assertion of dominance that tasted of copper and fire. He was pinning me, using his last reserves of strength to claim the space I occupied, his tongue sweeping against mine with a hunger that bordered on savage.
I fought him for a heartbeat, my hands pushing against his shoulders, but then the world tilted. A sharp, searing pain bloomed at the base of my neck—the same spot he had bitten me all those years ago—and a vision, vivid and terrifying, flooded my mind. I saw the woods, not as a scientist, but through eyes that saw heat signatures and bloodlines. I felt the pulse of the mountain, the deep, ancient hum of the earth, and the undeniable, soul-deep tether that connected me to the man currently devouring my mouth.
He pulled back, his eyes glowing with an unholy, possessive light. He looked at me, his face a mask of triumph and agony, his thumb tracing the swollen line of my lips.
"It’s happening," he rasped, his voice thick with a mixture of awe and warning. "The forest is calling you home, Beatrice. And you have nowhere left to run."
A loud, final crash echoed above us. The ceiling of the cellar began to give way, dust and stone raining down. Luca threw himself over me, his body shielding mine from the falling debris, his weight pinning me completely to the dirt floor.
"Luca!" I screamed as a massive timber shattered the floorboards above, plunging us into total darkness.
His hand gripped my wrist, his voice a final, guttural promise against my skin. "Don't let go of me, little wolf. If you let go, the mountain will take you, and I won't be able to catch you again."