Chapter 47

Kingston

Earlier that Day

The meeting had gone on too long. I could tell by the way Ethan kept checking his phone, tapping his pen against his notepad in that nervous rhythm he used when he wasn’t really hearing a damn word. Normally, I’d snap him back to attention with a glare or a sarcastic jab, but I wasn’t particularly eager to talk to him after everything with Cora.

Cora, with her tear-stained cheeks. Cora, with the diamond on her ring finger.

I grit my teeth against the memory,

Then his phone buzzed again, and I saw his face change. He went still.

Not the kind of still you fake in a boardroom. The kind that meant something had gone very, very wrong.

“What is it?” I asked, before I could stop myself. I had a sinking feeling that I knew what might be wrong.

He didn’t answer right away, just stared at the screen like he’d seen a ghost. Then, slowly, he turned the phone so I could see.

A message. From Cora.

Ethan. Please help me. It’s Riley. He collapsed. The hospital won’t operate fast enough because of my status as a human. I don’t know what to do.

I didn’t think. I didn’t breathe. I just stood up, my chair scraping hard against the polished floor.

“Get your ass to the hospital,” I said. “Now.”

He didn’t waste a second. He was on his feet and out of the boardroom in an eyeblink.

I turned to the people who remained sitting around me.

“Cancel the rest of the meeting,” I said, already pulling out my own phone. “I need my jet prepped for immediate departure. Ten minutes.”

Ten minutes later, I was racing down the runway in a black SUV, phone pressed to my ear.

“Get me Dr. Marcos Serrano. Pediatric hybrid specialist. I don’t care where he is. Tell him I’ll triple his usual fee if he boards my jet within the hour.”

“But sir,” my assistant stammered. “He’s based in Geneva—”

“Then start calling Switzerland.”

I wasn’t losing time. I wasn’t losing that kid. And I sure as hell wasn’t letting Cora go through this without me.

By the time we touched down outside the city, the specialist had agreed. Money was persuasive. But what really sealed it was the details of the situation itself.

Once I told him it was a hybrid child suffering from bloodline instability, his tone changed. Serrano lived for the rare cases, the puzzles no one else could solve.

I couldn’t reach Cora on her cell. I must’ve called ten times during the flight. Either it was off, or she wasn’t picking up.

It wouldn’t surprise me if she was ignoring me. She was likely too busy with her new fiancé to do more than seek comfort with him.

Didn’t matter. I’d find her.

The hospital smelled like antiseptic and fear. I walked through the front doors, Serrano at my side in a crisp coat, his silver hair giving him the air of a man born to command respect.

I spotted her immediately, like my eyes were trained to seek her out in every room.

She was slumped in a plastic chair in the waiting area, hands trembling in her lap. She looked so small. So fragile. Like all the fight had finally drained out of her.

“Cora,” I called softly.

Her head jerked up. Her eyes locked on mine and widened.

“Kingston?”

“I brought help.”

She stood too quickly and swayed, then caught herself. “You… what?”

“This is Dr. Serrano. He’s one of the leading experts in werewolf-hybrid physiology. He knows Riley’s condition better than anyone.”

Cora blinked. For a second, I thought she was going to faint.

Instead, her face crumpled.

She didn’t say thank you. She didn’t need to. It was in every inch of her body as she led the doctor down the corridor, rambling off details in a shaky voice, hands fluttering toward the room where Riley was resting.

I stood back and watched her disappear.

And it hit me: how deeply I still loved her.

When Serrano came back nearly two hours later, his face was calm. That alone nearly made my knees give out.

“He’s stable. The procedure went well,” he said. “There were some complications with the hybrid markers, but we corrected them. He’ll need ongoing treatment, but for now, he’s safe.”

Safe.

The word echoed in my chest like a shout down a vacant hall.

“Can we see him?” Cora’s voice cracked behind me. I hadn’t realized she’d come back.

Serrano nodded and left us.

Cora turned to me. “You didn’t have to come.”

“I did.”

“How did you even know?”

“I saw your message to Ethan,” I admitted. Ethan, who had left when I arrived, giving me a solemn acknowledging nod of his head on the way out.

“It wasn’t meant for you,” she said.

“I don’t care,” I said. “You needed help. And I would’ve burned the world down to get it for you.”

She stared at me for a long moment, then looked away.

“He almost died,” she whispered. “Right in front of me. One second he was laughing, skating, and then he collapsed. He was bleeding so much. Like someone pulled the plug on his body.”

I stepped closer. “But you didn’t freeze. You acted. You got him the help he needed right away.”

“I wasn’t enough,” she said. “Because I’m still registered as a human. Because I’m not his real anything in their eyes.”

“That’s bullshit,” I snapped. “You’re the reason he’s alive. Don’t ever forget that.”

Her lip trembled. “They wouldn’t even put him on the surgical list. Not until your guy showed up.”

“It doesn’t matter how it happened. He’s safe now.”

She nodded slowly. Her shoulders sagged under the weight of everything she’d been holding in.

Then she looked up at me, her eyes swimming with tears.

“Why are you still here?”

I swallowed. “Because I care. Because I love him. And because I still—” I stopped myself, heart pounding. “I never stopped loving you, Cora.”

“You’re just saying that,” she said. “It’s not real.”

“It is real.”

“Not if you’re not my mate,” she whispered. “And I don’t know if you are. My wolf… she said…”

Her voice trailed off. She shook her head like she couldn’t bear to finish.

“What did she say?” I asked gently.

“She said she couldn’t come back. That she was sealed away. Too weak. That I’d have to find my true mate for her to return.” She looked up at me with hollow eyes. “And you already have a child with someone. You have so much going on, and you’ve never felt that pull before.”

I took her hands, feeling how cold they were.

“Mating is not that simple. I’ve never met a woman like you,” I said. “And I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you. That means something, Cora.”

Her lips parted, but before she could respond, a nurse poked her head into the waiting room.

“You can see him now,” she said.

Cora gave me one last glance, then slipped through the door.

I stayed behind for a minute, trying to calm the wild hope burning in my chest.