Chapter 62

Nicholas

Last night…

The waiter had barely set the plate down before I waved him off, leaning back in my chair as I glanced around the expensive restaurant. It was quiet and dimly lit with candles, the soft hum of conversation mixing with the clinking of silverware.

Perfectly normal. Perfectly dull.

I ran my thumb along the edge of the fork, pretending to listen as the wedding planner across from me droned on about floral arrangements and seating charts. This was Kayla’s thing, not mine. I could barely picture what the inside of the damn venue looked like, let alone what color the napkins were supposed to be.

But I sat through it, nodding along when appropriate, because that’s what Kayla would have done. She was supposed to be here—I’d had plans to take her with me after the country club—but then we fought as usual and now I was here alone.

Still, it needed to be done. We had an image to uphold, a fake fairytale wedding to host. I didn’t really care about any of this, and I just took all of the wedding planner’s suggestions without a second thought, but I knew it had to be perfect.

Otherwise, our carefully-curated facade would crumble right in front of everyone’s eyes.

Still, I found myself picking at the food, barely tasting it as the planner circled back to the seating arrangements for the third time.

“You’ll certainly want to keep the Alpha family separate from the guild representatives,” she said, tapping her pen against the chart. “For political reasons, of course. The last thing you need is someone starting a scene.”

“Right.” I forced a smile, trying not to let my eyes drift to the clock behind her. “I’ll make sure to mention that to Kayla.”

The planner smiled politely and gathered her papers. “I’ll have the full list of recommended vendors by next week. Let me know if you and Kayla want to sit down for another tasting.”

“Absolutely.” I didn’t bother standing as she left. The second she was gone, I leaned back in my chair, exhaling slowly.

The night had only just begun, and I was already exhausted.

Pulling out my wallet, I flagged down the waiter and ordered more food to-go. Enough for two. Enough for Grace.

The guild hall loomed against the night sky by the time I got there. The two guards that were always on duty at this time of night were chatting by the front entrance, hardly paying attention to anything other than their conversation.

When I’m a chairman, I thought with a smirk as I slipped past, I’m firing all of these shitty security guards. Still, I stayed low just in case, slipping through the side door that Noah always left unlocked for me.

Noah.

Was he really coming onto Kayla when I wasn’t around? He was my best friend; it was a low blow, to say the least. Sure, Kayla and I weren’t really together in that way, and Noah was well aware of that.

But it didn’t give him the right to—

Stop it, Nicholas, I commanded myself. Now wasn’t the time to dwell on that kind of thing.

The hallway was dark as I crept downstairs, the cold seeping through the stone walls. Grace’s cell sat at the end of the corridor, the faint light of a lantern flickering against the wall. Unguarded, as usual, because no one in the guild thought that anyone was aware of her existence.

Hell, most of the people in the guild had no idea. Noah only found out because he heard screaming late one night while he’d been working and had investigated.

She was sitting against the wall when I arrived, her head tilted back as she stared at the ceiling.

Her eyes snapped to me the second I stepped inside.

“No Kayla tonight?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

I shook my head, holding up the bag of food. “She’s busy. I brought you some food, though.”

Grace hesitated. I could see it—the flicker of doubt crossing her face as she eyed the bag in my hands. It was different when Kayla was here. She seemed to respect Kayla, maybe even liked her a little.

But with me, she didn’t know what to expect. Not that I could blame her. I’d been pretty harsh in my interrogations in the past, before I found out the truth.

“You don’t have to do this,” she said quietly, but she was already sitting up straighter, her eyes lingering on the food longer than she probably meant them to.

“I know.” I set the bag down between us, leaning against the cold cell wall as I watched her unwrap the containers. “But I want to.”

Grace didn’t say anything, but the stiffness in her shoulders slowly began to ease as she pulled out the bread and roasted vegetables. For a while, the only sound was the soft scrape of utensils against the tin as she ate.

“How much longer?” she asked after a moment, glancing up at me.

“The safehouse is almost done.” I kept my voice low, careful of the guards upstairs. “It won’t be much longer.”

Her grip tightened around the plastic fork. “And after that?”

“You’ll have to stay hidden until I can find a way to clear your name.” I didn’t sugarcoat it, of course. “It won’t happen overnight, mind you. But once the guild heads back out for their pack audits in a couple of weeks, I’ll be able to get you out of here.”

She nodded, pushing the last of the food around her plate. “Why are you doing this?”

The question caught me off guard, although I wasn’t sure why. I’d known it was coming eventually.

I thought about brushing it off, telling her it was just the right thing to do. But the words didn’t come. Instead, I shifted, staring at the lantern flickering between us.

“I’ve been having dreams,” I admitted, the words sounding strange even to me. “For years now. About a waterfall.”

Grace’s eyes widened just slightly, but I kept going.

“I hear my mother’s voice every time I’m there. I thought it was just… nothing. A dream. But you mentioned the waterfall once. The way you described it…” I shook my head. “I never told anyone about those dreams. Not even Kayla.”

Grace’s expression softened, her fingers curling around the edge of the blanket she was sitting on—a blanket that Kayla had insisted on taking from our own house to give to Grace the last time we’d visited.

“I believe you.”

For some reason, hearing those words lifted a tension from my shoulders that I didn’t even realize I was holding onto. I never expected anyone to believe me, which was why I never told anyone. I always figured I was just crazy, that the dreams about the waterfall and my mother’s voice were nothing but my mind trying to make connections that didn’t exist.

“Kayla would believe you, too,” my wolf hissed in the back of my mind.

I clenched my jaw, looking away. My wolf had been urging me to tell her for some time, but I just… couldn’t. Our relationship, whatever it was, was still too fresh, too tentative.

And if I was being honest, the idea of being vulnerable, especially around her… It didn’t sit right with me.

We sat there for a long time after that. I didn’t leave until the first light of morning started creeping through the cracks in the walls. By then, Grace was asleep, curled up against the far side of the cell.

By the time I got home, the guild representative was there for our weekly interview. It went about as well as I expected, and the subsequent confrontation left us both angrier than before. I left again after that, ripping my motorcycle through the winding roads until the cold winter wind chapped my knuckles and my eyes were watering from the ice in the air.

Eventually, my ride took me into town. I wasn’t sure why, but I decided to park and wander around a bit. I grabbed a coffee from the cafe and walked around the shopping district, peering into various windows with no real intention of buying anything.

That was when I saw it.

Kayla, standing in an alleyway. But she wasn’t alone.

She was with Noah.

And the moment I turned the corner, I saw her throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tight.