Chapter 180

JACOB

The sound of children screaming was not what I’d call peaceful.

But it was honest.

Their laughter echoed off the bright mural-painted walls of the newly finished Rogue Foundation Day Care, bouncing between scattered foam blocks, oversized bean bags, and a play kitchen that someone’s kid had already weaponized into a command center. Crayons were rolling across tables. Someone was crying near the toy bin—whether out of joy or chaos, it was hard to tell.

It smelled faintly of naptime, baby powder, and cheese crackers. The chaos was deafening, but pure. Real.

I stood in the doorway beside Derek King, who looked like he’d rather be in the middle of a rogue ambush than standing here watching a toddler chew on a stuffed raccoon.

He had that stoic Alpha look on, the one where his face barely moved but his energy told you he was screaming internally. I didn’t blame him. Watching Derek try to process this level of disorder was like watching a wolf get tossed into a sandbox and asked to perform. Every muscle in his body looked like it wanted to leave the building.

He turned his head slowly toward me, face flat and unimpressed.

“This is your idea?” he asked, and I could practically hear his molars grinding. “Having me work in a day care?”

I smiled. No, I grinned. Because this was the cherry on top.

I had to admit, when I first thought of it, it was out of pure convenience. Aiden needed time with his father, and Derek needed a safe, low-risk way to be around his son without potentially endangering Elena’s recovery. But I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t a little pleasure in seeing Derek King—the great Alpha, all growl and dominance—reduced to potential babysitter.

The mental image of him sitting cross-legged in a circle, reading The Hungry Moon Wolf aloud to a pack of rogue pups, was going to carry me for the rest of the week.

“You want to see your son, don’t you?” I asked.

He didn’t answer right away. His eyes had flicked toward the far end of the room where Aiden was already running around with two other kids. One of them, a rogue girl named Bee, was trying to teach him how to build a fort out of cushions and plastic chairs. He looked happy. Free.

“Yes,” Derek said finally, low and strained.

I nodded, crossing my arms. “And you don’t want Elena calling the Moon Sentinels when you show up at Moonstone unannounced to take your son to the mall again, do you?”

That got a reaction. A flicker of tension across his jaw. A tightening of his stance. Not because he didn’t have a legal leg to stand on—but because I’d hit the nerve.

“I have joint custody,” Derek muttered. “There’s not a whole lot the Sentinels could do.”

“Other than explain to Elena who you are,” I said, holding his gaze. “Putting her life at risk.”

He didn’t respond.

Didn’t need to.

Because we both knew the truth: if Elena remembered everything too soon—if the bond slammed into her all at once without warning—it could shatter her.

And if there was one thing Derek King wasn’t going to risk, it was Elena’s life.

So yeah, I laughed when he balked at the idea. I found it funny. But this wasn’t just some power play. This was the best option we had. A tidy little loophole that let him be a father without endangering the woman he loved.

And even I wasn’t heartless enough to deny him that.

DEREK

I took one more look at the chaos and told myself I could survive it.

At least no one was bleeding.

Yet.

The noise alone could flatten most grown wolves—shrieks and giggles, the clatter of toys colliding at maximum velocity, the high-pitched wail of a toddler who had apparently just learned the word “mine” and weaponized it.

The air smelled like fruit snacks and kinetic sand. Something sticky had already glued itself to the heel of my boot, and I didn’t want to know what it was.

Aiden was still across the room, half-buried under a lopsided fort made of oversized pillows and plastic chairs, giggling with two other kids I didn’t recognize. One of them—a rogue boy with mismatched socks, wild curls, and what looked suspiciously like peanut butter in his hair—was roaring like a dragon and stomping on a foam alphabet mat. The other, a sharp-eyed girl with a permanent scowl and a set of toy fangs, had stationed herself at the “door” of the fort and was growling at anyone who came too close.

It was... something.

“This is the plan?” I muttered, more to myself than to Jacob. “This is how I get to see my son?”

Jacob shrugged, arms folded like he was presiding over my downfall. He was still leaning against the doorframe like he’d just delivered a eulogy and was taking a moment to admire his own performance. Smug bastard.

I didn’t look at him again. If I did, I might say something I’d regret—or worse, something he’d find entertaining.

I had been Alpha since I was twenty-five. I’d negotiated ceasefires between packs that hadn’t spoken in two generations. Led soldiers into battle against rogue units twice our size. Stared down wolves with blood on their hands and murder in their eyes, and walked away without flinching.

Now I was being asked to supervise snack time.

And for what?

Because the woman I loved—the mother of my child, the mate the Moon Goddess chose for me—didn’t remember who I was. Couldn’t remember. Not without the risk of her entire mind collapsing under the weight of it.

Because some bastard with a God complex had tampered with the deepest, most sacred parts of her mind—rewriting what she loved, erasing what mattered most. Because Logan had sunk his claws into her consciousness and left it splintered.

Because I had failed her.

Hadn’t seen it soon enough. Fought hard enough. Believed in her the way she’d always deserved.

The bond was still there—alive and unrelenting. I could feel it thrumming beneath my skin, steady and magnetic, like a second heartbeat. When she was nearby, it was like the air changed. Like everything in me aligned to her—heartbeat, breath, wolf.

When I stood in the same building as her, it was like standing too close to a bonfire. Heat curled under my skin, pulled at my ribs, dragged me forward no matter how I tried to stay still.

But she didn’t know me.

She’d looked at me from her hospital bed with bright, curious eyes like I was a stranger in the hallway.

And smiled.

Like we were meeting for the first time.

And even through the pain—Godess, the crushing weight of it—even through the horror of what had been taken from us, some part of me had clung to that smile like it was the first light after winter. She didn’t know me. But she liked me.

And maybe, just maybe, I could make her love me again.

If this was the way back to her, I’d take it.

Even if it meant putting on a volunteer badge.

Even if it meant being elbowed in the stomach by a five-year-old in a cape who thought he was Alpha of the foam block pile.

Even if it meant Jacob Stormvale watching from the sidelines, arms folded, eyes full of smug amusement like he was waiting for me to cry over spilled juice.

Let him.

He thought this would humiliate me.

He thought putting me in a room full of rogue toddlers would break me down.

What he didn’t understand was that I’d scrub toilets. I’d tie shoelaces with my teeth if I had to. I’d build LEGO castles and referee tag games in the hallways and pass out banana slices like they were gold coins.

If it meant seeing my son smile—

If it meant being close to Elena, even for a moment—

Then I would do whatever it took.

Up to and including proving Jacob wrong.

Let him watch.

Let him laugh.

I was staying.

And I was going to earn all of it back, one juice box at a time.