CHAPTER 9

“My king.”

The words hit the room harder than the gunshot in my hallway.

My king.

People used king in history books, chess games, and the emergency psych bay when a man in socks declared himself ruler of the vending machines. They did not use it in a warm living room that smelled faintly like garlic bread and expensive wood polish.

Except everyone here clearly thought they did.

Mace’s head was bowed.

Silas Evers stood straighter, his expression smooth but tight around the edges.

Even the anxious faces gathered in the hallway dropped their eyes.

Everyone except Nicole and me.

Nicole leaned close enough for only me to hear. “Tell me we did not just enter a wolf monarchy.”

“I can’t tell you that with confidence.”

Xavier Evers stood in the doorway, all six-feet-something of cold, injured authority. His long dark-blond hair hung loose around his shoulders, messy like he had either been dragged out of bed or had spent the last hour fighting death and losing patience with it. A bruise shadowed his jaw, already fading into the kind of healing that made my nurse brain want to throw a chair.

His blue eyes stayed on me.

Not the room.

Not Mace.

Not the bat in Nicole’s hand.

Me.

“Were you hurt?” he asked.

No hello.

No apology.

No explanation for vanishing from my ICU, wrecking my life, and sending a giant to my apartment.

Just that.

I folded my arms. “My plant died heroically, but thank you for asking.”

Nicole lifted Jeffrey. “The bat survived. In case anyone cares.”

Mace’s gaze flicked toward her. “No one does.”

“You’re obsessed with me already. It’s embarrassing.”

His jaw tightened.

Xavier stepped into the room, and the air changed around him. I hated that I noticed. Hated that my body noticed more. The burn on my wrist deepened, pulsing in time with each step he took.

He stopped a few feet away.

Too close for a stranger.

Too far for a patient I had once held together with gauze, prayers, and paperwork.

His gaze dropped to my sleeve. “Show me your wrist.”

I gave him a flat look. “You want to try that again with manners?”

A muscle moved in his jaw.

“Please,” he said, like the word had been dragged out with pliers.

Nicole made a small sound. “Historic moment.”

I pushed my sleeve back.

The room went unnaturally quiet.

The five dark marks circled my wrist where Xavier had grabbed me in the hospital. They were not bruises anymore. I knew bruises. I saw them on patients every shift—purple, blue, yellowing around the edges. These looked different. Intentional. Like someone had pressed shadows beneath my smooth brown skin and made them stay.

Xavier stared at them, and something sharp passed through his expression.

Anger.

Not at me.

Maybe not even at the marks.

Then his eyes shifted to my necklace.

That was worse.

The crescent-and-blade charm rested against my chest, still warm from the gate. Xavier went completely still.

Silas noticed. “You see it, then.”

Xavier did not look at him. “I see it.”

“Impossible,” Silas murmured.

I lifted the necklace between two fingers. “I’m going to need everyone to stop calling things attached to my body impossible.”

Xavier’s eyes came back to mine. “Where did you get that?”

“My grandmother.”

“Her name.”

Something in his tone scraped me wrong.

I smiled without warmth. “You mispronounced ‘what was her name, Deena?’”

His face gave away nothing.

Fine.

Two could play stubborn.

“Evelyn Mae Williams,” I said. “Grandma Mae, if she liked you. And she would not like most of you.”

Silas’s expression flickered.

Mace saw it.

Nicole saw Mace seeing it.

I saw everybody seeing everything and explaining absolutely nothing.

Xavier’s voice was quiet when he spoke again. “Williams?”

“Yes. That’s the name on my badge, my lease, and every student loan company determined to haunt me after death.”

“The symbol belongs to my house.”

I looked down at the charm, then toward the foyer where I knew that same crest sat on the gate, the floor, probably the damn towels if this family committed hard enough.

“It belonged to my grandmother before I knew your house existed.”

Silas stepped forward. “It should be examined.”

The sound that came from Xavier was not a word.

It was low, deep, and inhuman enough to freeze the room.

Nicole’s fingers tightened around the bat.

My heart kicked once, hard.

I looked at Xavier. “Did you just growl at him?”

His eyes stayed on Silas. “He overstepped.”

“No, Xavier. Men use words. Dogs growl.”

His gaze cut back to mine.

For one second, something dark moved behind the blue. Not anger exactly. Something older. Wilder.

“I am using words,” he said. “Silas, do not touch her.”

Silas lowered his chin. “As you command.”

The words were obedient.

The tone was not.

I filed that away under creepy relative with boundary issues.

Then I looked at Xavier. “Now that we’ve established nobody is examining me like a lab sample, start talking.”

“About?”

I laughed.

It came out sharper than I meant.

“About? Let’s make a list. You disappeared from ICU after injuries that should have kept you intubated. My records got altered. Someone used my badge. Security footage vanished. A mystery number texted me to stop looking. Then Mace showed up at my door saying you required my presence, three armed assholes tried to kidnap me, and now I’m in a mansion where people call you king and there are wolves the size of compact cars outside.”

Nicole raised a finger. “Also, someone insulted Jeffrey.”

Mace muttered, “Because Jeffrey is a weapon.”

“He’s family now.”

Xavier ignored them both. “The men at your apartment were not mine.”

“No shit. Yours are more polite while being terrifying.”

Several people in the hallway shifted like they did not know whether to be offended or impressed.

Xavier’s face remained cold. “They were sent by someone who wants leverage against me.”

“And I’m leverage because?”

His silence was the wrong answer.

I stepped closer. “Because I signed that paper?”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “Yes.”

“With blood?”

Another silence.

My stomach tightened.

I remembered the cut on my finger. The quick sting. The smear of red on the emergency authorization form. I remembered not caring because a man was dying under fluorescent lights and we had minutes, maybe seconds.

I had saved his life.

Somehow, that had made mine dangerous.

I swallowed. “What are you?”

The room stopped breathing again.

Nicole stood beside me, shoulder brushing mine. “Excellent question. Big fan of that question.”

Xavier looked at her for the first time since entering. “Nicole Hart.”

Her eyebrows lifted. “Look at that. The king knows my government name.”

“I know everyone close to Deena.”

That should not have sounded possessive.

It did.

I felt it settle low in my stomach and immediately hated myself for noticing.

Nicole’s smile thinned. “Then know this too. I don’t scare easily.”

“I gathered that from the bat.”

“His name is Jeffrey.”

Xavier looked back at me. “You want the truth?”

“I want several truths. Start with the one that explains why grown adults keep bowing.”

Mace’s mouth twitched.

Xavier’s did not.

“I am Xavier Evers,” he said. “Alpha King of the North American packs under the old treaty.”

I stared at him.

Then at Mace.

Then at Silas.

Then at the faces in the hallway pretending not to listen.

No one laughed.

No one corrected him.

No one looked even slightly concerned that a grown man had just introduced himself like a supernatural press release.

“Packs,” I repeated.

“Yes.”

“As in wolves.”

“Yes.”

Nicole exhaled slowly. “There it is.”

I pointed toward the window. “Wolves like the one outside?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re what? Their landlord?”

A faint ripple moved through the hallway. Someone coughed like they had swallowed a laugh.

Xavier’s eyes stayed locked on mine. “Their Alpha.”

“Alpha as in actual wolf? Not finance-bro podcast, chest-thumping, I-don’t-believe-in-therapy alpha?”

For the first time, something almost human touched his mouth.

Almost.

“Actual wolf.”

I waited for my brain to do something useful.

It did not.

It offered me flashes instead. The dark shape running beside the SUV. The howl in the woods. The way Mace had moved in my apartment hallway. The way Xavier’s wounds had closed at a speed that insulted modern medicine.

Werewolves.

No.

Absolutely fucking not.

I worked in an ER. I had seen people claim to be Jesus, vampires, presidents, dead relatives, and once, memorably, a reincarnated shrimp. I did not build belief systems off dramatic men with good bone structure and control issues.

“You’re telling me,” I said slowly, “that you’re a werewolf king.”

“Alpha King.”

“Of course, because regular delusion wasn’t exclusive enough.”

Nicole leaned toward me. “Deena.”

“What?”

“I saw a wolf outside the car look personally offended by my tone.”

“That could’ve been a large dog with an attitude.”

“It understood English.”

“Lots of dogs understand tone.”

“Babe.”

I pressed my lips together.

Xavier watched me, unreadable. “You don’t have to believe all of it tonight.”

“How generous.”

“But you will follow security protocols.”

And just like that, my fear found my temper and handed it a match.

“No.”

His eyes sharpened. “No?”

“You heard me.”

“You were attacked.”

“I was also kidnapped-adjacent by your Beta.”

Mace looked personally offended. “I saved your life.”

“You also put me in an SUV while bleeding and being dramatic.”

“I was not dramatic.”

Nicole snorted. “You were absolutely dramatic. Quietly, but still.”

Xavier’s voice cut through them. “You cannot return to your apartment.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“You cannot return to the hospital.”

My chest tightened. “Excuse me?”

“Mercy General is compromised. Your badge was used. Your file has been altered. Your patient records have been accessed. Until I know who is behind it, you stay here.”

I smiled.

It was not a nice smile.

“You do not get to decide where I stay.”

“I do when leaving gets you killed.”

“There it is.”

His brow lowered. “What?”

“That thing men do when they confuse protection with ownership.” I stepped closer, tipping my head back because the man was annoyingly tall. “Let me make this easy for you, Your Majesty. I am not your employee, your subject, your pet human, or whatever warm-blooded inconvenience you think got dropped into your royal lap. I make my own decisions.”

The room was so silent I could hear the faint crackle from the fireplace.

Mace looked at the floor.

Nicole looked proud enough to start clapping.

Xavier looked furious.

Not loud furious.

Worse.

Still furious.

“You think this is about pride?” he asked.

“I think this is about you being used to people bowing when you enter a room.”

His eyes flashed. “This is about the fact that three men came to your home to take you. They would not have asked politely. They would not have cared how brave you are. They would have dragged you out, cut you open if ordered, and left your friend bleeding beside you.”

Nicole went very still.

So did I.

The words were brutal.

Too brutal.

But I had seen the smile on the gunman’s face. I knew Xavier was not lying.

My voice came out quieter. “Then give me facts instead of commands.”

Something shifted in his expression.

A crack in the ice.

Gone almost as quickly as it appeared.

Before he could answer, Dr. Lena appeared in the doorway. Her auburn hair was tied back now, and there was a smear of blood on one glove.

“Mace will live,” she announced. “Despite his ongoing dedication to stupidity.”

Mace sighed. “Lena.”

“No, don’t Lena me. Silver blade, deep cut, and he tried to walk it off like masculinity is a clotting factor.”

I pointed at her. “Thank you.”

“I like her,” Lena said to Xavier.

“I noticed,” he replied.

She looked at me, then at my wrist, then at the necklace.

Her humor faded.

“Well,” she said softly. “That complicates the evening.”

“Welcome to the club,” Nicole muttered. “We have anxiety and no snacks.”

From somewhere down the hall, a voice yelled, “Dinner’s burning!”

Another voice answered, “Then stop staring and take it out!”

The sheer normal stupidity of it nearly broke me.

Werewolf mansion. Political danger. A king with murder eyes.

And somebody was ruining chicken.

Xavier turned his head slightly. He didn’t raise his voice. “Everyone not required in this room, leave.”

The hallway emptied fast.

Too fast.

The kitchen noise resumed in awkward bursts, pots and murmurs and someone trying hard not to slam a cabinet.

Silas remained.

So did Mace and Lena.

Nicole sat on the arm of the sofa like she had paid rent and dared anyone to object.

Xavier looked at her. “You may stay if you stop threatening my people with the bat.”

Nicole rested Jeffrey across her lap. “I’ll stop when they stop earning it.”

Mace stared at the ceiling.

I turned back to Xavier. “You said my signature matters.”

“Yes.”

“How?”

Silas answered before Xavier could.

“It was not only the signature.”

Xavier’s head turned slowly. “Silas.”

But Silas kept his gaze on me, eyes sharp with something I did not trust.

“It was the circumstance,” he said. “A dying Alpha. No kin present. A life accepted into the hands of another. A name given in blood.”

My pulse picked up.

“That sounds like old-timey bullshit.”

“It is old,” Silas said. “But not bullshit.”

Xavier’s voice was lethal. “Enough.”

“No,” I snapped.

Both men looked at me.

Good.

I was tired of being the only person in the room without a script.

“If this is why people are coming after me, if this is why my life got turned upside down, then I’m done waiting politely while all of you play dramatic silence Olympics.” I touched the mark on my wrist. “What did I do?”

Lena’s expression softened.

Mace looked at Xavier.

Silas smiled without kindness.

And Xavier, for the first time since he had walked into the room, looked almost reluctant.

Not scared.

Not ashamed.

But like the answer itself had teeth.

Before he could speak, an older woman entered the living room.

She was small, with silver hair braided down her back and a leather-bound book held against her chest. No one had announced her, but Mace straightened. Lena stepped aside. Even Silas moved with a kind of irritated respect.

Xavier’s mouth tightened. “Elder Miriam.”

The woman’s eyes came to me.

Then to my necklace.

Then to my wrist.

Her face changed.

“Dear gods,” she whispered.

Nicole stood. “That is not the reaction we were hoping for.”

Elder Miriam opened the leather book with careful hands. The pages were old, yellowed, filled with dark ink and symbols that matched the gate, the floor, my necklace.

She looked from Xavier to me.

Then she said, “Miss Williams, you are not merely under the Alpha King’s protection.”

My skin prickled.

Xavier’s voice went cold. “Miriam.”

She ignored him.

“You are bound to him by ancient law.” Her eyes held mine. “By blood, claim, and witnessed survival, you are Xavier Evers’s wife.”