I took a deep breath and filled him in on what took place after I got home from his house.

“How dare you!” Those were the first words spewed from her lips. “Is this what you’ve been doing behind my back? Wait for me to go to bed and then sneak out? What were you doing? Were you spreading your legs for the little neighborhood boys?”

“No, Mom. I was just sitting in the woods like I always do.”

“In a dress? In the middle of the night?”

“It’s a nice night. And I wanted to be cool.”

“You’re a pathetic liar, just like your father. You two think you can run around behind my back and fuck whoever you want while I sit at home. You disgust me.” She took steps in my direction, causing me to stumble backward further into the living room. “You’ll never amount to anything more than a cracked-out streetwalker.”

I should’ve left it at that, just dropped it, let her walk away. But against my better judgment, I squared my shoulders and allowed the wolf inside to take over. Axel had seen it in me, but I never believed him until that very moment. “I’m a slut? Then what does that say about you? You pointing your finger at a virgin and accusing her of being a whore…yet weren’t you the one knocked up by a guy that only slept with you because he was desperate? You had to force him to marry you. And then force him to stay with you. But I’m the slut…”

She lunged forward, grabbing a fistful of hair on the side of my head. “You listen to me, you ungrateful bitch. My biggest regret in life was having you. I should’ve killed you before you took your first breath. Keep pushing me, and I’ll take your last.” With that, she shoved me and I fell against the glass doors of the wall unit behind me.

The sound of broken glass didn’t register past the screaming in my ear. With wide eyes, I observed the deranged woman in front of me and realized those ear-piercing cries weren’t coming from her. Pain filtered into my mind as the deep burn in my upper back took hold of me, preventing me from drawing in a deep enough breath. The glass sliced through skin and murdered my strength. My knees gave out, as well as my fight.

As long as I was under her roof, I’d never survive.

Tears slowly leaked from my eyes as I recounted every moment to him, and then explained how she wouldn’t let me out of her sight for the rest of the weekend. Having him at my back instead of seeing my face made it easier to voice the worst moment of my life. Apparently, sometime during my explanation, he’d finished cleaning and bandaging my wounds. I could sense him closer to me, his scent becoming more powerful, overpowering the air around us. Soft, warm lips caressed my shoulder and the side of my neck.

“You can’t stay there, Bree.”

“I don’t have a choice,” I said with a sniffle.

He gently spun me around with his hands on my hips until we were chest to chest. His eyes no longer held the heated emotions as before. They’d turned forgiving and tender…worried, but easy. “Give me this week. Give me time to figure this out. I don’t care if you have to move four hours away to your dad’s house, but I won’t let you stay there any longer. I can’t wait around for a year with the fear I have inside me right now.”

I rested my forehead against his chest, my arms between us, pressing his shirt to my skin. But then he swiftly lifted me up, setting me on the ledge of the counter behind me.

He moved to stand between my legs. With a gentle hand on my cheek, he forced me to look in his eyes. “I will get you out of there, Bree. If it’s the last thing I do, I will keep you safe. Nothing will ever happen to you again.”

“I love you,” I confessed with a hiccup, feeling calmer than before.

Instead of answering my confession with words, he showed me what he felt with his lips. His kisses. His touches. And then he abruptly pulled away, studying me with bright, impassioned eyes. “I protect the ones I love most. You, Bree, are the one I love most.”

Happiness swelled in my chest at the thought of having him on my side for the rest of my life. I knew what the declaration of our love meant. It wasn’t something either of us took lightly. My heart grew full as I tugged him closer and kissed him once more. This time, his hunger became evident from beneath his slacks as his erection abraded over my sex. It caused a heated need to burn within me. It burned with his love, with his devotion, and the realization that someone actually cared about me—not only cared for me, but loved me. And he wanted to protect me.

But he never got the chance to fulfill that promise of undying protection.

Before the week was over, our secret was out. The school’s administration had called me into the office and questioned me relentlessly. They treated me like a victim, like a child who’d been taken advantage of. And before I could make any sense out of it, I found him leaving the school with a cardboard box in his arms. I chased him as far as I could, screaming his name and for him to stop. But he didn’t even give me one backward glance before departing the school grounds.

The love of my life left me. Just like that. In one fell swoop, all his words of love and vows of protection were gone. And I was left with nothing but an empty hole where my heart once lay.

Tears streaked my cheeks as I stood there, watching nothing. He was long gone, but I was still in disbelief and couldn’t figure out how to go on. And that’s when my eye caught something.

A picture had fallen from the opened box he’d carried. I walked over and bent down to retrieve it—a postcard with a close-up of wolf eyes on the front, bright and fierce. I never knew he had this, and it only served to tear me apart more.

I broke down in the middle of the parking lot, falling to my knees. I didn’t even notice the asphalt cutting into my skin as I sat there.

I clutched the postcard to my chest and sobbed uncontrollably.

I was completely alone.

I shattered, falling to pieces.

Present day

Axel

I had to have been seeing things. There was no way she lay in front of me. I’d spent so long seeing her in every crowd. Every redhead on the street miraculously became her. I couldn’t see a freckled arm without convincing myself that I’d found her again. But then I’d look into their eyes, and I’d known within an instant that it wasn’t my Bree. She was the only person in the world with eyes like that. They’d been etched into my soul, carved in my mind, and branded on my heart.

Wolf eyes.

After going for so long only being able to envision them in my dreams, never able to see them with my eyes wide open, I had nearly convinced myself that she’d never existed. Maybe I’d made her up in my head, seen her only in my dreams.

But here she was, this fragile woman staring up at me in shock with her big, bright-yellow eyes, and there was no way I could deny their familiarity. She had been real…and so was my love for her. Surrendering to that knowledge had my mind spinning, my stomach turning, and my heart racing.

She was real.

She was here.

“Oh, fuck,” she whispered, and the sound of her strained words stabbed my chest like a thousand tiny pins, aiming straight for my heart. “No… Oh, shit.” She lurched up and immediately began coughing.

Clutching her stomach, she turned to the side, hanging her head over the water. I reached for her, scared she would try jumping in again, but as soon as my hand touched her shoulder, vomit spewed past her lips, hitting the lake below. The fear of her jumping back in settled, but in its place, a new panic emerged. Her back arched as her stomach purged everything in it, continuing to dry heave even after there was nothing left to come out. Once the heaving stopped, her sobs filled the air around us.