"Any number of times you’d like," Sharon promised, her voice a soft anchor in the quiet room. She reached down, gently sliding the book from Alexander’s lap. "But we have to finish the story first, okay? No skipping to the end."
Alexander’s small fingers lingered on the colorful edge of the cover before he finally let go. "The dragon wins, right Mama?"
"The dragon always protects what’s his," she murmured.
As his lashes began to flutter, heavy with the weight of sleep, Sharon watched him with an intensity that bordered on worship. In the dim glow of the bedside lamp, the resemblances she tried to ignore felt sharper. At seven, he was already gaining that lanky height, his limbs stretching out as if eager to leave childhood behind. His hair had darkened from the pale flaxen of his toddler years to a rich, sandy brown, but it was his eyes that sometimes made her breath hitch—that specific, piercing blue.
She hated that she saw Luthor Michaels in the tilt of the boy's head. She hated that fragments of the Tenzclaw Alpha were stitched into the person she loved most. But she reminded herself, over and over, that Alexander was her heart, her anchor. If he carried Luthor’s shadow, she would be the light that drowned it out. Every drop of blood she had spilled to escape the pack was a down payment on a life where Alexander would never know the rot of their politics or the cruelty of his father’s "love."
"Sleep now, little dragon," she whispered, pressing a kiss to his warm forehead.
His breathing deepened into the steady, rhythmic pull of a child far away in dreams. Sharon eased out of the room, leaving the door cracked just enough for the hallway light to slice across his rug.
The cottage was silent. It was the kind of peace she had spent seven years building, brick by painful brick. Yet, the moment she stepped away from his door, the ache in her stomach returned. It wasn't the dull throb of hunger or the sharp cramp of stress; it was a slow, grinding pressure that vibrated against her ribs.
Something is wrong.
She stood in the hallway, her bare feet pressing against the cool wood. She tried to tell herself it was just the anniversary of her flight, or perhaps the heavy fog rolling off the coast. But the instinct was too loud to ignore. It was a pull—a magnetic, sickening tug toward the front of the house.
She moved silently through the living room. The shadows here felt different tonight—heavier, as if they were leaning in to listen. She reached for the front door, her fingers hovering over the deadbolt.
"Don't be a fool, Sharon," she breathed. "It's just the wind."
She opened the door anyway.
The night air was thick with the scent of the salt marsh and damp pine. A storm was brewing somewhere over the Pacific, and the wind carried a low, mournful hum through the trees. Sharon stepped out onto the porch, closing the door behind her to protect the warmth—and the boy—inside.
She reached for the magic in her blood, the power that had truly woken the night she left Luthor. It didn't feel like a foreign tool; it felt like her own breath, a shimmering extension of her soul. She let it spill outward, brushing against the grass, the trees, the pebbles in the drive.
The land felt restless.
"Is someone there?" she called out, her voice barely a whisper.
The porch light flickered. Snap. Snap. The sound was sharp, like a bone breaking. Sharon’s heart slammed against her ribs. The air suddenly felt charged, the atmosphere thickening until it was hard to draw a full breath. There was a metallic tang on her tongue, an electric charge that she hadn't felt in seven years.
It was him.
The realization didn't come as a thought, but as a total physical collapse of her security. Her wolf stirred, pacing in the dark cage of her mind, whimpering in a mix of terror and ancient, carved-in submission.
"No," she gasped, clutching the porch railing. "No, you can't be here."
She had buried herself so deep. She had used every ounce of her magic to shroud their trail, to turn their names into dust. An Alpha shouldn't have been able to find her. Not after this long. Not here.
The crickets abruptly went silent. The wind died, leaving the trees frozen like jagged teeth against the gray sky. Sharon’s hand white-knuckled around the doorknob. She thought about running back inside, grabbing Alexander, and driving until the road ran out. But her feet wouldn't move.
A shadow shifted at the edge of the yard, just beyond the reach of the porch light. It was tall, broad-shouldered, and stood with a stillness that was more terrifying than any movement.
"Luthor?" she rasped.
The shadow moved, stepping forward into the fringe of the light. She couldn't see his face clearly yet, but she saw the tilt of his head—that arrogant, possessive curiosity. The porch light flickered again, casting a strobe-like effect on the figure.
She saw the glint of his eyes. Cold. Gold. Constant.
He didn't need to speak. His presence was a physical weight, a command that pressed down on her shoulders, demanding she drop to her knees. The ache in her stomach twisted into a sharp, white-hot knot of recognition.
"You've grown quite the thorns, little wolf," a voice rumbled from the dark. It was deeper than her memories, rougher, like stones grinding together.
Sharon’s breath caught in her throat. "How did you find me?"
"I never stopped looking," Luthor said, taking another step. Now she could see him—the hard lines of his face, the scar across his brow that hadn't been there before, the expensive dark coat that looked out of place in her rugged coastal world. "You took something that belongs to me, Sharon. You didn't think I'd let that stand, did you?"
"He doesn't belong to you," she snapped, her fear momentarily eclipsed by a mother’s rage. "He is nothing like you."
Luthor’s mouth curved into a dark, mirthless smile. He looked toward the house, his gaze lingering on the window of Alexander’s room. "I could smell him from the road. My blood. My strength. You did a fine job of hiding, but a sire always knows his own."
"Get off my property, Luthor. I have a life here. I have a pack here."
"A pack of humans and a broken witch?" Luthor stepped onto the first stair of the porch. The wood groaned under his weight. "That’s not a pack. That’s a hiding spot. And the game is over."
"I'll kill you before I let you touch him," Sharon said, her fingers beginning to glow with a faint, shimmering violet light.
Luthor stopped, looking down at her hands with genuine amusement. "Magic. So that’s how you did it. You’ve been busy, Sharon. But you’re still a shifter at your core. And I am still your Alpha."
He released a surge of his own power—a raw, dominant energy that hit Sharon like a physical blow. She staggered, her back hitting the door. Her wolf wanted to howl, to bow, to offer its throat in exchange for peace.
"Don't," she pleaded, her voice breaking.
"Where is he?" Luthor demanded, his voice dropping into a low, terrifying register. "Bring him out. I want to see my son."
"Never."
Luthor moved with a speed that defied his size. Before she could cast a spell, he was on the porch, his hand slamming into the door beside her head. He didn't touch her, but the heat radiating from him was a brand. He leaned in, his scent—cedar and old blood—overwhelming her senses.
"You have two choices, Sharon," he whispered against her ear. "You can open this door and we can meet as a family. Or I can take this house apart piece by piece until I find him. And believe me, I will enjoy the second option much more."
"He's just a boy," she sobbed. "Please, Luthor. If you ever cared for me, just go. Let us have this."
Luthor’s hand moved from the door to her chin, forcing her to look up at him. His eyes were burning, a frantic, obsessed light dancing in the gold. "I cared for you so much I almost burned the world down when you left. You don't get to ask for mercy now. You're coming home. Both of you."
"He won't go with you."
"He's a child. He'll go where his Alpha tells him to go."
Luthor turned his gaze to the doorknob. Sharon tried to block him, but he simply picked her up by the waist and moved her aside as if she weighed nothing.
"Luthor, don't!"
He didn't listen. He turned the handle. The door, which she had forgotten to lock in her panic, swung open. The warm, yellow light of the hallway spilled out, illuminating Luthor’s predatory silhouette.
He stepped inside.
Sharon scrambled after him, her heart in her throat. "Alexander, stay in your room!" she screamed.
But it was too late. At the end of the hall, a small figure in dinosaur pajamas stood in the doorway, rubbing his eyes. Alexander blinked at the giant man standing in their living room.
The silence that followed was absolute. Luthor froze, his entire body going rigid as he stared at the boy. For a moment, the Alpha mask slipped, and Sharon saw a flash of something raw—something that looked almost like wonder—in his eyes.
Alexander looked from the stranger to his mother. "Mama? Who is that?"
Luthor took a step toward the boy, his voice uncharacteristically soft. "Hello, Alexander."
"Who are you?" the boy asked, his voice trembling slightly but his chin lifted in that same stubborn way Sharon did when she was backed into a corner.
Luthor knelt down, making himself smaller, though he still looked like he could swallow the room whole. "I'm the man who's been looking for you for a very long time."
Sharon rushed between them, her arms spread wide. "Don't you dare," she hissed at Luthor.
Luthor looked up at her, and the wonder was gone, replaced by a cold, iron-clad resolve. "He has my eyes, Sharon. And he has my scent. He’s coming back to the Tenzclaw. We leave at dawn."
Sharon looked at her son, then back at the monster from her past. The quiet life was dead. The dragon had found its hoard, and she realized with a sickening dread that the fight for Alexander’s soul had only just begun.
