Mara’s POV
The forest was quiet now, almost deceptively so. Every sound—the rustling leaves, the distant call of a night bird, the trickle of water—was amplified in my senses, making it impossible to tell if the silence was a lull or a warning. My body still trembled from the encounter with the rogue earlier, and the tension that Dresden’s presence had ignited in me refused to subside. My wolf paced restlessly beneath my skin, her claws itching to run, her instincts screaming at me to let go, to accept what I had fought against for so long.
Dresden didn’t move away. His amber eyes stayed locked on mine, piercing, intense, and unrelenting. “You’re running,” he said softly, almost a statement, not a question. “You’ve been running from this… from me… from yourself, for far too long.”
I swa
