Serena’s POV
I let out a long, shaking sigh. The first in days.
Ari was breathing evenly, his little chest rising and falling on the soft mattress beside me. The fever had broken. His skin wasn’t burning anymore.
I should have collapsed right there. I should have slept. But my body wouldn’t let me. Fear had lived in me too long. I sat still, my hand resting on Ari’s quilt, watching him with the desperate focus only a mother could know.
He was safe. For now.
Safe, because Kael had finally done the bare minimum a father should.
I closed my eyes, but the memories wouldn’t let me rest. Two years ago, when Kael had looked at me like I was dirt. When his pack threw me out like garbage. When I’d carried his child alone, through nights of hunger and cold.
And now here I was, back under his
