Night had fallen over Silver Creek, wrapping my parents’ house in a calm that contrasted with the storm inside me. After our morning in the shower, Caleb’s heat still burned on my skin, his ebony touch against my pale body a memory that made me shiver. But the shadow of Ethan and the mate bond was still there, a persistent echo reminding me of the life I had left behind in Moon’s Fang. Clarisa was restless, her presence a constant murmur in my mind, torn between past and present. I was in the kitchen, helping my mother, Susan, prepare dinner, when the doorbell rang.
My heart skipped a beat.
“I’ll get it,” I said, drying my hands on a rag.
I opened the door, and there he was, his tall, strong figure framed against the moonlight. Caleb smiled, his ebony skin glowing under the silver radia
