When Lucian returned to the estate, he realized for the first time just how empty it was.
There was no hot soup left out for him late at night in the dining room, and no lights were kept on in the bedroom. He instinctively reached out his consciousness toward the mate link, but he was forever met with nothing but dead silence.
For the first few days, he woke up every night with a start in that absolute silence. His inner wolf thought its mate had died, thrashing wildly against his chest and forcing him to pace through the estate over and over again by following Mara's lingering scent. The scent lingered in the kitchen and inside Theo's room before finally vanishing in front of her empty wardrobe. The wardrobe contained nothing but the jewelry and Luna gowns he had gifted her, as she hadn
