The night before the ceremony should have been quiet.
It was the one thing everyone had promised—one final evening of calm before the territory watched Tristan mark me as his. The Alpha house had settled into an almost unnatural stillness. My mother had gone to bed early. Tristan’s father was locked in his study with the last of the ceremonial arrangements. Outside, the patrols had been doubled, but even that felt like routine precaution rather than true alarm.
For the first time in weeks, the future felt close enough to touch.
Tristan found me on the back porch just after nightfall, wrapped in one of his hoodies, watching the dark line of trees beyond the property. He didn’t speak at first. He just came up behind me, slid his arms around my waist, and rested his chin on my shoulder. Th
