Chapter 4
1310 Words
Rowan didn’t ask her to pack.
He told her.
“Take only what you need,” he said, already scanning her apartment like it was a vulnerability map. Windows. Corners. Blind spots. “We’re leaving.”
Elara stared at him. “You can’t just uproot my life.”
“I can,” Rowan replied calmly. “And I am.”
Her temper flared. “You don’t own me.”
“No,” he agreed, meeting her glare without backing down. “But I am responsible for you now.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“It is in my world.”
She opened her mouth to argue—and stopped.
“My world,” he’d said.
Not this world.
Something in his tone told her this wasn’t a figure of speech.
“Where are we going?” she asked carefully.
“My estate,” Rowan replied. “It’s secure. Warded. Monitored.”
Her stomach flipped. “Warded?”
He paused, just long enough to curse himself.
“Protected,” he corrected.
“That wasn’t what you said.”
Rowan’s jaw tightened. “Elara—”
“No,” she said, crossing her arms. “I just watched you tear a car apart with your bare hands. You don’t get to half-explain things anymore.”
Silence stretched between them.
Then Rowan exhaled, slow and deliberate.
“There are others like me,” he said. “Not many. But enough to form rules.”
Her pulse spiked. “Rules for what?”
“For survival,” he said. “And control.”
She swallowed. “You said they experimented on you.”
“They did,” Rowan replied. “But they didn’t create what I am. They triggered it.”
Her head spun. “So you were always—”
“Different,” he finished. “Yes.”
He stepped closer, lowering his voice instinctively. “And so are you.”
Her breath caught. “What?”
Rowan’s eyes searched her face, conflicted.
“You don’t react the way humans do,” he said quietly. “You didn’t faint. You didn’t run. You didn’t scream.”
“That doesn’t make me—”
“It makes you compatible,” he said.
The word landed with dangerous weight.
“Compatible with what?” she whispered.
Rowan looked away, restraint visibly tightening his shoulders.
“With me.”
Her heart hammered.
“This is insane,” she said. “You’re saying I just… what? Fit into your world?”
“You’ve always fit,” he replied softly. “You just didn’t know it.”
She shook her head, backing away. “You don’t get to rewrite my life because of some instinct.”
His gaze snapped back to hers, fierce but controlled.
“And you don’t get to pretend the pull between us doesn’t exist.”
The truth of that hit too close.
Rowan straightened. “Pack a bag. Ten minutes.”
“And if I say no?”
He hesitated.
Just for a second.
Then, honestly, “Then I’ll stay here and tear this city apart until I know you’re safe.”
Her chest tightened.
“That’s not a choice.”
“No,” Rowan said quietly. “It’s a warning.”
She turned and walked toward her bedroom, hands shaking.
As she packed, she could feel him behind her—even when he wasn’t in the room. A presence. Steady. Watchful.
When she returned with a small bag slung over her shoulder, Rowan nodded once.
“Good.”
She glared at him. “This doesn’t mean I trust you.”
A corner of his mouth lifted.
“It means you’re alive,” he said. “Trust comes later.”
They left the apartment together as the sun dipped low over the city.
Elara glanced back once, knowing something had shifted irreversibly.
She wasn’t just leaving her home.
She was crossing into Rowan Blackthorne’s territory.
And once inside an Alpha’s domain—
Nothing ever stayed the same.
The estate rose out of the darkness like something pulled from another world.
High iron gates. Stone walls wrapped in ivy. The kind of place that didn’t announce wealth so much as assume it. As Rowan’s car approached, the gates opened silently, lights guiding them up a long, winding drive.
Elara pressed her forehead lightly against the window, taking it in.
“This is where you live?” she asked.
Rowan’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “When I need to.”
That answer unsettled her more than if he’d said yes.
The house itself was vast but restrained—no garish displays, no excess. Everything about it felt… deliberate. Controlled.
Alive.
The moment the car stopped, Elara felt it.
The pressure.
Like invisible eyes tracking her movement. Like the air itself had weight.
She stepped out slowly. “Rowan… why does it feel like I just walked into someone else’s territory?”
He came around the car, standing close enough that his presence grounded her.
“Because you have,” he said. “Mine.”
Before she could respond, the front door opened.
A man stepped out onto the stone steps. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Dark hair pulled back neatly. His gaze snapped to Rowan first—respectful, alert—then slid to Elara.
Something flickered there.
Surprise.
Interest.
Calculation.
“Alpha,” the man said, bowing his head slightly.
Elara stiffened. “Did he just call you—”
“Yes,” Rowan said calmly. “He did.”
Her heart skipped. “So this is real. All of it.”
Rowan turned to her. “I won’t lie to you here. Not in my territory.”
That promise felt heavier than anything else he’d said.
“This is Marcus,” Rowan continued. “My second.”
Marcus inclined his head politely. “You’re… unexpected.”
Elara raised a brow. “I get that a lot today.”
A faint smile tugged at Marcus’s mouth before he sobered. “The pack can feel you.”
Her stomach twisted. “Feel me how?”
Rowan’s jaw tightened. “Enough.”
Marcus immediately stepped back. “Of course.”
Pack.
The word echoed in her head as Rowan guided her inside.
The interior was warm, quiet, and unsettlingly calm. No staff. No noise. Just the soft crackle of a fire and the sense that the walls were listening.
“You’re safe here,” Rowan said. “No one crosses my land uninvited.”
“And if they try?”
His eyes darkened. “They don’t leave.”
She believed him.
He led her up a sweeping staircase, then stopped outside a bedroom door.
“You’ll stay here,” he said. “It’s protected.”
“And you?” she asked.
Across the hall, another door stood open—larger. Darker.
“There,” Rowan replied. “Close enough.”
Her pulse fluttered.
“Rowan,” she said quietly. “What happens if I don’t belong here? If all of this is a mistake?”
He looked at her for a long moment, something conflicted moving behind his eyes.
“Then I’ll make the world adjust,” he said.
That should have frightened her.
Instead, something warm and dangerous settled in her chest.
Rowan reached out, hesitated, then rested his hand lightly over hers.
Just a touch.
Nothing more.
But it sent a shock through both of them.
He pulled back immediately, breath controlled but eyes burning.
“Rest,” he said hoarsely. “Tomorrow, I explain everything.”
She nodded, watching him retreat across the hall.
As her door closed softly behind her, Elara leaned against it, heart racing.
She was inside an Alpha’s home.
Surrounded by creatures she didn’t understand.
Protected by a man who barely trusted himself around her.
And somewhere deep in her bones—
She knew this was only the beginning.
- Writer
