EMMA
The words sat between us like something alive.
Heavy. Breathing.
Years.
I folded my arms around myself, suddenly aware of how exposed I was—emotionally stripped, nerves raw, standing in a place that had never been meant for me to fully understand.
“You keep saying that,” I said quietly. “That you waited. That you knew. And you expect me not to hear ownership in it.”
Gabriel’s jaw flexed. He looked like a man choosing every word with care, like one wrong syllable might finally destroy what little ground I had left beneath my feet.
“I didn’t wait like a hunter,” he said. “I waited like a guardian.”
I scoffed softly. “Those aren’t as different as you think.”
“They are to us,” he replied. “To wolves.”
There it was again. That quiet divide. Us and you. Even when he tried to softe
