46. August

46

August

The haze of unconsciousness finally began to lift. My head felt heavy, and the soreness in my body was overwhelming. I blinked into the dim light, the room still spinning around me. My throat was dry, and there was a metallic taste on the tip of my tongue. My eyes flickered toward the corner, and I spotted her.

Elisabed.

I drew a shaky breath and said her name.

It was enough. She was at my side instantly, her eyes wide with hope, anger, and relief.

“August,” she breathed, her voice shaking. It only took a heartbeat before she was in my arms, clutching at me like I was the only thing that could tether her to this world. She was crying now, quietly, as if afraid to let out the full weight of it.

I sat up slowly, the world tilting beneath me. Somehow, I was strong enough to pull her into my lap, sitting her in between my legs. I ran my hands up her back, trying to offer her some semblance of comfort, even though the rawness of my body betrayed me.

Her sobs were muffled in my chest, and I tried to steady her, running a hand through her hair. “What happened?” I asked, trying to distract her, to focus on something that wasn’t the pain in her eyes or the way she was clinging to me as though I could slip away at any moment.

She didn’t answer right away. Her breath hitched, and it was several moments before she could gather herself enough to speak. “You...you’ve been out for a week. You were...you were nearly dead, August. I thought you were gone...”

Her voice broke again, and I felt the sharp sting of it deep in my chest. I couldn’t even explain why I went after Raol in the first place and was so desperate to fight him because I didn’t even think before I did it. I just reacted. I pushed her and everyone else away and nearly lost myself to it. When the pact broke, my feral wolf acted the same way, dragging me away from the main conflict to fight enemies in the woods alone.

“Elisabed, I—” I started to say, but she was shaking her head, cutting me off with a desperate, “You can’t keep doing this to me, August.” She pulled back a little, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, but she didn’t hear me. She was moving now, away from my chest, her hands gripping my arms tightly.

She told me everything—about Finn and Marshall, how they helped her bring them back from the madness, how they all searched for me and found me barely alive in the woods. She was speaking so fast, the words spilling from her in a cascade. I could hear the edge of her frustration with me in every sentence. The anger and hurt were thick in her voice as she explained how the other two alphas helped restore order after the chaos. They’d managed to hold things together, and the new leadership was in place.

But when she started to explain what happened with Raol, I felt the fury I’d been fighting rise again. I gripped her tighter, fighting the tremor that coursed through me.

“Raol...” she whispered his name like a curse. “He...he’s dead,” She was struggling to explain, but I didn’t need to know.

“I wish I could have done it for you, Elisabed,” I said. “I would have done it slowly and painfully and made that bastard regret everything he ever did to you and your sister. That’s what he deserved, and I should have done it.”

Elisabed’s eyes flashed with something I didn’t expect. “What do you think you’re doing?” she snapped, her voice fierce with a mix of hurt and frustration. “You’re going to blame yourself? You’re going to carry all this weight on your own?” She shook her head, her hands gripping my shoulders. “You’ve never trusted me, August. You never let me in. Why won’t you just—” Her words caught in her throat, the anger in her eyes giving way to raw emotion, and I saw it all. The cracks in her heart.

I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t stand seeing her like this, broken, torn between the anger at me and the love I’d failed to return fully. She was everything to me, and I’d been pushing her away. But I couldn’t do that anymore.

“I know, Elisabed,” I whispered hoarsely. “I know I’ve hurt you and don’t deserve you. I never should have kept you at arm’s length. But please...please don’t leave me.”

She pulled back just enough to look me in the eyes, her breath coming fast. “Why, August? Why won’t you just...let me in?”

I didn’t have an answer for her. Not one that made sense. I couldn’t explain it. Not when it’d been this way for so long.

But I couldn’t keep running anymore.

And then I said it. The thing I’d been hiding from myself for so long. The thing that I’d feared would destroy everything if I spoke it aloud. “I’m in love with you, Elisabed. I always have been.”

Elisabed’s eyes widened, and she looked at me like she didn’t know what to say, but I couldn’t stop now. I needed her to know.

“I love you more than anything in this world,” I continued, my voice hoarse with the weight of it all. “I’d sacrifice everything for you, for us. I’ve pushed you away because I was scared. Scared of what I’d lose, scared of how much I need you. But the truth is, I need you more than I’ve ever needed anything. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything I’ve put you through. For hurting you. For leaving you. For letting Raol hurt you and your sister.”

I could see the raw emotion in her eyes. The anger, the hurt, the relief—all of it mingling as she stared at me. But I didn’t regret saying it. I couldn’t.

She’d been waiting for me to admit it. And I couldn’t keep her waiting any more.

“Just...just fucking kiss me,” she growled, her voice cracking from the emotion.

I didn’t need another word. I leaned into her, closing the distance between us. Her lips crashed into mine—demanding and desperate, like she’d been waiting for this moment longer than I even realized.

It wasn’t the soft, tentative kiss I’d imagined. It was wild, hungry, filled with everything she’d kept hidden, everything I’d forced her to bury for so long. I felt it in the fierceness of her touch, the way her fingers pressed against the back of my neck, pulling me closer. She’d been waiting for me to break, to let myself fall into this, into us. And now that I had, there was no stopping it.

My hands moved instinctively, cupping her face and pulling her even closer. She was here. She was with me. And for the first time in what felt like forever, I wasn’t afraid.

Her lips parted against mine, and I took it as my cue to deepen the kiss and show her how much I meant it. I wasn’t just apologizing. I wasn’t just trying to make up for the mistakes I made. This was more than that. This was me telling her everything I kept locked inside, every inch of me that I’d been terrified to share with her. I loved her. I always had.

She shuddered against me, her body pressing into mine like she was trying to drown herself in me. And I let her. I let myself fall into the heat of it, into the weight of what we are. What we’d always been.

I pulled back just enough to catch my breath, and when I looked at her, her eyes were glistening and full of emotion. It was raw. It was vulnerable. And it scared me because, for the first time, I wasn’t sure what would come next. I’d spent my entire life running from things I didn’t understand, my own feelings, and the weight of my responsibilities.

“I’m sorry,” I said again. “I’m so sorry for all the pain I’ve caused you.”

She didn’t answer immediately. Instead, her hand moved to my chest, resting there as she took a deep, shuddering breath. “You’re sorry? Is that all you’ve got?”

I felt a sharp pang in my chest at her words, but I understood. I’d put her through hell, and I couldn’t just make it all better with a few words.

“I wish I could give you more than just my apologies, Elisabed,” I said, my hand gently brushing a strand of hair away from her face. “But right now, all I have is this. All I have is me. And I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you if you’ll let me.”

She looked at me, her expression unreadable for a long moment. Then, slowly, she reached up, her fingers tracing my jawline with a tenderness that seemed to contradict everything else in this moment. It was as if she was trying to understand me and make sense of the man she thought she knew.

But she didn’t pull away.

Her voice was barely a whisper, but it was enough to shake me to my core. “You think I’m going to just forgive you?”

“I’m not asking for forgiveness,” I responded softly. “I don’t deserve it. But I’ll spend my life trying to earn it.”

She didn’t answer. Instead, she leaned in again, her lips brushing mine more gently this time as if she was trying to figure out what was left between us. I could feel the weight of everything we’d been through, everything that brought us to this point, hanging in the air. It was too much to process in one moment, but I knew one thing for certain: I was never letting her go.

Her hands moved to my chest, and I could feel the tension in her body, the conflict in her eyes. She wanted to trust me, but she’d been hurt too many times to simply fall back into the illusion of safety I once offered her. She had every right to doubt me, and I couldn’t blame her for it.

“August...” Her voice broke through my thoughts, and I looked down at her. Her eyes searched mine like she was looking for the truth in every inch of my face. “I don’t know if I can just forget what’s happened. I don’t know if I can just let it all go.”

“I’m not asking you to,” I said, my voice thick with emotion. “I’m asking you to let me prove to you that I’m here. I’m asking you to let me fight for us. Fight for you. Fight for the future we both deserve.”

She didn’t say anything right away, but I could see the flicker of something in her eyes. It wasn’t forgiveness—not yet—but it was something. Something that told me she wasn’t ready to give up on me, on us, entirely.

I gently wiped the tears from her cheeks. “I’m here, Elisabed,” I whispered. “I’m here, and I’m never leaving you, and I love you.”

For a long moment, neither of us said anything. We sat in the silence of the room, the weight of the words hanging in the air like a storm about to break.

Then, without warning, she leaned in again, her lips meeting mine. The kiss was slower this time, less frantic and desperate, but it was filled with promise.

We were both breathless when we finally broke apart, but there was something new between us now. Something that wasn’t there before. Something that made me believe that maybe, just maybe, we had a chance.

“I don’t need you to be perfect, August,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “I just need you to be here. With me.”

And for the first time, I knew I was exactly where I needed to be. With her. Always.