Chapter 264
Elowen's POV
I paused, hope flaring briefly that he'd changed his mind, that he was going to offer to come with me after all. But when I looked back at him, he was still sprawled on the bed, his expression almost bored.
"Turn off the light on your way out, would you?" Ronan asked, his tone maddeningly casual. "Some of us actually value our beauty sleep."
The audacity of it, the sheer dismissiveness, made something inside me snap completely. "You know what?" I said, my voice dangerously calm as I walked back toward the bed, leaning down so my face was inches from his. "If you don't get out of my room in the next thirty seconds, I'm calling Alaric right now and telling him he's the godfather instead of you. See how you like being replaced by someone who actually gives a damn."
The shock that flashed across Ronan's face was almost worth the anger still churning in my gut, and I straightened up, crossing my arms over my chest as I waited for his response. For a moment, he just stared at me, his mouth slightly open, and I could practically see him trying to figure out if I was serious.
"You wouldn't," he said finally, but there was uncertainty in his voice now, a crack in his earlier confidence.
"Try me," I said flatly, pulling my phone from the nightstand and making a show of scrolling through my contacts. "I'm sure Alaric would love to hear that he's been promoted. He's always been better with emotional support anyway."
Ronan sat up slowly, his expression shifting from shocked to calculating, and I knew he was trying to determine if this was a bluff or a genuine threat. But before either of us could say anything else, I turned on my heel and walked to the door, flipping the light switch with perhaps more force than necessary and slamming the door behind me hard enough to make the frame shudder.
The hallway was dark and cool, the silence broken only by the sound of my own harsh breathing and the rapid beating of my heart. I stood there for a moment, my back against the closed door, trying to calm the storm of emotions raging through me—fury at Ronan and Kade for treating me like a child, guilt for the cruel things I'd said, worry for Casper that wouldn't be silenced no matter how much I tried to rationalize it away, and underneath it all, a bone-deep exhaustion that came from months of trying to hold myself together while everything around me fell apart.
"You're really going to do this?" Juno asked quietly, her mental voice stripped of its earlier sarcasm, replaced with genuine concern.
"I have to," I whispered back, pushing off from the door and moving down the hallway toward the stairs. "I can't just leave him there, can't just pretend I don't care what happens to him. Even if he doesn't love me anymore, even if he chose someone else, I still—"
"Still love him," Juno finished for me, her tone resigned rather than judgmental. "I know. Believe me, I know. But Elowen, you need to be careful. Not just physically, but emotionally. Every time you let yourself get pulled back into their orbit, every time you risk your heart for them, you make it that much harder to heal."
She was right, I knew she was right, but knowing didn't change the fact that I was already moving through the darkened pack house, my bare feet silent on the hardwood floors as I made my way to the key rack by the front door. Ronan's truck keys hung on their usual hook, the metal cool against my palm as I grabbed them, and I felt a grim satisfaction at the thought of his reaction when he discovered I'd taken his vehicle.
"If he's going to be an ass about this," I muttered to Juno, pocketing the keys and grabbing one of the jackets hanging nearby—Kade's, judging by the size. "Then he can deal with explaining to his insurance company why his truck has one or ten new dents in it."
"That's the spirit," Juno said dryly. "Nothing says 'mature decision-making' quite like property damage and grand theft auto."
I ignored her, pulling on the jacket and zipping it up over my sleep shirt, grateful that it was long enough to provide at least some modesty. My reflection in the hall mirror showed a woman who looked half-wild, her hair tangled from sleep, her eyes too bright with unshed tears and barely controlled fury, her hand resting protectively on the small swell of her belly where two lives depended on her to make the right choices.
"Please let this be the right choice," I whispered to my reflection, to the universe, to whatever deity might be listening. "Please let me get to him in time, let me help him, let me prove that I'm strong enough to handle this without falling apart."
Then I turned away from the mirror, from the doubt and fear reflected in my own eyes, and walked out into the night, leaving behind the safety and warmth of the pack house for the uncertain darkness beyond, driven by a love I couldn't kill and a loyalty I couldn't abandon, no matter how much everyone—including myself—thought I should.