Chapter 134

Chapter 134: Chapter 134

Lysander’s pov

The clock on the bedside table read two in the morning, its pale digital numbers glowing faint and green in the dark.

I couldn’t sleep.

The master bedroom at our new estate was massive, built around a sweeping wall of floor-to-ceiling glass that opened up to a wooden terrace hanging over the valley. Outside, the rain had tapered off into a thick, suffocating mountain fog. The white mist clung to the glass panes like a living thing, swirling slowly against the darkness.

Behind me, the bed was warm. Drake was asleep or at least as deeply asleep as he ever allowed himself to be.

His heavy, even breaths were a steady anchor in the quiet room. One of his long, muscular arms was still thrown across the empty mattress where I was supposed to be lying beside him.

I sat on the low sill of the window, my knees pulled up to my chest, a thin cotton sheet wrapped loosely around my bare shoulders.

My fingers were trembling against my shins.

I kept my eyes pinned to the edge of the property line, two hundred yards below the house. Beyond the manicured stone courtyard and the glowing ambient ground-lights, the dense pine forest began. Right now, it was a wall of pitch-black shadows drowned in fog.

It was just a hallucination, I kept telling myself, repeating the sentence like a mantra until the words lost all meaning. You saw a stranger in a store. You panicked because you’re messed up in the head. You’re safe here.

Drake’s blood wards hummed through the estate, a faint, rhythmic vibration I could feel in the soles of my feet if I paid close enough attention. The property was a fortress. Nothing could get past the outer gates without triggering a alarm that would wake every guard within five miles.

So why did the skin on the back of my neck feel like it was on fire?

Why did every hybrid instinct in my chest scream that someone was out there, standing in the cold mud beneath the pines, looking straight up at my window?

I leaned my forehead against the cold glass, my breath creating a small, oval fog patch on the pane.

Down at the tree line, a thick swirl of white mist drifted across the dark silhouettes of the trunks. For a fraction of a second, the fog parted.

My heart didn’t just jump; it stopped dead in my chest.

Standing right at the edge of the tree line, lit only by the faint red aura of the perimeter ward, was a tall figure. Broad shoulders. A dark jacket. Standing completely still, his head tilted upward, staring directly at the third-floor window where I sat.

My lungs locked up. No air came in. No sound came out.

Gideon.

I couldn’t see his face, it was too dark, the fog too thick but I knew that posture. I knew that suffocating, heavy weight that used to make me feel like I was drowning every time he walked into my room. My stepbrother was standing on my husband’s land, watching me in the dark.

Turn on the lights, my brain shrieked. Scream. Wake Drake!

I tried to move, but my body felt completely paralyzed, turned to stone by a wave of primal, nauseating terror. I could only stare through the glass, my hand pressing flat against the pane, my pulse hammering in my ears like a freight train.

The fog rolled back over the clearing, thick and white. When it cleared a second later, the space beneath the pines was empty.

Nothing was there. Just dark trees and wet grass.

A soft, heavy rustle of sheets sounded from the bed behind me, followed by the quiet, distinct slide of feet hitting the hardwood floor.

I flinched, pulling my hand back from the window as if the glass had burned me. I tried to smooth my face, trying desperately to force my ragged breathing back into a normal rhythm, but my chest was hitching so hard my ribs hurt.

"Lysander?"

Drake’s voice was a low, gravelly rumble, thick with sleep but laced with that sharp alertness that never truly left him.

His bare feet made no sound against the floorboards as he walked across the room. Before I could scramble up from the window sill, Drake was there.

His massive, warm shadow blocked out the cold draft from the glass as he dropped to one knee beside me.

His broad hands came up, wrapping firmly around my shivering waist, and in one effortless motion, he lifted me off the sill and pulled me directly into his lap.

The contrast hit me like a physical wall—his skin was burning hot, smelling rich and comforting of sandalwood, clean sheets, and his own essence. He wrapped his arms around me, pulling my back flush against his broad chest, burying his face in the crook of my neck.

"You’re freezing," Drake murmured, his low voice vibrating directly against my collarbone. His cool lips pressed against my pulse point, right over the dark mark he had left there days ago. "Why are you out of bed, little bird?"

I swallowed hard, my throat feeling like it was lined with sandpaper. My heart was still pounding wildly against my ribs, so hard I knew he could feel it through his chest.

"I... I couldn’t sleep," I managed to choke out, my voice sounding small, thin, and pathetic.

Drake’s grip on my waist tightened instantly. He didn’t move, but I felt the subtle, dangerous shift in his muscles—the quiet transition from a sleepy lover to a mate sensing a threat. His head lifted from my neck, his glowing eyes tracking past my shoulder to stare straight out the floor-to-ceiling glass window, scanning the dark tree line below.

The air in the bedroom grew heavy, thick with the subtle, suffocating pressure of his aura as he reached out with his senses, probing the estate’s blood wards for any sign of a breach.

For ten agonizing seconds, the room was dead silent. Only the sound of the wind blowing through the valley outside filled the space.

Drake’s eyes slowly shifted back to me. His brow was pulled tight, a sharp, calculating line cutting between his dark eyebrows.

"Your pulse is racing," Drake said softly, his voice dropping an octave, heavy with quiet authority. "Your skin is pale, and you’re trembling in my arms. What were you looking at out there, Lysander?"

Tell him, the voice in my head begged. Tell him you saw Gideon. Tell him you’re terrified.