Chapter 303: Spiraling and Silence

Vivian’s POV

"Hannah, you cannot start a strict diet right now," I said, staring down at her in complete disbelief.

"Why not?" she huffed out, brushing a few stray strands of hair off her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand.

"Because you haven’t even had the baby yet!"

She arched a dark brow at me as if I had completely missed the most obvious point in the world. "Do you know how long it actually takes to lose baby weight after giving birth? If I am going to be your official maid of honor at this wedding, I want to look damn good in my dress."

"You are going to look better than good," I assured her warmly, trying my absolute best to smother my rising laugh. "You will be completely gorgeous. But seriously, we haven’t even picked an actual wedding date yet, so maybe, just maybe, take a deep breath?"

Mark came to her immediate rescue like the wonderfully supportive mate he always was, settling down softly beside her on the couch cushion and placing his broad hand gently over her very round belly. He began rubbing slow, calming circles across the soft fabric of her dress until she finally stopped trying to do some ridiculous couch crunches and leaned back into his firm chest with a heavy grumble of defeat.

"I guess," she muttered, clearly not thrilled about being talked out of her intense workout routine.

I couldn’t help but smile fondly at her stubbornness. Ever since I asked her to be my maid of honor, she had gone full-on warrior bride mode, completely ignoring the fact that her due date was, quite literally, any day now. The exact moment I had told her the good news earlier, she had dropped straight to the floor and tried to perform a sit-up right then and there.

She had managed to get to three reps before collapsing with a dramatic wheeze. And Johnson, being the ever-helpful brother figure that he was, had actively cheered her on like she was training for the Olympic games. Mark, meanwhile, looked like he wanted to physically throttle him on the spot. I had a strong gut feeling that her baby wasn’t going to wait much longer to make its grand appearance.

After I had asked Algebra to drop me off at Hannah’s house, it certainly was not a shock when my pack guards showed up outside not long after. Of course they did. I swear those males probably tracked my unique scent across the territory like trained hounds.

Watching Johnson greet everyone at the front door was highly entertaining in itself. He tried to smoothly coax a kiss out of Mila before letting her step inside, only to receive a swift kick straight to the shin and a hard shove out of her way. She breezed right past his leaning frame with that lethal glare of hers, while he followed happily behind her, grinning like she hadn’t just physically assaulted him in front of everyone. Honestly, those two were either going to murder each other before the month was out or end up mated.

The rest of the afternoon wasn’t anything too dramatic just running a few small errands around town... until my sensitive senses started picking up distress signals coming from nearby wolves. I simply couldn’t ignore them, not when the feelings were hitting my mind so strongly. One of the situations turned out to be a guy in his thirties who had somehow managed to trap himself completely under the heavy metal frame of what looked like a half-built outdoor patio.

Who on earth decides to build heavy structures entirely alone and blatantly ignores safety instructions? Apparently, that guy.

He adamantly insisted he didn’t need any help from a she-wolf, desperately struggling for thirty whole minutes while I stood there politely on the grass, watching him flail around uselessly. I waited until he finally gave up his foolish pride far too proud to ask out loud, but way too exhausted to fake it anymore before I casually stepped in and lifted the damn metal structure right off him like it weighed absolutely nothing. His stunned face when I did it one-handed? Completely priceless.

By the time I finally made my way back home to the pack house, it was much later than usual, and I could immediately feel Zahliver’s intense presence resting in our master bedroom upstairs. But one familiar energy was completely missing from the territory again: Joshua’s. That made... what, four nights in a row now?

I really did not like it at all.

Maybe it was the newly awakened Luna in me being overly protective, needing to constantly keep track of every single wolf under my rule. Or maybe it was just me as a person, feeling deeply uneasy every single time he left the house without saying where he was going or when he would be back. Either way, it simply did not sit right with me.

Where on earth was he going all the time at night?

I certainly didn’t think he was the wild partying type. I mean, how does a male go from being a death-mute-ghost to clubbing on the weekends? Highly unlikely. I strongly doubted he had suddenly picked up private guitar lessons during his time as a walking corpse, so the "secret band member" theory was out the window. And it’s not like he had made enough actual friends here yet to have a tight-knit group of ride-or-die bros to hang out with.

Which left... the really shady stuff.

I really didn’t want to imagine him out there in the dark doing something reckless, illegal, or worse, a quick hookup. Nope. Absolutely not going down that mental road.

He was a strange male, that kid. Odd, like a stray shadow that hadn’t quite figured out if it wanted to stay in the light or disappear into the dark forever.

But I genuinely hoped desperately hoped that my survival instincts were just being overly paranoid for no reason. Because if I received a frantic phone call in the middle of the night about him needing bail money... I swear, I would declare total bankruptcy on the spot just to avoid paying it.

At least until morning came.

I climbed the grand wooden staircase slowly, physical fatigue tugging heavily at my limbs like iron weights. As I reached our bedroom door, I pushed it open gently and paused right at the threshold. The lights inside were completely off, even though I could feel Zahliver’s overwhelming presence in the space like a living, tangible force. It was a heavy pulse in the air that pressed firmly against my skin.

My brown eyes quickly adjusted to the dim darkness, sweeping the quiet space until I spotted him sitting right on the edge of the mattress on his side of the bed. His broad back was perfectly straight, his large hands clasped tightly together, just staring blankly ahead into the dark room.

I closed the wooden door gently behind me.

"Nope. Totally normal," I said dryly, walking further into the room. "Sitting around in pitch-black silence for... who knows how long? Not creepy in the slightest, my love."

Still, he didn’t utter a single word in response. He didn’t even move a muscle.

That’s when I felt it this strange, unnatural stillness that wasn’t just about simple silence. It was complete emotional distance. At some point during the day while I was out with Algebra, he had intentionally shut me out of our mate bond. I hadn’t even fully noticed the wall until right now, and that sudden realization unsettled me far more than I wanted to admit out loud.

He was getting remarkably better at blocking me out when he wanted to. I honestly didn’t know whether to feel proud of his strength... or completely terrified of what it meant.

A dark, unwanted thought crept into my mind, uninvited but sharp as ever: cold feet about the wedding.

My chest clenched up tight. No way, my internal wolf snarled fiercely in my mind. He is definitely not getting that damn ring back from us.

Zahliver let out a long, deeply tired sigh into the quiet room, the only subtle hint that he had heard her fierce thought.