He Signed My Freedom Now He Wants Me Back Chapter 24
Once in a while, he brought a bunch of wildflowers from the shore. Sometimes a box of cookies, baked a little unevenly. Most often, he simply sat in a corner and stayed until I closed the shop.
Little by little, I grew used to a companionship that asked for nothing.
One rainy night, the bell above the door rang in a frantic rush.
Elias stood there soaked through, Chloe burning with fever in his arms. She was still so young that her healing wasn’t stable, and the more frightened she became, the harder it was for her temperature to come down.
“She refused to go to the treatment center,” he said, his voice strained. “She kept saying she wanted to see you.”
I took them upstairs, gathered Chloe into my arms, and softly began reading her the story about the lighthouse.
Ember helped me hear the chaos of the girl’s heartbeat. Every time it sped up, I slowed my voice and held her hand a little tighter.
By the second half of the night, Chloe finally fell asleep.
Even after her fever broke, she trembled from the lingering heat. A young werewolf’s healing is easily thrown off by fear, so Elias kept his own aura carefully reined in, using the steady breathing rhythm taught in Healer training to guide her.
I sat on the other side and told Chloe she didn’t have to force herself to sleep. When Noah failed his first wolf-sense training, Lucian had looked at him as if he were unworthy of being an heir, and I had stayed outside the training grounds with him for an entire week. That memory still hurt, but it no longer made me blur the child in front of me with the children I had borne.
Chloe was not someone I was keeping near to fill an empty space.
I stayed because she had called my name while burning with fever, and I wanted to answer.
Elias sat by the bedside, exhausted, and took off his glasses.
“Thank you.”
“She’s given me a lot, too,” I said.
When I stood, my leg went numb, and I swayed. Elias caught me immediately—but let go the moment I was steady again.
We were very close.
He smelled of pine needles after a fresh snow, clean and warm. Ember didn’t push me toward him. She only made one thing clear: I was no longer afraid to have someone standing beside me.
Outside, the rain softened to a whisper.
For the first time, in the middle of the night, I thought that maybe a new life didn’t have to mean being alone forever.