"…No," she breathed at last.
The lie tasted like ash.
Thomas did not press. Not tonight. His wolf knew when his sister had drawn a line in the concrete, when pushing would only drive her further away. He simply watched her turn slightly on the couch, back to him now, creating that small, deliberate distance. Her hand stayed beneath the blanket, gentler this time, as if silently apologizing to the life she had already ended.
Outside, the rain fell harder, washing the city's sins into overflowing gutters. Inside, the quiet settled deeper, no longer empty but crowded with ghosts: the pack's ruthless expectations, her parents' cold calculus of survival and power, the future she had been raised to guard with teeth and claw.
She had made her decision long before stepping into this ward.
She would go through with the rest of it.
For the pack. For the fragile peace that kept their kind hidden among steel, glass, and endless lights.
