Bonus Chapter 5

*A Few Minutes Ago*
***Rhys***

It’s snowing when we pull up the long drive to Blackmoon’s packhouse. 
“You alright, Rhys?” Ava asks, peering over from the passenger seat. Her meadow green eyes sparkle, wide and merry, just like always.
I nod once, brushing my thumb against the steering wheel. “Yeah. Just never done Christmas this way before.”
My pack usually doesn’t celebrate Christmas.
Ava grins. “You’re gonna love it. Lights, cake, way too many hugs.”
Edward snorts from the back seat. “And loud people. Lots of them.”
“Brilliant,” I mutter, but there’s warmth behind the sarcasm. I’m only here because Ava insisted, and there are very few people I’d go to such lengths for. She’s like a little sister to me—a good one, the kind that says too much, laughs too easily, and somehow sees everything.
The snow crunches beneath my boots the moment I step out of the black SUV, the cold slapping my face like an old enemy. London may be grey and cold, but the forest surrounding this packhouse is a different kind of stillness—older, heavier, and peaceful. It smells like pine, burning logs, and something else. 
I pause.
Something sweet.
Ava hops out beside me, her white-blonde curls bouncing like she’s just stepped out of a bloody fairy tale. She’s been waving to the people passing by like she owns the place. Her scarf flutters in the wind like her laugh, bright and warm and so bloody full of life. 
Edward follows, quieter, always a step behind her like she’s the gravity he can’t resist. Then he drops a kiss on his fated mate cheek.
Ava spins around, her cheeks pink with cold. “Told you it’d be proper cold here!”
I grunt, tugging my coat tighter.
Ava’s family—big, loud, too damn happy—spill out of the packhouse, shouting her name, throwing arms around her and Edward. Laughter rings through the cold air, alive and bright.
But I barely register any of it.
I sniff again.
There it is.
Sweet.
It’s sweet and bloody intoxicating.
So sweet it makes my mouth water.
Like vanilla and strawberry and something warm, something I’ve never smelled before but already want to drown in.
Stepping closer to Ava, I ask, my voice low through their chaotic happy sound, “Do you smell that?” 
She blinks. “Smell what? The soup? That’s probably my aunt’s stew. She adds way too much garlic, but I promise, it’s deli—”
“Not that.” My eyes narrow. I turn my head slowly, letting the scent guide me like a thread tugging my spine. “That. That smell. It’s...”
I trail off.
Edward joins us, sniffing the air. “Smells normal to me.”
Edward frowns, clapping a hand to my shoulder. “You good, mate? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
But I’m not. Not in the slightest.
“It’s not a ghost,” I mutter. My chest tightens. My wolf stirs, restless.
No. Not restless.
Starved.
Someone shouts, and a chorus of excited voices erupts.
Ava and Edward are instantly engulfed in hugs.
A woman with long dark curls, a sharpness to her beauty, steps toward me. “And who’s this?”
“This is Rhys, Lily,” Ava says cheerfully, tugging me forward. 
I nod stiffly. “Good evening.”
Then I step forward, but Ava steps in front of me. Her beaming smile falters. She knows me. She’s seen me fight, lead, bleed—but she’s never seen me like this. “Rhys,” she says gently. “Are you okay? Talk to me.”
I blink down at her.
She’s always been good at reading people. That’s what makes her dangerous, despite all her sunbeam smiles. Ava knows when to push and when to shut up. Wise little wolf, this one.
But I can’t give her words. Only instinct.
I push the door to the packhouse open without asking. Rude as fuck. But I don’t care. My wolf surges forward me like a storm, and I’m just the vessel he’s hijacked.
I step inside.
The scent is stronger here.
I stride through the entrance hall, ignoring the gasps and questions and eyes that land on me with confusion. 
Ava’s laughing nervously behind me. “Sorry! He’s not usually like this, I promise. This is Rhys, by the way.”
I barely hear them. My wolf is howling.
Blackmoon’s big packhouse seems nice enough—clean floors, warm lighting, pictures on the walls, the whole bloody holiday postcard.
But I don’t care about any of that.
I care about that scent.
The warmth of the room hits me, and so do the eyes. People gathered. Hugs. Laughter. Someone passes a tray of biscuits.
“Hi,” a deep voice says. “Who’s this?”
Ava jogs beside me, panting a little but beaming. “Az!” she squeals, throwing her arms around the big guy.
Az hugs her tightly, lifting her slightly off the ground. “You’re late, little bug,” he murmurs, but there’s no bite to it—just pure affection. Ava told me about him, her big brother. Az’s eyes flick to me, narrowing. “And who’s that?”
“That’s Rhys,” Ava says, still half-laughing in his arms. “He’s my best friend. From London.”
Az stiffens, then growls. “*I am* your best friend, Ava King!”
I barely hear them. The words register, sure, but they blur beneath the burning ache crawling up the back of my throat. That scent, light and calm and sweet like spring on a sunny day, wraps tighter around my ribs.
My jaw clenches.
My fists, too.
“Why he stormed in like he owns the place?” Az presses, stepping in front of Ava now, half-shielding her with a signature overprotective stance. 
“What is that scent?” I snap.
Az and Ava both blink at me.
I turn in a slow circle, breath sharp, my eyes scanning every inch of the room, every face. My voice turns feral. “Can’t you smell that?”
“Excuse me?” The woman with dark curls says, frowning. Lily.
Ava asks, pale brows pulling together, “Rhys, are you okay?”
No. No, I’m not. I’m two seconds from losing what little composure I have left. The scent is everywhere—on the air, on my tongue, under my skin. My wolf stir, restless, clawing toward it.
“What is that smell?” I snap again, spinning on my heel.
Everyone freezes.
The room goes silent.
Eyes widen. Chairs scrape.  
A woman steps forward—petite, elegant, light blonde hair pinned into a perfect twist. Her dress is a soft floral cream, her meadow green eyes are big and bright, like Ava’s. The way she looks up at me makes me remember Ava when she’s being clever. Only this woman is older. Wiser.
I know before she even opens her mouth that this is Alicent, Ava’s mom. 
“You must be Rhys,” she says, her voice calm, curious. It carries the same graceful cadence Ava uses when she wants to make me behave. “I’m Allie, Ava’s mother.”
Of course, you are. Look at that bright aura. 
My wolf stills. Just for a breath.
I give her a slight nod, my jaw tight, my eyes scanning the room behind her, past her. I don’t speak. I don’t explain. I can’t. The scent is too strong. It’s a siren’s pull, dragging me deeper into something I’m not ready for.
Something that won’t wait.
“What is that smell?” I say, absentminded.
“What smell?” Ava asks gently.
“Bloody hell,” I growl. My wolf is pacing inside me now, clawing at my skin. My control is slipping, and that never happens. Not to me. “Something sweet. Here. Right here.”
She looks at me like I lost my mind.
I spin in place, hand outstretched like I can grab it.
My eyes scan the room. Frantic.
Edward touches my elbow, voice low. “Brother, you’re scaring them. You alright? You were fine a moment ago.”
“He’s never like this,” Ava adds quickly, her eyes wide and worried. “Rhys’s usually... very proper.”
I open my mouth to answer, but my wolf growls.
Not here.
Not in this room.
The scent is here, yes. Strong. But faint.
Like someone was here. Recently.
My head snaps to the left.
“It’s not coming from any of you,” I say, more to myself than them. “There’s a scent,” I say, low, clipped. “It’s not just any scent. It’s here. It was right here. The scent’s thick where I’m standing. Who was standing here?”
A gasp cuts through the silence. I turn. Alicent’s meadow green eyes widen. She glances at the floor beneath my boots as if she, too, suddenly realizes who had been standing there. And then she looks up at me with a knowing smile. “You,” she whispers so softly I almost don’t hear. “You found her.”
My heart slams.
But it isn’t Ava’s mom that answers me. “The scent,” a tall, elegant woman says. “You’re standing right where my daughter stood minutes ago.”
My pulse slams.
Everything in me freezes—and then detonates.
I inhale. That’s it. That’s where the scent is thickest. Where she stood.
“Mate,” I whisper. “This is my mate’s scent.”
“Your what?” everyone says.
Gasps ripple through the room. Murmurs. Ava covers her mouth.
The elegant woman stares at me like I’ve gone mad but with hope in her chestnut eyes. “Are you sure?” Tears fill her gaze. 
“I don’t mistake that,” I snarl. “Where is she?” I demand, sharp. My voice slices through the tension. It’s not a question. It’s a command.
No one answers fast enough.
“Where. Is. She?”
The regal woman straightens her spine, meeting my gaze. She doesn’t cower. Impressive. “She’s in the garden.”
Another voice, but this one is deep and rough, says, “She’s out there.”
I glance toward the speaker. A tall man with an eyepatch, who looks like he could wrestle a bear and win, points through the glass doors. I don’t wait.
I’m already moving.
I run.
The cold slams into me like a wall as I shove the doors open. My breath fogs the air. My boots slam into the snowy deck and then I’m leaping off it, into the white. My boots crush through it, but I don’t feel the cold. My blood’s hot. My muscles coil. Every instinct in me screams to run, to *get* to her.
“Rhys!” Ava yells. Feet scramble behind me. Voices.
I don’t stop.
My wolf howls inside me. My heart pounds. The scent is close now. Closer.
She’s close.
I veer past a tree, a rose bush still wearing thorns, and then I see her.
My heart pounds.
A woman.
Back turned.
Long hair tumbling down her back. Small shoulders. Thin frame. The snow falls around her like a curtain.
And then—
A hand.
A hand lifts.
Crack.
I hear it.
A sound like skin on skin. Sharp. Violent. It echoes through the night.
My blood turns to fire.
She’s hit.
And before I even think, I move.
I don’t know who she is. But I know her sweet scent smells like home. Like warmth. Like everything I didn’t know I wanted.  
And someone just hurt her.
That’s the last thing they’ll ever do.
I growl. The cold disappears. The world narrows to her—
And the bastard who laid a hand on her.
Mate, my wolf whispers, savage and reverent.
Mine.
She’s hit. She’s hit. She’s hit.
The sound of the slap still rings in my ears—like a gunshot.
I’m already moving.
There’s no time to think, no breath to waste.
I cross the snow in a heartbeat, the snow blurs as I cut through it like a blade, fury wrapped around my bones. 
She’s still standing, barely, her fingers pressed against her cheek where the bastard dared to touch her, blood blooming on her lip. I can sense her wolf stirs, but I also can sense that she’s too stunned to fight back. Too shocked to breathe.
And the motherfucker’s *still* talking.
“You *will* show me respect—”
I burst through the line of trees behind her. My vision narrows—tunnels. My wolf is howling for blood.
He doesn’t even see me.
I don’t give him the dignity of a warning.
My hand closes around his throat like a vice, and I don’t stop to speak. I don’t roar. I don’t ask why. 
I *rip.*
The sound it makes is wet, vicious. Right.
His head tears free from his shoulders, spine snapping clean. I drop what’s left of him without care. Blood spurts hot and immediately, splashing my arm as his body drops like a sack of rot.
His head hits the snow a moment later—mouth frozen mid-snarl, eyes still open. The bastard’s blood streams in the winter air.
Red paints the white ground.
Her scream cuts through the silence. It’s not fear. It’s pain. Deep. Shredding.
I spin to her. Her body curls, her hands clawing at her neck as if something inside her is burning. I see it then—the mark. 
A fucking chosen claiming mark. 
Unraveling. 
It glows—flickers—and then vanishes like smoke.
The bond between them dying with him.
And it hurts her. She still screams.
“Fuck,” I breathe, and I’m at her side in a blink, arms scooping her up. Her body trembles in my hold, hot and cold all at once. The wind catches her hair and whips it back from her face, pale with agony. 
“Hey, hey, I’ve got you,” I mutter, pressing her against my chest, shielding her from the storm. Her skin burns hot under my hands. “You’re safe now. I swear it.”
She doesn’t answer. Just writhes in my arms, the pain too much for her to speak. 
“Fuck’s sake, *what did he do to you?*” I snarl fiercely, cradling her tighter. “That piece of shit! You poor thing…”
She whimpers. No one should have to endure that.
And then she goes limp.
Unconscious.
Her head lolls against my chest.
“No, no, no—stay awake, my love. Look at me.”
Too late.
She’s out.
Panic claws up my throat. My wolf’s pacing now, out of his mind, begging me to do something.
I turn her face to the side, the red cheek already healing from the slap. A slap.
He hit her.
He bloody marked her.
He dared.
And I killed him too quickly.
Voices shout from behind, crunching over snow. I don’t look. I don’t care. I hold her closer, nestling her against my coat. She’s got no fucking jacket on. Out here in this cold. The snow soaks through the knees of my trousers where I knelt.
They burst through the trees. Ava’s whole bloody family.
Someone gasps. A chorus of them, actually.
“What the hell happened?” A tall bloke with an Alpha aura storms toward us. Black hair, fury in his black eyes.
“Why the fuck did you kill him?”
I look up, my gaze sharp and steady. “He slapped *my mate*. He’s lucky all he lost was his head!”
Another gasp. One of them growls low. Then, the others follow.
“If anyone else fancies laying a finger on her,” I growl, my voice like steel, “you’ll meet the same fucking end.”
She stirs in my arms, just a twitch, and I look down, brushing the hair from her face. She’s beautiful. Soft. Delicate. Like a princess.
How could that bastard ever lay a hand on *her*?
My mate’s too bloody precious for this world. 
She’s barely breathing in my arms, and something sharp twists in my chest.
“She’s not waking up…” I murmur, more to myself than anyone else. “Why is she unconscious? What—what’s happening to her?”
Alicent, Ava’s mom, kneels beside me, her eyes flooded with tears. “She’s unconscious because he was her chosen mate,” she says softly, her voice cracking. “The bond… when you killed him—it broke inside her.”
She covers her mouth, barely holding back a sob as she stares at my mate in pain.
And I feel it then. The full weight of it. Not just what I did—but what he did to her. Even in death, he’s hurting her.
My jaw tightens.
My hatred swells. I want to kill him again. Burn the memory of him from her skin. From her soul. He had her, and instead of cherishing her, he hurt her.
Growls rise around us. Not at me. At his corpse.
Even dead, no one’s defending the bastard.
“Enough!” Alicent shouts, voice rising. “Back to the packhouse. All of you.”
The Alpha who questioned me steps in beside her. “It’s too cold for you, my Little Dove. Come here,” he says as he lifts her into his arms with a tenderness that says everything. She’s his mate. A second later, they vanish in a shimmer of power.
I blink once, then return to the woman in my arms.
Mate.
My mate.
Ava’s voice is behind me. Shaky, near tears. “Rhys… is she… is she okay?”
I don’t look away. “She will be. She has to be.”
Footsteps crunch closer. The large man with a single eye kneels beside me. I growl at him. “That was my daughter,” he says. His face is raw with fury, but his voice breaks. 
I stop growling, and then he strokes her hair.
“I’m Cedar.”
I nod stiffly. Then I glance down at his daughter.
He stares at the corpse now, blood staining the snow. “I want to revive him just to kill him again.”
A soft cry behind him. Another woman approaches. Regal. Graceful. Her hands tremble as she covers her mouth. “My baby girl,” she sobs. Then, her hand trembles as she reaches out to touch my mate’s hair. “She didn’t deserve this. She’s the kindest person in this world.”
My chest tightens. I hold my mate tighter.
I grit my teeth. “She’s also *mine* now. And I’ll die before I let anyone touch her again.”
Another voice, sharp as ice, says, “You killed him too fucking quickly.”
I look up. It’s the woman Ava called Lily earlier. Her lips are tight, her eyes blazing.
“That fucker hit my little sister. You killed him too fucking quickly for my liking.”
I nod once. “Agree.”
She kneels beside me and touches my mate’s hand. 
My jaw clenches. I look up. “She shouldn’t be in this cold. Bloody hell, Ava, I—we need to get her inside.”
Snow clings to her lashes. Her skin’s gone paler. Too pale.
Ava puts a hand on my shoulder. “Come. Back to the packhouse. We’ll sort everything out there.”
I shift her higher in my arms, wrap my coat tighter around her, shielding her from the snow. She sighs faintly. My heart lurches.
“What’s her name?” I ask, low.
Her mother steps forward. Tears streak her face, but her voice is clear. “Her name,” she says, “that perfect girl you hold—that is our Wren.”
I rise with her in my arms, holding her like something sacred as the name sinks permanently into my chest.
*Wren*.