Page 27

27

KENDALL

I slip through the front door like the fucking wind.

No creaks. No shoes. No lights. Just me, breathing too loud in the dark, trying not to feel like my skin’s too tight after everything with Callum.

The kiss. The pull. The way I wanted more, even when I shouldn’t have.

Home should feel like a relief.

It doesn’t.

The air smells wrong. Not rotten, just... warped. Like wildflowers blooming where they shouldn’t. Rain-soaked stone. Metal. And under all of it, something sour, something ancient.

I push my bedroom door open and freeze.

“Jesus, Adora.”

She’s perched on my bed like some kind of waiting omen—taller than me, lean and whipcord tense, arms crossed, long legs tucked beneath her like a loaded spring. Her ashy-blonde hair, straighter than mine and slightly damp at the ends, hangs over her sharp cheekbones. Her skin’s paler than I remember, but glowing in a way that doesn’t look healthy. It looks unnatural. Radiant and wrong.

“You scared the shit outta me,” I hiss.

She doesn’t flinch. Just shrugs. “You took forever.”

I shut the door behind me, heart still jackhammering.

“How’d you get in?”

“Window.”

“You scaled a two-story?”

Her eyes flick toward me. Hazel. But off. They shimmer with an amber tint that catches the moonlight, like something ancient swimming just behind the surface.

“I needed to talk to you,” she says.

“Yeah. No shit.”

She glances down, and I follow her gaze. Her hands are shaking—barely—but her fingers twitch like live wires. Like they’ve been dipped in static. Her nails are longer than they should be. Sharpened. The skin around her knuckles looks rubbed raw, like she’s been fighting herself in her sleep.

I reach for the lamp, but she flinches at the sudden light, shadows carving hollows in her face. So I switch it back off.

The soft moon glow casts her in silver-blue light, and for a second, she looks… haunted. Beautiful, sure. But eerie. Like someone caught between two worlds.

“Adora,” I say slowly, “what’s going on?”

She breathes out through her nose. “Something’s wrong with me.”

I sit on the bed, careful not to crowd her.

“Talk.”

She’s silent for a beat.

“I hear things now. Not like voices. Just... frequencies. I can hear when someone’s heartbeat shifts from calm to rage. I smell lies—sickly sweet. Like dead roses. And I can see things. Trails. Emotion trails.”

I stare at her.

“That’s not werewolf stuff.”

“No,” she whispers. “It’s not.”

I feel it now—something coiled inside her, something pushing at the seams. Not like my wolf, buried but steady. This is louder. Jagged. Chaotic.

This isn’t a transformation. It’s a fracture.

She’s splintering.

“Do you feel... like you’re still you?” I ask.

She looks at me then. And for a second—just a breath—I swear her face shifts. Not literally. But her expression warps. Like there’s something else behind her eyes. Watching.

“I don’t know,” she says. Her voice is a whisper. “Sometimes I feel like I’m floating above myself. Like I’m watching a version of me I can’t control. A crueler one.”

My chest tightens. “What do you mean?”

“I had a dream last night,” she murmurs. “I was standing over a body—mine. And I was smiling. Laughing. But it wasn’t me doing it. It felt... ancient. Familiar. Like it belonged in my bones.”

I swallow hard. “You’ve felt this since... he bit you?”

Her jaw clenches. “Don’t say his name.”

“Okay.”

Her hands flex again. Fingertips glowing faintly. A glimmer of something like energy, but too faint to catch fully. I see it—just for a second—and then it vanishes.

“Adora,” I whisper. “That’s not werewolf. That’s not even shifter.”

She stares at the ceiling. “Then what the hell am I?”

I don’t answer. Because I don’t know.

But I do know someone who might.

“I know someone,” I say. “Someone who might help.”

Her eyes snap to mine. “Who?”

I hesitate.

“Callum,” I say. “Callum Wulfson. The one I told you.”

A flicker. Barely there—but I see it. Her face changes. Recognition. Then quickly buried under a tight, polite curiosity.

“Who is he?”

“He’s... a shifter. Like a real one. He’s helped me figure out parts of this I couldn’t on my own. He’s not like Dad. He doesn’t try to control it—he teaches you to own it.”

She nods slowly. Too slowly.

“And you trust him?”

“Yeah. More than I probably should.”

She presses her lips together. Her posture has changed—shoulders stiff, jaw set. Something in her has gone quiet. Too quiet.

And then she says, “I’ll meet him.”

Just like that.

But I don’t believe it’s that simple. Or maybe she’s agreeing because she already knows more than she’s telling me .

The air shifts again.

Her scent—once sunlight and worn denim and citrus shampoo—now hums like hot metal and rain-soaked forest. Something wild beneath, pretending to be tame.

I feel it. There’s someone else in there with her.