They called him the butcher king.
Alexei didn’t just rule the wolf world, he crushed it beneath his heel.
Billions in the accounts, an army of lethal warriors, a face carved from marble and cold fury.
But he had one weakness.
His five-year-old son, Artyom.
A little wolf who had bitten three nannies, sent a duchess to the hospital, and despised every woman who dared breathe near his father.
Everyone said the boy was broken until the night the wild prince sprinted past supermodels and heiresses and wrapped his arms around the leg of a trembling, penniless cleaning girl.
He didn’t bite her.
He looked up with wide, wet eyes and whispered one word that would change everything.
Mama.
The chandeliers in Alexei’s grand estate were made of diamonds.
At least, that’s what the invisible staff whispered to each other in the shadows.
And Sophia had no time to look up and check.
Her world was the floor, 12 inches of Italian marble that had to stay flawless while the upper crust of wolf society danced across it.
She adjusted the scratchy collar of her gray uniform, a parting gift from head housekeeper Olga for arriving 3 minutes late, and gripped her tray of empty vodka glasses.
Keep your head down, Sophia.
Two more hours, just two more hours.
The air in the ballroom changed before she heard him.
The scent hit first, ozone and rain and terrifying power rolling through the room like a wave.
Music stopped.
Conversation died.
Every wolf in the building dropped their eyes.
Alpha king Alexei had arrived.
He was everything the tabloids promised and everything nightmares were made of.
6’3″ in a bespoke suit that strained across his shoulders.
What he looked less like a man and more like a weapon wrapped in silk.
Jaw sharp enough to cut glass.
Eyes the color of Atlantic ice.
A scar through his left brow that gave him the permanent look of a man deciding whether to kill you.
But the scariest thing in the room wasn’t the king.
It was the small boy holding his hand.
Artyom.
Five years old.
Dressed in a tiny matching suit.
And wearing the expression of someone who wanted to burn the building down.
A woman stepped forward from the crowd, Elena, daughter of the southern alpha, devastating in red silk worth more than Sophia would earn in 10 lifetimes.
She crouched to the boy’s level with a practiced smile.
“And how is the little prince? I had this made specially for you in Paris.
” She held out a velvet wolf toy.
Snap.
The sound echoed across the silent ballroom.
Artyom hadn’t taken the toy.
He’d bitten Elena’s hand instead.
Elena shrieked, staggering backward.
Blood welled between her fingers.
“He’s a monster.
” She hissed, her gracious mask sliding.
“Watch yourself.
” Alexei growled, red flickering in his eyes.
“He’s your future king.
” But Artyom was already running.
He bolted through the crowd, scattering guests, knocking over a server, a blur of panic and instinct looking for somewhere safe to hide.
Somewhere that didn’t smell like false perfume and ambition.
Sophia saw him coming.
She was pressed against the service entrance, tray clutched to her chest.
She knew what she was supposed to do.
An omega touching the alpha king’s son was heresy.
They could execute her for it.
But she saw the terror in the boy’s eyes.
She recognized it.
She saw it in her own mirror every morning.
As Artyom hit a patch of polished marble at full speed, he was going to crash into the appetizer table.
Sophia dropped her tray.
Glass exploded across the floor.
She fell to her knees and opened her arms just as the boy lost his balance, and he slammed into her chest, knocking the air from her lungs.
She held him, wrapped herself around him, covered him from the falling glass.
She waited for him to bite, to scream, to claw.
The boy went rigid, then still.
In the grand ballroom of the most powerful alpha in the world, complete silence fell.
Alexei was crossing the room.
His aura was so heavy that people physically sank to their knees around him.
His eyes were red.
He looked prepared to execute whoever was touching his son.
“Release him.
” Sophia trembled, her face pressed into the boy’s curls.
“I I’m sorry.
I’m so sorry.
I just” But Artyom’s grip only tightened.
The boy who hated women, the boy who had drawn blood from a duchess 20 minutes ago, he pressed his nose into the curve of Sophia’s neck and breathed.
Long, deep, deliberate.
His little body shuddered and the growling stopped.
The tension left him like water draining from a tub.
Sophia smelled like cheap soap and rainwater and something else.
Something ancient and warm like sun-warmed earth.
Artyom buried his face deeper and squeezed her worn uniform in both fists.
He looked up at his father.
His eyes were clear, wide, present, maybe for the first time in months.
“No.
” Artyom said firmly.
Alexei stopped.
He stared at his wild son clinging to this thin, shaking woman surrounded by broken glass.
Then Artyom reached up and touched Sophia’s cheek with one small, and her trembling hand.
A single tear tracked down his face.
“Mama.
” He whispered.
Elena’s vodka glass shattered in her grip.
Sophia’s heart hammered so hard she thought it might break through her ribs.
She raised her gray eyes and met the terrifying gaze of the alpha king.
“Please.
” She breathed.
“I didn’t do anything.
” Alexei stared at her for five full seconds.
For the first time in five years, his son was not screaming.
“What’s your name?” “Sophia.
” “Just Sophia, my lord.
” “Pick him up, Sophia, and follow me.
” The penthouse was enormous, modern, and colder than the street outside.
Floor-to-ceiling windows.
Furniture with sharp edges and nothing soft in it.
Not a home, a fortress.
Artyom fell asleep the moment they left the ballroom, his head on her shoulder, drooling on her uniform, out cold like a light switched off.
In 40 floors of elevator silence, Alexei stood with his back to her and didn’t speak once.
In the boy’s bedroom, the only spot of color in the apartment, full of toys that looked like they’d never been touched, Sophia tried to lay Artyom on his race car bed.
His grip on her collar tightened.
“Mama stay.
” He mumbled, half-conscious.
Alexei watched, a muscle working in his jaw as he carefully pried his son’s fingers loose.
It took effort.
When Artyom finally released her, he whimpered and curled toward the empty space where she’d been.
Alexei covered him with a blanket, stood over him for a long moment with an expression that looked painfully close to grief.
Then the mask slammed back into place.
“My office.
” Alexei poured himself two fingers of amber liquid and didn’t offer her any.
He leaned against his desk with his arms crossed, endearing her to be lying.
“Who sent you?” “No one, alpha.
I work for Clean Servant Staffing Agency.
I was assigned tonight’s shift.
” “And I’m supposed to believe my son, who put three trained nannies in the hospital, just happened to imprint on a cleaning girl?” His eyes flickered red.
“You used a spell, a potion.
” “I’m an omega.
I have almost no wolf at all.
” He stepped into her space, bent close to her neck and inhaled.
His expression shifted, puzzled, almost against his will.
“You smell like” He pulled back, blinking.
“Like the winter solstice.
Like quiet.
” “Blinis.
” Artyom’s voice pierced the air from the hallway.
Alexei stepped away, straightening his cuffs, face resetting to stone.
He walked to his desk and opened a drawer, pulled out a checkbook.
“How much?” Sophia blinked.
“Sir?” “How much to leave your agency and live here? I need a nanny.
I fired 12 in the past year.
My beta is running my empire while I play single father because no one else can manage Artyom.
” He scratched on a check.
“10,000 a month.
Room and board included.
” 10,000.
Enough to buy an apartment.
Enough to pay off her father’s debts.
“There will be rumors.
” Sophia said quietly.
“An unmarried omega living in the alpha’s penthouse.
” Alexei let out a dry, humorless sound.
He looked her over.
Worn shoes, messy bun, borrowed uniform.
“Look in a mirror, Sophia.
No one will think you’re my mistress.
You’re staff.
” The insult stung, but it also made her feel safe.
“I have conditions.
” She said, surprising herself.
Alexei raised an eyebrow.
“My father owes money to southern loan sharks.
If I come here, they’ll find me.
I need protection.
Something darkened in his eyes.
He looked Southern Pack.
Elena’s people.
Consider it handled.
No one touches what belongs to me.
He stood, ending the meeting.
And Sophia.
She paused at the door.
Burn that uniform, he said, his voice dropping an octave.
I never want to see you in gray again.
She hadn’t told him the truth.
If Alexei ever what she actually was, what ran in her blood, he wouldn’t just employ her.
He’d use her like everyone else had tried to.
She was a moon-cursed omega, a Lunaris.
Her scent calmed feral wolves.
Her pheromones could quiet a raging alpha.
It was a rare genetic anomaly that made her a valuable commodity, or an exploited one.
Her father had sold her services to underground fighting pits, bleeding her until she couldn’t walk, using her like a living sedative.
She had run to be free.
Looking at Artyom eating his blinis with honey, see he’s completely peaceful for the first time, she prayed the Alpha King would never find out.
The convoy to the pack hospital looked like a presidential motorcade, three armored black vehicles, bulletproof everything, modified for combat.
Artyom was calm the entire ride.
He played with the hem of Sophia’s sweater and hummed a melody.
It was the first time anyone had seen him act like a normal child in public.
He likes your singing, Alexei said, watching his son with equal parts wonder and suspicion.
He normally screams in cars.
He’s not broken, Sophia said softly.
He’s overwhelmed.
His senses are too strong for his body.
He just needs an anchor.
Alexei’s ice blue eyes flickered.
You speak like you know.
I was sensitive to sound as a child, too, she said, watching the city pass.
The convoy slowed.
The bridge ahead was gridlocked, two trucks blocking every lane.
Why are we stopping? Alexei said into his earpiece.
Accident.
We’re trying to reroute, Alpha.
His entire posture changed instantly.
Relaxed father gone.
Butcher King present.
This is a bottleneck.
Get us out, now.
We can’t move, sir.
Boom.
The bridge shook.
The rear vehicle vanished in a fireball.
Ambush! Garrick shouted from the front seat.
Southern Pack, 3 o’clock.
Men in tactical gear repelled from the bridge supports, transforming into wolves midair, landing on the hood.
Claws tore through reinforced metal.
Stay down, Alexei commanded, and kicked the door off its hinges.
He transformed as he exited.
A massive midnight black wolf, half the size of the car, lunging for the first attacker’s throat.
Sophia unbuckled Artyom, and her hands were shaking so hard she nearly couldn’t manage the clips.
Papa’s fighting, Artyom said, gold blazing in his eyes.
Papa’s fighting.
I know, I know.
We hide, now.
The driver’s window exploded inward.
Sophia threw herself over Artyom.
Her door was ripped clean off.
A man stood there, not a wolf, a human, holding a tranquilizer rifle.
He smiled with rotten teeth.
Found you, little Sophia, and the golden ticket.
He aimed at Artyom.
Sophia didn’t think.
She threw herself in front of the barrel.
The dart hit her shoulder like liquid fire.
She didn’t stop.
She grabbed a shard of windshield glass and drove it into the man’s thigh.
He roared and backhanded her across the face.
She hit the doorframe hard.
Blood flooded her eye.
The world tilted.
The man reached for Artyom.
So Artyom let out a sound that shattered the remaining windows.
Then a shadow fell over the car.
Alexei was back.
Not in wolf form.
He’d shifted back to squeeze through the wreckage, but he looked more monstrous than the beast, covered in blood, eyes glowing demonic red.
He grabbed the man by the throat.
No questions.
No hesitation.
One wet crack.
He dropped the body like a ragdoll.
Artyom.
Papa, the boy pointed.
Mama’s sleeping.
Mama fell down.
Alexei looked.
Sophia had slumped to the floor, the dart still in her shoulder.
Her face pale, an ugly gash at her temple.
He lifted her.
She was frighteningly light, and pressed his face to her hair.
Under the blood and smoke, that scent was still there.
Winter Solstice.
Quiet.
Stay with me, Sophia, said the Butcher King, carrying her through the burning wreckage.
That’s an order.
Artyom gripped his father’s leg and wept.
For the first time, Alexei didn’t pull away.
He carried them both, his strange, broken, brand new family, into the waiting helicopter.
The pack’s medical wing buzzed with controlled chaos.
Alexei stood outside the glass wall of the trauma bay, hands pressed to the barrier.
Inside, four doctors moved around the small, pale figure on the table.
Heart rate dropping.
The aconite is crystallizing in her bloodstream.
Run dialysis, now.
Purple veins spread from her shoulder like cracks in porcelain, crawling toward her heart.
Behind him, Artyom sat on the cold floor, holding the blue velvet wolf toy he’d refused at the party.
He looked very small.
Is Mama going to the stars? he asked.
Like my other mama? Alexei crouched beside him.
No.
I I ordered her to stay.
She’s quiet, Artyom whispered.
She’s never quiet.
Her heart usually sings.
The monitor inside the room screamed a flat tone.
We’re losing her.
Alexei was through the door before the sentence finished.
Alpha, you cannot be in here.
Move.
He shoved his way to her side, looked at her gray, lifeless face, placed his massive hand over her heart.
He had no healing magic, no spells, only raw Alpha energy that usually destroyed things.
You don’t get to die, he said, pushing everything he had into her chest.
You saved my son.
You do not have the right to leave him alone.
Breathe, Sophia.
Breathe.
Something strange happened.
Where his aura met her skin, soft silver light began to pulse from her shoulder.
The purple veins didn’t recede.
They absorbed.
The black toxin transformed, is becoming silver luminescence that evaporated through her pores like morning mist.
Dr.
Aris dropped his tablet.
Impossible.
On her shoulder, where the dart had pierced her, the wound sealed.
But it didn’t scar.
Instead, a birthmark appeared.
A pale crescent moon twined with a rose.
The Lunaris mark, Aris whispered, face draining.
I thought it was a myth.
What are you talking about? Alexei demanded, his hand still on her chest.
She’s not a normal omega, Alpha.
The Lunaris line.
Moon-cursed peacemakers.
Their blood neutralizes poison.
Their pheromones can calm a feral alpha.
He swallowed.
They were hunted to extinction 50 years ago because their blood was worth more than gold.
Alexei stared at the woman he’d been treating like a servant.
The reason Artyom, overwhelmed to madness by his own senses, found peace in her arms.
Sophia gasped, arching off the table.
Her eyes flew open.
For one moment, they were pure, glowing silver.
Artyom.
He’s safe, Alexei caught her flailing hand, held it still.
You’re safe.
It’s over.
She blinked.
The silver receded to gray.
She looked at his hand wrapped around hers.
You saved me.
You saved my son.
His voice came out strange, rough.
We’re even.
Dr.
Aris cleared his throat.
Alpha, if word gets out about what she is, every pack on the continent will go to war to claim her.
Delete the blood work, Alexei said without looking up.
Erase the scans.
She’s not a specimen.
She’s my son’s nanny.
He turned back to Sophia.
She’d heard everything.
She knew he knew.
You lied to me, he said quietly, brushing wet hair from her forehead.
You said you were nobody.
I am nobody, she whispered.
Tears slipped down her temples.
Please don’t sell me.
My father sold my blood to the fighting pits.
He drained me until I couldn’t walk.
I ran to be free.
I just want to be free.
The murderous rage that rose in Alexei’s chest was not directed at her.
He looked at the fragile woman who had taken a bullet for a child she’d known for 24 hours.
No one will sell you, Sophia, he said.
He leaned forward, pressing his forehead to hers, startling them both.
You’re under the Butcher King’s protection now, and I keep what’s mine.
Artyom scrambled onto the bed.
Sophia winced, then opened her arms.
Alexsei watched his son disappear into her neck, breathing in silver and ozone.
A dangerous thought took root.
She wasn’t just a nanny, and she was the only thing that had ever brought quiet to his chaotic house.
And he was beginning to realize he wanted her.
Not just for his son.
The peace lasted 6 hours.
By midnight, Alexsei was in the war room interrogating a surviving attacker.
The man broke quickly.
They always did.
“It was the girl.
” He sobbed.
“The nanny.
She sent the convoy route.
” “Elena had someone on the inside.
Said the girl owed money to the southern pack.
Said she was paying it off by selling you out.
” The temperature in the room dropped 10°.
“She admitted the debt herself.
” “Search her room.
” Alexsei said, his voice gravel.
“Now.
” 30 minutes later, Garrick held up a burner phone found taped under the nightstand.
One conversation thread.
Recipient: the duchess.
“10:00 a.
m.
He trusts me.
I’m inside.
1400.
Convoy departs at 4:00.
Route B, the bridge.
Uh I know heavy armor on the rear vehicle.
16:30.
Done.
” “Where’s my money?” Alexsei crushed the phone in his bare hand.
Glass and plastic cut into his palm.
A small voice in his head said, “This is a setup.
” She took a bullet for Artyom.
Why would she His darker instinct answered, “She’s Lunaris.
Masters of manipulation.
She made your feral son call her mama in 60 seconds.
She made you feel She did all of it on purpose.
” Betrayal tasted like ash.
“Bring her to the great hall.
” Alexsei said, “and lock Artyom in his room.
I don’t want him to see this.
” They dragged Sophia from her hospital bed half asleep, hauled her down stone corridors in a hospital gown and bare feet, and threw her on the floor at the foot of the throne.
She looked up.
Alexsei sat in the obsidian chair.
He was not the man who had held her hand in the medical bay.
He was the butcher king again, and his eyes were the color of Arctic winter.
He threw the shattered phone to the floor in front of her.
“Explain.
” “I’ve never seen that before.
” “Don’t lie to me.
” The windows rattled.
“You sent Elena the route.
You told her which car had no armor.
You sold my son for cash.
“I didn’t.
I swear on his life.
” A guard hit the back of her knee, dropping her.
“You admitted the debt to the south.
” Alexsei said coldly.
“Yes, but And you’re Lunaris.
” He continued, descending the throne steps like an executioner.
“You used your pheromones to lower our defenses, make us vulnerable, soft.
Someone planted that phone.
Look at Olga.
She was in my room.
” “Olga has served this family for 30 years.
” He stopped in front of her.
She searched his face for the man who had promised to protect her.
He was gone.
“You took the bullet.
” He said quietly.
“That’s the only reason you’re not dying right now.
Life for life.
You saved Artyom, so I’ll spare yours.
” His face hardened.
“But you’ll rot in the iron tower until I decide what to do with you.
And if you ever try to speak to my son again, I will tear your throat out.
” “Alexsei, please.
” She fought as the guards grabbed her arms.
“Artyom needs me.
” From somewhere far above, a sound echoed through the house.
Small and muffled and heartbroken.
“Mama.
” “Ma-ama.
” Artyom had woken up.
He could feel her distress.
Alexsei flinched, but didn’t turn around.
“Take her.
” As they dragged her toward the heavy oak doors, Sophia looked back at him.
“You’re making a mistake.
” She said, her voice breaking.
“You’re so afraid to trust anyone that you’d rather believe a lie than your own heart.
” The doors sealed behind her.
Alexsei stood alone in the great hall’s silence.
He looked at his hand.
The one that had held hers.
Still bleeding from the broken phone.
“Alpha.
” Garrick appeared.
“Should I contact Elena? Declare war?” “Not yet.
” Alexsei didn’t move.
Something was wrong in his gut.
“Put surveillance on Olga.
If the girl is innocent He stared at the closed doors.
Then I just locked away the only peace my son has ever known.
” The iron tower was not a metaphor.
It was a cold cylindrical bunker separate from the main estate, built to contain rogue alphas.
For Sophia, with almost no wolf at all, it felt like being buried alive in a refrigerator.
She huddled in the corner in her hospital gown, shaking.
The pain in her shoulder pulsed with every heartbeat.
But the pain in her chest was worse.
“He didn’t believe me.
” “Be safe, little wolf.
” She whispered into the dark.
High in the penthouse, the calm Alexsei had tried to impose was collapsing.
Artyom was gone.
The guards heard nothing.
No screaming.
No struggle.
But the ventilation great near the floor had been pried open with inhuman strength.
He was small enough to fit where no adult could follow.
In the security center, Garrick worked through 24 hours of internal footage.
“There.
Timestamp 1500 yesterday.
Olga entered Sophia’s guest room, looked over her shoulder, pulled the burner phone from her apron pocket and taped it under the nightstand.
Then took out her own phone and made a call.
” Garrick ran the audio intercept.
“It’s done, Elena.
The girl’s been framed.
Convoy route is sent.
I’ll make sure your men kill her first.
I don’t want loose ends.
” Alexsei felt the floor tilt beneath him.
Not guilt.
Nausea so deep it nearly buckled his knees.
He had thrown the woman who saved his son into a frozen prison cell based on a lie planted by a traitor he’d employed for decades.
“Arrest Olga.
” He said, his voice like a dead man’s.
“And get me the tower key.
” The security room lights flickered and died.
Alarms began wailing.
“System failure.
Perimeter breach.
Sector 4, the tower.
” Alexsei understood in an instant.
Elena knows Sophia is in the tower.
She’s coming to finish it.
Sophia heard the hydraulic door of the prison block hiss open.
She pressed against the wall, expecting guards.
Instead, a small dark shape skittered across the floor.
“Artyom.
” The boy was covered in soot from the ventilation shafts.
Pajamas torn.
He’d squeezed through the bars of her cell, small enough to fit where adults couldn’t.
He flung himself at her, sobbing.
“I found you.
I followed your smell.
” “You have to leave.
” Sophia said frantically, checking him for injuries.
“It’s freezing in here.
” “Not going.
” Artyom growled, eyes flashing gold.
“Papa is bad.
Papa put you in a box.
I hate Papa.
” “No, baby.
He just made a mistake.
” Boom.
The outer explosive door shuddered.
“Open it.
” A man’s voice from outside.
“Elena wants the girl’s head before the king arrives.
” Sophia looked at Artyom.
No place to hide in the bare cell.
“Listen to me.
” She said, gripping his shoulders.
“Be brave.
Stay behind me.
Not a sound.
” The blast door flew inward.
Three men in tactical gear.
Silenced pistols raised.
“There she is.
Shoot her through the bars.
” Sophia turned her back to the cell door.
She curled herself around Artyom, making herself his shield.
She closed her eyes.
“I’m sorry, Alexsei.
I tried.
” She waited for the bullet.
Instead, she heard something that was not human and not wolf.
Something ancient and demonic.
A roar split the corridor, shaking dust from the ceiling.
A mass of black fury and violence slammed into the first gunman from behind.
Alexsei fully surrendered to his wolf.
An enormous beast, 8 ft at the shoulder, moving through the small space like a force of nature.
He didn’t pause.
Didn’t hesitate.
First man, gone.
Second man’s skull met the wall with a sound Sophia would not forget.
Third man ran.
The jaws closed.
Silence.
The wet sound of the alpha king’s breathing.
He shifted back, dropping to human.
Naked, covered in blood that wasn’t his.
His chest heaving.
He looked through the bars.
Sophia is a curled in the corner.
Artyom peering out from under her arm, watching his father with pure hatred.
Alexsei didn’t stand.
He got on his hands and knees.
The butcher king, richest man in the hemisphere, crawled across the filthy stone floor until he was at Sophia’s feet.
“Artyom.
” He whispered, reaching out.
“Get away.
” Artyom slapped his hand.
“You hurt Mama.
” Alexsei absorbed the blow like a physical impact.
Tears carved channels through the blood on his face.
He looked at Sofia, pale, blue-lipped from the cold, but alive.
“I know.
” He said.
“I know.
I heard her.
I’m a monster.
I’m an idiot.
” He lowered his head to the floor, the highest act of submission, an alpha bearing his neck to an omega.
“Kill me if you want, Sofia.
I deserve it.
But please, let me get you out of the cold first.
” Sofia looked at the shattered man in front of her, but she saw the fear in his eyes.
Not of death, of losing them.
She looked at Artyom.
The boy watched her, waiting for her signal.
If she turned Alexei away now, this boy would hate his father forever.
The family would be rubble.
She reached out.
Her hand hovered over his dark hair.
She shouldn’t forgive him.
He’d nearly killed her.
She placed her palm on his head.
“You’re an idiot, Alexei.
” She said, her voice hoarse.
A sound broke from his chest, a sob that shook his entire body.
He surged forward, not to attack, but to wrap his arms around her waist, pressing his face to her stomach, holding both of them.
“I’m sorry.
” He kept saying.
“I’m so sorry.
” Sofia rested her cheek on the top of his head and closed her eyes.
“Take us home, alpha.
” She said.
“It’s cold down here.
” Six months later, the garden of Alexei’s estate was unrecognizable.
Where there had been gray stone and clipped hedges, there were now wildflowers, climbing roses, a wooden swing set that had clearly seen significant use.
Sofia sat on a bench in a pale yellow sundress reading.
On her finger, a diamond the size of a quail’s egg.
“Higher! Push me higher!” Artyom was on the swing laughing.
Not the wild, snarling creature from the ballroom, a loud, grubby, happy 6-year-old who had recently learned to threaten to call his lawyer when asked to eat broccoli.
Behind him, pushing the swing, stood Alexei.
The scar was still there.
The power still rolled off him in waves, but the permanent scowl was gone.
His eyes went soft the moment they found Sofia.
Elena was in prison, stripped of her title.
Olga was serving life in the very tower she’d tried to use as a grave.
And the world knew the Butcher King had a weakness.
Alexei came to sit beside her, lifting her hand and pressing his lips to the crescent moon birthmark on her shoulder.
“What are you thinking about?” She smiled, leaning into his side.
“Our first meeting.
You looked like you wanted to eat me.
” “I still do.
” He murmured, playfully biting her ear.
“Just in a considerably more civilized way.
” “Mom! Dad! Watch!” Artyom launched himself off the swing at maximum height, landed in a chaotic tumble, and stood up with enormous dignity.
“10 out of 10.
” Sofia called.
Alexei chuckled, a sound that had been absent from this house for five years, and pulled her close.
“Thank you.
” He said quietly.
The playfulness gone.
“For saving him.
For saving me.
For staying.
” Sofia looked at the man who had been her nightmare and had become her home.
“Yeah, I I didn’t stay for the king.
” She said honestly.
“I stayed for the lonely man in the elevator.
” He kissed her, deep and slow, tasting like something permanent.
The Butcher King was gone.
In his place stood a father, a husband, and a man who had finally found his quiet.
Tell me in the comments, would you have forgiven Alexei after he threw her in the tower? Did he deserve a second chance, or should Sofia have taken Artyom and run? Drop team forgive or team run below.
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Until next time, keep howling at the moon.
