Chapter 201

Chapter 201
For a few heartbeats, only the twins’ small sounds filled the air.
“I didn’t expect to see you today,” I said finally.
“I didn’t expect to see you,” Nolan admitted, standing slowly. “Alaric asked me to review the border security reports before the council meeting I was just leaving when” His eyes flicked to the twins again. “When I saw you,”
Ladjusted August on my hip, trying to steady myself, “They ve changed a lot since you last saw them.”
“I can see that.” A faint, wistful smile ghosted across his mouth. “They look like you.” “And you,” I said before I could stop myself.
Our eyes met, and something flickered there recognition memory, the quiet thrum of the bond that had never truly broken.
I swallowed, forcing myself to focus on the moment, despite the tears still blurring
my vision. “If you’d like,” I began carefully, “we could… set up a schedule. For visits. You could spend time with them when you’re here for meetings.”
Nolan blinked, as if he hadn’t dared to hope for that. “You mean it?”
I nodded. “They should know their father.”
For a moment he didn’t move, as though afraid I might take the words back. Then his face softened, and the tension in his shoulders visible eased..
“Thank you,” he said quietly. “You have no idea how much that means to me.”
I did, though. I could see it in the way his voice shook, in the way he reached out again take lan’s tiny hand.
slower this time
– to
The boy squeezed his finger and giggled. Nolan laughed, startled by the sound, his expression breaking into something pure and unguarded.
My chest tightened painfully.
I’d never seen this side of Nolan before. I never would have imagined that he’d be capable of this.
I watched the way his large hands handled the boys with gentle care, the way his entire face transformed with joy as they reached for him. He looked younger than I’d ever seen him, his normally stormy eyes clear and focused solely on the boys.
This was what I’d stolen from him not out of cruelty, but out of fear. And now, watching him like this, I realised how much it had cost us both.
How much it had cost the boys.
“You can come by tomorrow,” I said softly. “They nap after lunch, but they’re usually awake early in the mornings.”
“I’ll be here,” he said immediately, and the certainty in his tone made me smile despite myself.
A door opened somewhere down the hall, filling the packhouse with voices and footsteps, the faint reminder that the world was still turning around us.
Nolan straightened, glancing toward the sound, then back at me. “I should go before someone starts gossiping.”
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“They’ll gossip anyway,” I said, my voice lighter now.
“True.” His smile was crooked, almost shy. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then?”
The sight of it made my heart do a strange little skip.
I nodded. “Tomorrow.”
He lingered a heartbeat longer, eyes tracing the boys’ faces one last time. “Goodbye, little ones,” he murmured. ” Be good for your mother.”
Then he turned and walked away down the hall, the sunlight catching in his dark hair.
I watched him until he was gone, my pulse still racing.
August bounced excitedly, making a small, contented noise against my shoulder. I pressed a kiss to his head, blinking back the tears that burned behind my eyes.
The goddess had shown me Nolan’s wolf saving me – not in violence, but in protection. Now, seeing him with our sons, I felt like I understood the meaning. Whatever else had happened between us, the bond hadn’t died. It had only been waiting.
But it was different now. There was a new dimension to it that I had never expected. I could see it in the way Nolan reached for the boys, in the way they instinctively trusted him.
The bond between us had spread to them. I felt it myself when I was with the boys. The bone deep peace that filled me when I held them and the overwhelming pride that I felt when I watched them play.
It was beyond any bond that I ever could have imagined. And now I saw that Nolan felt it too.
The guilt I felt for keeping them apart for so long reared up again, but this time it was overshadowed by my determination never to let my fear cause them pain again. I could face anything for my boys.
Even my complicated feelings for their father.
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