Chapter 9

Chapter 9:

Adelia

The silence inside the Maybach was thick enough to choke on. Outside the tinted windows, the steel skeleton of the city was rapidly giving way to the dark, encroaching blur of forest—but my mind was still trapped in the penthouse study.

I could still feel the phantom pressure of Dallas’s body caging me against the bookshelf. I could still smell him—ozone, cedar, and that terrifyingly addictive current of raw power. For a moment back there, when his eyes had darkened to pools of obsidian, I had been certain he was going to bite me. Not as a contractual gesture, but as something else entirely.

Something primal.

I shifted in the leather seat, my hands trembling in my lap. Dallas sat beside me, staring straight ahead, one hand resting with practiced ease on the steering wheel. He looked composed—the perfect image of the billionaire Alpha—but the air around him crackled with a residual charge that raised the hair along my arms.

“Where are we going?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper. “You said ‘home,’ but I don’t have a home p>

Dallas didn’t look at me immediately. He signaled a turn and guided the car onto a private, winding road that cut deep into the mountains. The trees here were ancient, their branches weaving together overhead into a canopy that swallowed the afternoon sun whole.

𝖳𝗵𝗲 𝘮𝗈𝘀t 𝗽оp𝗎l𝘢𝗋 𝗇𝗼𝘃e𝗹𝗌 𝗈𝗇.с𝘰m

“Moonstone Creek,” he said.

The name hit me like a fist to the chest. All the air left my lungs in a sharp, involuntary gasp.

“No,” I choked out, panic clawing at my throat. “That’s impossible. Moonstone Creek was destroyed. The Rogues—the Hyde family absorbed the territory years ago. There’s nothing there but ruins p>

Memories I had kept locked away for a decade surged forward all at once—smoke, screams, the smell of burning timber, and the lifeless eyes of my mother. Moonstone Creek wasn’t a place on a map anymore. It was a graveyard.

“It was destroyed,” Dallas said, his voice low and steady as distant thunder. “But I bought the land six years ago. I rebuilt it p>

I stared at his profile, genuinely stunned. “You? Why would Dallas Marshall want a decimated territory in the middle of nowhere p>

“Because it is secure,” he said simply, finally glancing at me. His gaze was intent, unhurried, stripping away my defenses one layer at a time. “And because no one—especially Braydon Hyde—would dare set foot on my private soil p>

He reached across the center console. I flinched instinctively, but he didn’t pull back. His large, warm hand closed over my icy ones, engulfing them completely. The heat from his skin seeped into my bones, quieting the screaming panic in my head with an ease that should have frightened me.

“You are safe with me, Adelia,” he said. “I will burn the world before I let anything hurt you again p>

I wanted to pull away—to remind myself that promises were pretty lies men told before they broke you. But looking into his eyes, I couldn’t find the deception I was searching for.

Twenty minutes later, the trees broke open and the estate came into view.

It was nothing like the rustic pack house I remembered from childhood. This was a fortress of glass, dark stone, and heavy timber, cantilevered over the edge of a cliff like a predator surveying its territory. It overlooked the valley where my parents’ village once stood—now lush and deeply green, the land quietly reclaiming the scars the fire had left behind.

Dallas parked and led me inside. The interior was cavernous, filled with modern art and furniture that had clearly cost more than anything I had ever owned. But despite the luxury, the space felt strangely empty. Lonely in a way that expensive things sometimes are.

“The master suite is down the hall to the right,” Dallas said, setting my small bag on a console table. “It has the best view of the valley p>

I stopped, my fingers twisting the hem of my shirt. “And where will you be sleeping p>

The question hung between us, weighted with everything it implied. We were married on paper. We were alone in the middle of the wilderness. If he chose to enforce his rights as a husband, I had no recourse. I was a wolfless orphan with no pack, no power, and no one to call.

Dallas watched me, his jaw tightening as though he could hear every thought racing through my head.

“I have Pack business to attend to,” he said, his tone shifting into a clipped professionalism. “I will be in the study in the west wing. The master suite is yours p>

Relief washed over me so completely that my knees nearly buckled. But beneath it—buried and unwelcome—was a strange, confusing pang of something that felt disturbingly like disappointment.

Don’t be stupid, I told myself. He’s sparing you.

“Oh,” I exhaled. “Okay. Thank you p>

“Don’t thank me yet,” a bright, familiar voice called from the back of the house.

I spun around. The glass doors to the terrace stood open, and leaning against the frame—champagne in hand, red hair catching the late sun—was Azalea.

“Azalea?” I gasped. “How—when did you get here p>

She grinned. “Dad called me while you were packing. Said you might need a friendly face so you didn’t die of boredom out here with Mr. Grumpy.” She winked at Dallas, who responded with a long, suffering exhale.

“I thought you might appreciate the company,” Dallas murmured, his eyes settling on me. “I know I can be… intense p>

I looked from Azalea’s beaming face to Dallas’s carefully neutral expression. He hadn’t brought me here to hide me away like a possession. He had called my best friend—my only friend—because he understood I would be frightened. He had given me the master suite. He was giving me space.

He was treating me like a person, not an asset.

“I…” My throat tightened. “Thank you, Dallas. Really p>

He gave a single, curt nod and turned away before I could read whatever had flickered briefly across his face. “Dinner is at seven. Azalea—try not to burn the house down p>

He walked away toward the west wing, his broad shoulders carrying the quiet weight of an empire, and I felt the ground beneath me shift in a way that had nothing to do with the cliff outside.

I had signed a contract for protection. But standing here in a home built on the ashes of my past, I realized I had no idea who Dallas Marshall truly was.

For the first time in years, though, I wasn’t looking for the exit.