Chapter 392: New Clues

My cat had turned into a ridiculous fluffy ball over the winter, looking more like a stuffed toy than an actual animal. I scratched her behind the ears, set her down, and took a long shower. By the time I dropped onto the couch with my iPad, I felt almost human again."Carl, there are so many bonding ceremony gown designs," I said, scrolling through page after page. "Each one is more stunning than the last. How am I supposed to choose just one?"

Lewis was sitting at the other end of the couch, trimming my toenails without looking up. "Pick the one you love. Don’t think about the cost I’ve got it."

He wasn’t overstating things. Between what Lewis had built and what Bi my father by bond had set aside for me over the years, money had never really been a concern. There was also the matter of the gold bars under my bed, enough to last several lifetimes without either of us working a single day. Wealth wasn’t the issue. The issue was that I only had one body and couldn’t wear every dress at once.

"I can’t put them all on at the same time," I said with a laugh.

"Then pick your favorite features and I’ll have someone design a custom one."

"What do you want?"

He paused, actually thinking about it, then answered with quiet seriousness. "Something traditional. I want to do it properly the old way, the way the pack has always honored a true mating. Betrothal gifts. All the ceremonies. And I want to see you in a pink dress."

My eyes lit up. "You want a traditional bonding ceremony?"

"That’s what I’d like," he said. "But it’s our ceremony. I want it to reflect what you truly want, not just me."

"Carl." I moved closer and looked at him. "This belongs to both of us. Your opinion matters just as much."

I hesitated before asking the thing sitting quietly at the back of my mind. "Is it because I wore white when I bonded with Julian?"

"It’s not only that." He finished the last nail and wiped his hands slowly with a damp towel, in no hurry at all. "You were in a white dress soaked in blood. That image has stayed with me." He paused. "And I once promised you when I came back that I would make you mine the right way."

The weight of that landed exactly where it was meant to. I laced my fingers through his. "Then it’s settled. Pink dress. A proper ceremony. All of it."

A traditional bonding ceremony was far more involved and costly than anything modern. But how many times in a life did you get to do something like this right? In my last life, I had waited and waited for something that never came. This time, I wasn’t waiting for anything.

Our eyes met across the quiet of the room, and something warm moved through my chest. I tilted my face up toward him. "Carl "

I woke the next morning sore in ways I refused to examine too closely, only to find that Lewis had already slipped out for work. Not long after, Whitney called and asked me to come over. She didn’t have many people around her yet, so I didn’t hesitate I grabbed my keys and drove over to the Morrigans’ place.

Julian was there.

I hadn’t known he was back. He stood in my old room, tall and still, one hand resting lightly against a framed photo of the two of us from a time that felt like it belonged to a different person entirely.

Whitney stepped beside me and said quietly, "He said he wanted to take some of your things."

She had probably pieced together enough of our history from things I’d let slip. Calling me over was her way of keeping things from going sideways.

Julian turned when he heard me come in. He was holding the photo frame, and his eyes were slightly red. "Elena," he said. "Can I keep this?"

"Go ahead. I was going to throw it out anyway."

Everything tied to the Morrigans to him, to that Chapter had stopped meaning something to me. I wasn’t being cruel. It was just the truth.

"Lewis and I are planning our bonding ceremony," I added. It felt right to say it plainly. He deserved to hear it from me.

Julian’s hands tightened around the frame. "That’s... good," he said, the words coming out carefully, like he was building a wall around each one. "I’m happy for you."

He moved past me toward the door, and that’s when I noticed it streaks of white through his hair that hadn’t been there before. He looked like someone the years had hit all at once.

"Julian." I kept my voice gentle. "We can’t go back. It’s time to move forward."

He stopped walking but didn’t turn around. "Move on?" His voice broke on the words. "Elena, every time I close my eyes, I see you. Only you." He stood there for a moment, unsteady in a way that had nothing to do with his body. "This is my fault. All of it. I deserve everything that happened."

Then he walked out, and the room felt very quiet.

Whitney watched the doorway for a long moment before turning back to me.

"What are you going to do?" I asked her. "Go to the countryside with your parents?"

"No." She shook her head without any hesitation. "I don’t want that life. I missed twenty years of the world, but Vito made sure I had tutors, so I’m not starting from nothing. I want to take some refresher courses, fill in the gaps, and keep going with my education."

I had seen enough of how Whitney moved through pressure calm, deliberate, unbroken to know that her quiet exterior was just a surface. Underneath it, she was made of something solid. Hearing her talk like this, clear-eyed and forward-facing, made something in me settle.

"Good," I said. "I won’t worry about you, then."

She gave me a small smile. "Don’t. I’m going to live well and make myself proud."

"And the drug?" I asked. The one that could erase those twenty years from her memory, clean and painless.

"I won’t take it," she said firmly. "I don’t want those years erased. They remind me every single day why I’m going to make the most of whatever comes next."

I smiled a real one. "You’re incredible."

Her phone buzzed before I could say anything else. She answered, listened, then looked at me. "Elena Greg found something in Grandma’s things. Let’s go see."

Grandma’s old house still smelled faintly of sandalwood and old paper. Her worship altar sat undisturbed beaded bracelets, a small carved statue, a worn Bible. Vivian was already there, holding a small sandalwood box when we arrived.

"There are letters in here," she said.

The papers were yellowed at the edges but well-preserved. Old, carefully kept. I turned them over in my hands.

"Friends of hers?" I asked.

Vivian handed the stack to me. "Look for yourself."

Each letter was written in the same hand elegant, distinctly feminine. The usual pleasantries filled the early lines, but one name kept appearing again and again. The Blackwells. I slowed down when I reached one particular line: Ilora

, the Blackwells cannot be allowed to survive. Destroy them while they’re still weak, or they will become a threat.

I stopped reading. Who was this person, and why had she wanted Grandma to go after the Blackwells? I turned to the signature at the bottom of the page.

Brynn Chandler.

The name meant nothing to me. I looked up at Vivian. "Have you ever heard of a Brynn Chandler?"

Malcom, who had been sitting in the corner with a cigarette burning low between his fingers, said without looking up, "I met her when I was young. She was the Commander’s wife the one you’ve been trying to track down."

Everything in the room shifted slightly.

"She stayed in contact with Grandma all this time?" I asked.

"I don’t know about recently," Malcom said. "But back then, after the Commander’s family fled overseas, Brynn reached out to Mom. That much I remember."

I turned that over in my mind. Grandma had always told the truth about the Commander’s family being the ones who’d tried to pull her into their plan against the Blackwells. But the Blackwells had already been destroyed by then scattered, fleeing, barely surviving. So why push so hard to finish them off? What was the real reason?

I held the letters carefully, and that familiar instinct moved through me the one that told me when something beneath the surface was still breathing. Grandma had carried secrets to her grave. I was sure of it.

"Keep looking," I said. "There might be more something from later, after Brynn settled abroad."

We went through the remaining letters one by one. Most of them were ordinary warm, chatty, the kind two old friends exchanged to stay connected across distance. One caught my attention near the end of the stack: Ilora, we’ve found our footing here. Come visit whenever you’re free. I’ve found a wonderful way to earn you’d do well with it too.

The letter ended there.

I set it down and stared at it. How had Grandma responded? Had she refused? And what exactly was this opportunity Brynn had been talking about?

The letters gave me more questions than answers, but that was always how the truth worked it didn’t arrive all at once. It left a trail.