Chapter 4: Safe Haven
The knock was too quiet, a frail tapping Bunny was sure no one would hear. But within seconds, the door swung open, framing Sennia in a halo of warm, tangled light from the fairy strings behind her. She wore flannel pajamas dotted with cartoon owls, her dark hair a messy bun on top of her head. Her eyes, sharp and knowing, scanned Bunny’s face, then dropped to the duffel bag clutched in her white-knuckled hand.“Okay,” Sennia said, the single word holding a universe of understanding. She stepped back, pulling the door wider. “Get in here.”
The apartment was a soft crash of comforting chaos. Mismatched pillows were strewn across a sagging sofa, books formed precarious towers on every flat surface, and the air was thick with the scent of cinnamon tea and the faint, dusty smell of old paper.It was the polar opposite of Kellan’s sterile, controlled spaces. It felt alive.Bunny stood just inside the doorway, trembling. The adrenaline that had propelled her across town was leaching away, leaving her hollow and shaky.Sennia didn’t push. She just went to the tiny kitchen nook, filled a kettle, and set it on the stove. The click of the gas igniting was a familiar, comforting sound. “Shoes off, stay on,” she said without turning around.“Couch is yours. Try not to knock over the Neruda.”
Bunny obeyed, toes curling in the thick wool of Sennia’s rug. She sank onto the couch, the springs groaning in protest, and let the duffel bag slump to the floor. She watched Sennia move, the sure way she pulled down two chipped mugs, the quiet efficiency of her hands. The normalcy of it was a blanket.For a few minutes, only the sound of the kettle heating filled the room. Then it whistled, a sharp, steam-driven shriek that made Bunny jump. Sennia poured the water, the scent of cinnamon and ginger blooming stronger. She brought the mugs over, set one on a coaster made from a sliced tree trunk beside Bunny, and sat in the armchair opposite, tucking her feet beneath her.They sipped in silence. The tea was hot, almost scalding, and the burn felt good.It grounded her.“He was in my apartment,” Bunny said finally. Her voice sounded strange to her own ears—less meek, but fractured.Sennia nodded slowly. “I figured it was Kellan-shaped trouble.”
“Smashed one of his own glasses on my floor.Left a note.” The words came out flat, drained of their earlier terror. “It said, ‘You forgot something.’”
Sennia’s eyes, usually crinkled with laughter, went hard and flat.“The pills.”
“Yeah.” Bunny took another gulp of tea. “I threw them out.Before I left.”
A slow smile spread across Sennia’s face. It wasn’t a nice smile.It was fierce and proud. “Good.”
“But… something’s happening, Sen.” Bunny put the mug down, her hands still unsteady. She stared at her palms as if they might have answers.“Since I stopped.Since I saw the glass. It’s like… there’s a hum.Under my skin. Like a generator turning on in a room I forgot existed.”
“Your wolf,” Sennia said, matter-of-fact.“It doesn’t feel like before.Before… everything, it was just there. A part of me.Quiet.This feels… loud.Angry. Scared, but not in a run-and-hide way. In a chew-through-the-fence way.” She looked up, meeting her friend’s gaze. “Is that stupid?”
“It’s not stupid.” Sennia leaned forward, her own mug cradled close.“He was suppressing her.Doping her. Of course she’s pissed. You would be too, if someone locked you in a closet for years.”
The analogy was so brutally apt it stole Bunny’s breath. That’s exactly what it had been.A closet.A small, lavender-scented, meticulously designed closet.
“He can get in anywhere,” Bunny whispered, the dread returning.“He proved that tonight. I have nowhere that’s mine.”
Sennia set her mug down with a decisive clink. She stood up, rummaged in a junk drawer by the television, and returned with a single silver key on a battered red keychain shaped like a chili pepper. She slid it across the tree-trunk coaster until it touched Bunny’s mug.“Now you do,” she said. “You stay as long as you need.Forever, if you want.Kellan doesn’t know this place exists. And if he finds it, he’s got to go through me.” She said it casually, but there was steel underneath.Sennia was a beta, but her loyalty was an alpha-level force.
Bunny’s throat tightened. She picked up the key, the metal warm from Sennia’s hand.The weight of it was real, solid.A truth. “Thank you,” she managed, the words thick.“Don’t thank me yet. My shower pressure is garbage and I eat cereal for dinner at least three times a week.” Sennia stood, stretching. “I’ll get the pullout set up. It’s a medieval torture device disguised as a bed, but it’s yours.”
As Sennia wrestled with the couch, Bunny sat holding the key. The hum beneath her skin seemed to quiet, just a fraction, soothed by the cinnamon air and the safe, cluttered walls. The image of the shattered glass receded, replaced by the steady glow of the fairy lights.
But when she lay in the dark later, on the pullout’s unforgiving bar, the other gaze surfaced in her mind. Not Kellan’s cold, possessive stare.Coyle’s. The man at the bar with the battle-worn body and the eyes that had held no pity, only a deep, searching recognition. He’d looked at the version of her everyone saw—the soft girl in the pom-pom sweater—and he’d seen something else entirely.Something that matched the low, vibrating growl she now felt in her own marrow.
Kellan thought she’d forgotten something.He was right.She’d forgotten herself. And as she drifted into a thin, wary sleep, the wolf within her, awake and listening, began to remember. It remembered the scent of pine and cold rock, the feeling of speed, the taste of autonomy.It remembered what it was to be rare. And it remembered that you didn’t just hide from a hunter.
Sometimes, you turned and bared your teeth.