The door slammed open.
A red-haired woman in a leather jacket rushed in, grabbing my wrist before I could tear my IV out. Her eyes widened like she hadn’t expected me to wake up screaming. “Miss Jessica, please calm down. You are safe now.”
Safe? I did not know her. I had never seen her. Her scent wasn’t Vale Pack.
But instead of asking who the hell she was, the only thing that came out of my mouth was, “What did they say about my hand? What happened? Tell me!”
She froze.
Her eyes dropped to the cast, and the way her throat bobbed told me everything she couldn’t say.
Before she could force a lie, the door opened again.
Johan walked in.
The second I saw him, every muscle in my body locked up.
My wolf curled so far back into my chest I could barely feel her.
Pain didn’t matter anymore.
Breathing didn’t matter.
All I remembered was Jude’s shaking voice. Jude saying Johan ordered my hand smashed. Johan choosing Suzette. Johan protecting her. Johan sacrificing me like I was an animal.
Tears burned at the corners of my eyes before I could stop them. I didn’t even know if they were from pain or rage. Probably both.
He stepped forward with a basket of fruit like this was some sweet hospital visit.
I didn’t even think.
“Get out! Get the hell out!” I grabbed the lamp beside me and hurled it at him with my left hand, knocking over the IV stand, spilling half my water, and nearly ripping out my tubes.
It smacked his chest with a dull thud, but he barely reacted while the whole damn room descended into chaos around me.
He froze, stunned.
The redhead quickly grabbed the tray of fruit from his other hand. Her shoulders jerked with tension, and she cut a quick glance at me, then at Johan. It even shocked me that she didn’t try to stop me from lunging at Johan. Johan stepped toward me. “Jessica, listen to me.”
He reached out and pulled me into his arms like he actually had the right.
“Your hand isn’t the issue,” he said, voice thick like he was trying to convince himself more than me. “I’ll handle everything. Whatever life you had before, I’ll make it easier. Better. You don’t have to suffer anymore. Just calm down, Jessica. Please. I can’t stand seeing you like this. You’ll hurt yourself.”
I thrashed in his grip.
“Let go of me!” I screamed. “I must’ve been completely insane to ever love you! If all you wanted was to spoil your precious Suzette, you could’ve dumped me like trash. But no, you had to destroy my hand. You had to destroy me. Was that fun for you?”
His jaw tightened.
“You knew what it meant to me,” I shouted, my voice breaking like something tearing inside me. “You knew perfume was the only thing that kept me sane, the only thing I had left in this whole damn world. It was my life, my soul, everything I fought to rebuild. And you didn’t just take it. You crushed it with your own hands. Who the hell do you think you are coming here, acting like you can fix me now? Get out. Get the hell out!”
He held me tighter.
“Jessica… this is on me,” he whispered, voice shaking in a way I had never heard from him. “If you need to hit me, then hit me. If you need to scream, do it. I’ll take every damn thing you throw at me. Just don’t hurt yourself. Please. I’m begging you. Let me make this right. Let me take care of you for as long as I breathe.”
“I don’t need it!” My voice was raw. “I don’t want anything from you! You destroyed everything! You ruined me!”
But no matter how hard I struggled, I couldn’t break out of his arms.
I used to love the way he smelled. Clean. Fresh. Comforting.
The redhead flinched in the corner of my eye, like hearing the shift in my breathing warned her something worse was coming.
“I’m pressing charges against Suzette,” I declared, staring directly at his face.
His whole body tensed.
“This is attempted murder. She needs to pay for what she did. Both of you already violated wolf rights under pack law, and I’m done pretending this is normal.”
“No.” He grabbed my left arm, the only one not broken. “Jessica, you can’t report Suzette. She’s dying.”
I laughed, not because anything was funny, but because the sound coming out of my mouth wasn’t a laugh at all.
“And now she wants to drag me down with her?” I snarled. “I didn’t give her that illness. So why the hell does she get to destroy mine? Since when does being sick give her permission to crush my future?”
He swallowed hard.
I could see the walls behind his eyes. The line he refused to cross. The truth he would not admit.
“Jessica,” he said, voice low. “Like I said, I’ll take care of you. I don’t care that you lost your hand. But I can’t let you press charges against Suzette. I have influence in the high council. If I want, I can block it. Don’t make me fight you.”
Fight me.
He was willing to fight me… but not Suzette.
Something inside me cracked so deeply I felt it in my wolf.
“I hate you,” I whispered.
And I meant it with every piece of my fractured spirit.
“I hate you, Johan. I hate what you did to me. I hate that I ever trusted you.”
My throat tightened.
“Get out. I don’t want to see you again.”
“Jessica-“
“Get out!” I screamed.
The force of it ripped something loose in my chest.
I coughed violently, then blood splattered onto my sheets.
The redhead rushed forward without hesitation, slipping one arm behind my shoulders and wiping my mouth with a small cloth, steadying me while I shook.
Johan’s eyes widened. “Jessica! Calm down. Please. I already punished Jude. I’ll make sure you get justice.”
I glared at him through tears. “Stop lying to my face. Suzette gave the order and you know it. She’s the one who should be paying for this, not some pawn you threw to the wolves.”
His expression hardened.
He stared at me like he was choosing his last stance.
Then he said each word slowly, flat and final:
“Jude was the one who hurt you. There is no one else behind it. Jessica, stop pushing this. As long as I’m alive, no one will touch Suzette. Not even you.”
And just like that, something inside me died.
He wasn’t protecting me. He was protecting her.
She hurt me. She ordered my hand broken. She left me on the road like trash.
And he still said he would shield her.
I felt my wolf retreat so far I wondered if she’d ever come back.
I didn’t cry or scream this time because I finally understood that Johan was the claws wrapped around every inch of the Vale Pack, sharp enough to cut down anything that tried to defy him.
And I didn’t have the strength to pry myself out of those claws. I was trapped under him, under the power he wielded, under the choices he made long before I ever mattered.
Not yet. But one day, those claws would bleed before they ever held me down again.
Jessica’s POV
I did not want to go back to Vale Pack’s infirmary. Not after everything that happened. Not after the truth about Johan, about Suzette, about everything I lost.
“I am not going back there” I snapped at Johan the moment he carried me toward the door.
“Jessica you need treatment” he said with that low, tired voice.
“Then drop me in a ditch because I am not stepping into that place again.”
He still brought me. He always did whatever he wanted.
The moment we crossed the threshold my wolf bristled.
“She is here” I growled under my breath.
Suzette. Breathing my air. Existing. That alone made my blood feel like fire.
The first time Johan came into my room I threw a pillow at him.
The second time it was a cup.
The third time a vase.
“Jessica stop” he said, dodging.
“Get out of here!” I screamed until my throat burned. “Do not touch me. Do not look at me. Do not talk to me.”
He tried again. I hurled whatever was within reach.
“Jess please” he said.
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