Page 132 of Broken Wolf Heart
Grey gasps, and I watch the way his veins suddenly glow bright blue as magic flares to life inside him.
The air shifts.
Grey groans, and a second later, darkness pours from his mouth, rising above us like an angry cloud. It blots out the light from the windows, darkening the room until we’re standing inside a roiling storm. Suddenly, the sound of the wind against the building isn’t coming from outside but from within the cyclone above our heads.
I have no idea whether to be relieved it’s out of him or worried that it’s become something sentient and separate—something capable of hurting us.
“Uh, not to interrupt, but what the fuck,” Dutch calls.
“Stay where you are,” Mia tells him. “It’s not finished yet.”
“This is some serious Wizard of Oz shit,” Razor says.
My wolf surges to the surface—but not violently. Not wild. She rises like a tide. Strong. Steady. Awake.
Part of me.
Grey’s eyes flare silver. His power floods toward me—but it doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t burn. Itsettles.
This is what it was always meant to be.
“Do you feel it?” he says, nearly shouting to be heard above the wind.
I nod, the magic already nudging me to speak aloud what’s woken inside me. We never needed a witch after all.
“We should say it out loud,” I whisper, breath catching.
Grey nods, his voice low and reverent. “I pledge my wolf’s strength to you, Lexi Giovanni. Not just as your mate but as your equal. Your co-alpha. A bonded pair; a balance. Shared strength, wolf to mated wolf. As it was always meant to be for our kind.”
The words hit deep, anchoring something inside me I didn’t know was still floating.
“I pledge my wolf’s strength to you, Grey Diavolo. As your equal. Your mate. Your co-alpha. A bonded pair; a balance. My strength freely shared, wolf to mated wolf.” The darkness seethes at that, but I finish the words that arebuilding inside me. “What we’ve joined, nothing can ever break apart.”
And then, just like that, the full weight of our bond clicks into place—not just emotional butphysical. I feel Grey’s wolf in a way I’ve never felt before. His strength. His steadiness. His unwavering love. And beneath it, his fear. His pain. His desire to protect me. His commitment to never hurt me.
And I let it all in.
Just as clearly as I can feel Grey and his wolf, I see my own wolf standing on the other side of a door, shut and locked between us. She watches me in my mind’s eye. Waiting. She doesn’t ask me to open the door, but I know instinctively that is the choice I have to make.
To fully let her in.
To allow her to become part of me.
To embrace both halves of my soul and no longer define myself as either human or wolf. From this moment forward, I’m both, always.
Shoving aside the fear, I reach over and yank the door wide open.
Because she’s mine. And I’m not just Grey’s; I’m hers. And our wolves belong to one another just as fiercely as they belong to each of us.
My wolf crosses the threshold, and something inside me bursts wide open. Power, love, unity, flashes of white, of magic, of futures—all of it fills my mind, and I gasp, blinking against the sheer enormity of it all.
Around us, the air audibly hums with a power too big to contain inside us any longer. Suddenly, the darkness is met with a white cloud so pure and blinding, I have to shield my eyes from its brightness. The dark cloud screams and writhes before sizzling out of existence.
A heartbeat later, the air clears, and any trace of magic or sentience winks out.
Mia lets out a sharp exhale. Razor mutters a string of curses that are aimed at “The Wicked Witch of the Hex Blade” and other nonsensical accusations.
When I look down at my palm, the wound has already sealed shut. Only a small scar remains to prove I didn’t just hallucinate the entire thing. I exhale, feeling both drained and energized. Grey looks back at me, the same stunned expression on his face. We stand there for a long moment, just holding each other’s gaze.
