CHAPTER 387: SHELTER IN THE STORM...

Lyla

The front door of the house burst open with such force that it slammed against the wall, splintering the wood around the hinges. Ramsey and Elias stormed in.

As soon as Elias saw the chaos—the destroyed sitting room, the hole in the roof, the creatures advancing on me—he didn’t hesitate. His human form melted away in seconds, replaced by a massive grey Lycan that was easily as large as Ramsey’s war form.

Without a sound, he launched himself at the nearest creature, his claws tearing through its chest like paper.

Ramsey immediately wrapped his arms around me, pulling me against his chest as his body tensed. "Are you hurt?" he demanded, his hands running over my arms and face, checking for injuries.

Across the room, Nanny finally stopped fighting the creatures. Since Elias had entered, she quickly shifted back to her human form and rushed to the bedroom to change her clothes since it was torn.

Two of the clawed creatures snarled and charged Elias. His powerful paws struck them like twisted wrecking balls. One got crushed against the couch; another lunged and exploded into dust when Elias sank his claw into its throat.

Elias fought with the efficiency of someone trained for this exact situation, his massive Lycan form eating up the space in the sitting room as he continued to fight the creatures. Each strike was calculated to kill, not just wound. Within minutes, the last creature lay motionless on our destroyed floor.

Elias shifted back to human form, breathing hard from the exertion. His clothes were torn and bloodstained, but he appeared uninjured.

I stared at him, still trying to recover from the shock that he wasn’t human. "So... you’re not human?"

Elias nodded, guilt written across his features. Without hesitation, he dropped to one knee before me in the traditional gesture of respect to a Luna.

"I am Elias Thornwick, assigned as your personal guardian by order of the Hollow Kin Council," he said formally. "I am deeply sorry for not revealing my true identity sooner, Luna. The deception was necessary for your protection."

I turned to Ramsey, seeing a contemplative expression on his face that suggested he’d already put some pieces together. "Did you know?"

Ramsey nodded slowly. "I only found out today. I suspected something when he defended us to the police, but I confirmed it this morning."

I shot him a glare that could have melted steel. The betrayal stung—not just from Elias, but from my own husband, who had kept this information from me.

Turning back to Elias, I crossed my arms. "First of all, I’m mad at you. Moons! I am so gullible! How could I have missed the fact that you’re—"

"Maybe because you’re pregnant," Elias said quietly, shrugging his shoulders. Then continued hastily, "And also because I needed to stay undercover. My assignment was to protect you without drawing attention to my true self. I’m sorry, Luna, but I had orders."

"So what are you doing here then? Why do I need a guardian I didn’t know about?"

Elias cleared his throat. "I’m sorry about that, again, Luna. It’s just that—"

Before the words would come out of his mouth, Ramsey cut him short, drawing me closer against his side. "We should clean up first," he said, his voice tight with concern. "Are you sure you’re not hurt?"

Nanny finally came back to the room in fresh clothes and without any preamble, or rather, I would say with her eyes burning with fury, walked up to Elias, who took one step back when he saw her approaching.

"Tell me what those creatures were and what they wanted with my daughter."

Elias scratched his head uncomfortably, looking to Ramsey as if he was asking for help.

Ramsey sighed and took a step forward. "We’ll talk about all of that later, Miriam. How about we try to clean up the house first and sort out the roof issue? It’ll be night soon, and we can’t sleep with a hole in the ceiling."

Nanny turned to Ramsey, her eyes blazing with anger. "If you think I would allow my daughter to stay in this same house after hearing clearly from one of those creatures that they came here to kill her, then you’re insane." She paused, then added with icy politeness, "Respectfully, Lycan Leader."

She stretched forth her hand to me. "Come here, my baby."

I untangled myself from Ramsey’s protective embrace and walked to Nanny, who immediately wrapped me in her arms.

"Wait a minute while I go get our bags," she said, stroking my hair. "I’ll call the doctor and the healer to meet us so we can go home where it’s safe."

Elias approached us hesitantly. "I’m sorry, High Priestess, but—"

"I’m not a High Priestess, Miriam to you." Nanny shut him down immediately, her voice filled with irritation.

Elias scratched his head and muttered, "But you have the mark..."

"And so what?" Nanny fired back. "Do you have a problem with that?"

"Let’s all take a breather here, Miriam," Ramsey said quietly. "You still have the aura of a High Priestess even though you no longer perform your duties."

"Tell me what I don’t know, Lycan Leader," Nanny sneered again, shooting Ramsey another icy glare.

"I’m sorry for mixing that up," Elias apologised, clearing his throat nervously. "But you can’t leave now with Luna Lyla. I need to protect her. It’s my duty."

"And yet you took your sweet time getting here," Nanny fired back.

"That’s because I wasn’t linked to the Luna yet. Thankfully, Alpha Ramsey was able to sense her distress through their bond. I hope in the future I can be granted access to her, and once I am, I can always sense when she’s in trouble."

"Linked?" I arched my brow, feeling my patience dwindling every passing second. "What the fuck is going on here?"

Ramsey raised his hand placatingly. "Everybody, chill out. First of all, Miriam, we won’t be staying here again. I already made arrangements for us to move to a safer and more spacious place."

"Why can’t we just go home?" Nanny demanded.

"I’ll explain, but first we need to get to our new house." He turned to Elias. "How quickly can you get the roof fixed?"

"I’m on it," Elias replied immediately.

"And our transport?"

"On its way to us too, Alpha," Elias murmured, typing rapidly on his phone.

Ramsey then crossed the room and lifted one of the couches that had turned upside down during the fight, cleaning it as much as he could before returning to me. Without saying a word, he carried me in his arms and placed me on the chair.

When I was seated, he knelt in front of me, stroking my cheek. "I’ll go pack our bags from the bedroom and do it as quickly as I can, okay? Before I go, is there anything I can get you?"

I wanted to remain angry, but the warmth that flooded inside of me right now reminded me of the reason why I was head-over-heels for Ramsey. I mean, how could I say no to his pleading amber eyes or to the way they were rounded with innocence?

Sighing, I looked away from him. "I don’t want anything," I muttered grudgingly. "Even if I want, Nanny would get it for me."

He nodded and straightened, not before placing a kiss on my hair and moving to the bedroom.

As Nanny and Elias tried to pick up the worst of the debris, my mind kept replaying the creatures’ words.

Going somewhere, little Moonsinger?

They were humans, I could tell that much. They smelled like humans, maybe, except for the claws, and they had been specifically hunting me, not to mention the warehouse incident she had mentioned.

The only way for her to know that is if she had been in that warehouse that day, too. The memories weren’t pleasant and weren’t something I was proud of reflecting on. Now, despite all my efforts, I kept seeing it.

Xander and I walked into the abandoned warehouse, where we saw a lot of people underground, and they all greeted us. Then, there was the ritual that almost went through, if Nanny hadn’t found me.

I stared at Nanny, wondering if I should tell her what the creature had said specifically. Although I had shared everything that had happened during my short time away from Ramsey, I still withheld many details from him.

That was because I wasn’t proud of them.

A while later, Ramsey came out of the bedroom with our bags, and Elias went to him immediately, brushing dust from his clothes.

"Car’s ready, Alpha."

Without any word or complaint, we piled in, with Elias at the wheel, and travelled for about an hour toward the high-rise part of town.

We pulled up in front of a tastefully furnished duplex that screamed expensive. A professional-looking woman in a business suit approached us with a clipboard and legal documents.

"Mr Thornwick?" She asked, her gaze darting from Ramsey to Elias.

Elias moved forward immediately, stretching his hand. "Good evening, Ma’am and thank you for coming through for us at such short notice."

The woman nodded, her gaze darting back repeatedly to Ramsey, not bothering to hide the fact that she was oogling my husband.

"Everything is ready for your signature," she managed to inform Elias, who took the documents and hurried to Ramsey.

Ramsey signed the papers quickly, and the woman walked away with a satisfied smile, not bothering to look at me for once, and I wish she had.

When she was gone, I turned to my husband. "Did you just buy a house?"