CHAPTER 124: THE CHAOS HE BRINGS

Josie

I didn’t sleep well that night. Every time I closed my eyes, I kept replaying their voices—sharp, heavy, carrying judgment I hadn’t asked for. The Alphas always thought they knew best. Always thought they were protecting me. But protection had started to feel like chains around my ankles, tightening with every decision they made for me.

When I finally drifted into sleep, it wasn’t peaceful. My dreams were restless things, full of shadowed figures pulling me in different directions, none of them listening to me. Their voices overlapped—Varen’s harsh warnings, Thorne’s cold disappointment, Kiel’s frustrated demands. Every tug pulled me further apart until I woke with a strangled gasp.

My throat was dry, my body aching, and my head pounding like I’d been fighting battles all night long.

The door opened with a soft creak, and the nurse bustled in with her usual polite smile. Her shoes squeaked faintly against the floor as she set a tray down. "You’re fine now," she said, voice crisp and final, like her words alone were supposed to settle everything. "You can go back to the pack house today."

Fine. The word tasted bitter, like ash coating my tongue.

I pushed myself upright, wincing as my back protested, and squinted at her. "Where are they?" My voice came out reluctant, more fragile than I wanted. I hated that I even asked, hated how the question exposed me.

She hesitated for a second, too long for it to be nothing. Her eyes darted toward the door, then back to me, as if she were deciding how much truth I deserved. "They said you could come back on your own. They had... something to do."

For a heartbeat, I thought I’d misheard. My ears rang, desperate to fill the silence with something else. But her expression said it all—polite sympathy that only made my stomach twist harder.

"They left me?" I asked, the words thick, weighted with something I refused to call hurt. I tried to flatten the emotion out of my voice, but it leaked into every syllable, staining them with accusation.

She didn’t answer directly, just fussed with the edge of the sheet, smoothing wrinkles that didn’t matter, before slipping out the door. That silence was louder than anything she could’ve said.

Heat surged under my skin. I was the one who should’ve been furious with them, not the other way around. I had every right to be. But instead, they abandoned me. My chest felt tight with betrayal, with the sting of being dismissed again.

The wall across from my bed seemed to tremble with my anger. My fingers twitched, and a sharp crack rang out as bits of debris loosened and dropped from the plaster. The fracture line spread like a spiderweb, crawling outward before I forced myself to stop. I dragged the power back into myself with gritted teeth, clenching my fists so hard my nails bit crescents into my palms. Another second and I would’ve destroyed the whole damn room.

I exhaled sharply, muttering under my breath, "Get it together, Josie. Don’t let them see you fall apart."

Swinging my legs off the bed, I shoved on my flats and straightened my dress with jerky, impatient movements. The fabric clung wrong, every seam irritating my skin, as if my own clothes had turned against me. If they wanted me to walk back on my own, fine. I didn’t need anyone holding my hand.

When I stepped outside, sunlight stung my eyes, too bright, too cheerful for the storm in my chest. And of course—because the universe had a twisted sense of humor—there he was.

Liam.

Leaning against the hospital wall like he owned the place, lounging as if he’d just been waiting for me. A shirt clung to his frame this time, thank the stars, but his casual arrogance filled the space more than his body ever could.

I sighed, already exhausted, and kept walking, hoping I could pass him without a word.

"Leaving me to my vices again?" he called out, voice lazy, catching up with me in two long strides. His tone was a mix of mockery and false injury, as if I’d wounded him by ignoring him.

I rolled my eyes, sharp enough to cut. "What I don’t like," I snapped, "is the way you never understand anything. You just keep doing things that put me in trouble, again and again."

He tilted his head, feigning innocence, his mouth curving into that infuriating smirk. "I don’t understand what you mean."

Another eye roll. I didn’t care if it was childish. "The fact that you used your powers on my mate. That wasn’t right, Liam. And you know it. Something has to be done to fix this mess."

He shrugged, careless as always, shoulders loose like none of this mattered. "I’m not like you. I don’t spend my life trying to fix everything. I make things better in my own way."

That made me stop dead. My shoes scraped against the path as I turned to face him fully, the sun throwing shadows across his cheekbones. "Better? How in the world is any of this better, Liam? Tell me."

He smirked, but there was a glint in his eyes—something sharper, something dangerous. "By creating chaos. That’s how I operate. There’s nothing wrong with that. Chaos clears the field, wipes away pretenses. It’s honest."

I stared at him, my pulse hammering so hard it echoed in my ears. "You’re insane if you think that’s helping anyone. All you do is stir storms and then watch everyone else drown in them."

He chuckled, but the sound lacked its usual arrogance. It was hollow, cracked at the edges, like he was hiding something beneath it. "And yet here you are, still talking to me."

That stung more than I wanted to admit. My lips parted, but no retort came. I bit down on my lip, tasting iron, and turned away, resuming my steps with sharp determination. Somehow, despite the arguments, despite everything, we fell into stride together. His presence pressed against me like an unwanted shadow I couldn’t shake.

The walk back to the pack house felt longer than it should have. Every word he tossed out was like a spark, threatening to set me off, but I forced myself to breathe, to keep my power leashed, to not lose control again. The silence between his quips gnawed at me worse than his words.

When the building finally came into view, relief coursed through me like water to parched earth. My sanctuary. My mess. My prison.

"I’m going to rest," I said quickly, before he could wedge himself further into my day. My voice was flat, clipped, a dismissal. I didn’t wait for his reply—I just slipped through the door of my room and closed it firmly behind me.

The silence wrapped around me, but it didn’t soothe me. It pressed harder, heavy and suffocating. My room, once a comfort, now felt too empty. No one had come looking for me. Not Varen. Not Kiel. Not Thorne.

Not one of them.

The ache swelled again, hot and angry, burning behind my eyes. My chest tightened as if my own ribs were squeezing me from the inside. I stormed out before I could think better of it, my feet carrying me faster than my thoughts. The dining hall was my destination, though I didn’t know what I expected to find there—comfort, confrontation, or just the illusion of not being so alone.

And then—

Thorne.

He stepped out of the kitchen, a robe hanging loosely around him, his dark hair a messy tumble as he rubbed at it with a towel. Drops of water clung to his collarbone, trailing down his chest, catching the light before disappearing into the fabric.

For a moment, everything in me went still. The robe. The water. The casual, unguarded picture he made. It sparked something dangerous in my chest, a fantasy I didn’t dare let unfold, but it came anyway—warmth, closeness, a different kind of silence where I wasn’t judged but wanted.

My lips parted before I could stop myself. "...Thorne."

His eyes lifted to mine, and whatever softness I’d conjured shattered instantly. His gaze was sharp, heavy with disappointment, colder than the water still clinging to his skin.

"Why are you staring at me like that," he asked coldly, each word deliberate and cutting, "when your behavior has been nothing short of awful?"

The words sliced through me, sharper than any blade.

And this time, I didn’t know if I had the strength to stop the bleeding.