TRADING MY CHEATING HUSBAND FOR THE LYCAN KING novel Chapter 105

CHAPTER 71: THE WOLF AND THE FOX

EMBER’S POV

He’s quiet for a long moment. Something flickers through his eyes. Pain, maybe. Or fear. The shutters start to come down, that familiar wall rebuilding itself brick by brick.

“I don’t think I’d be a good father,” he says finally.

“Why?”

“The Volkovs weren’t exactly a stable family.” His voice has gone careful. Controlled. “Dysfunction runs in

my blood. Literally. I’ve seen what happens when damaged people try to raise children. I refuse to continue that cycle.”

There’s so much more underneath those words. I can feel it. Decades of history I know nothing about.

“What was your family like?” I ask softly.

He chuckles, but there’s no humor in it.

“You really don’t get enough, do you? Always pushing. Always wanting more.”

“You’re so closed off,” I admit. “Every time I think I’m getting somewhere, you build another wall. It makes

me want to know everything. Every secret. Every scar. Everything you’re hiding behind all that ice.”

He stares at me for a long moment. Something shifts in his expression, something vulnerable and raw that he usually keeps buried.

Then he moves.

Before I can react, he’s pulling me on top of him, rearranging us until I’m sprawled across his warm chest,

his arms locked around my waist like he’s afraid I’ll float away.

“Time for you to sleep,” he murmurs against my hair.

“I can’t sleep. I want to talk.” I know I sound childish. I don’t care. “You always do this. You deflect and

distract and-”

“It’s been a long day, baby.” His hand strokes down my spine, soothing despite my protests. “The longest.

You need rest.”

“But-”

“Tomorrow. I’ll answer one question tomorrow. Any question you want.” He presses a kiss to the top of my

head. “But right now, you need to sleep. And I need to hold you. Can you give me that?”

The fight drains out of me. He’s right. I’m exhausted down to my bones, and lying here wrapped around

him feels too good to argue with.

“Fine,” I mumble into his chest. “But I’m holding you to that. One question. Any question.”

34

KACTERIA–THE WOLF AND THE FOX

“Deal”

+25 Points

“And I want a real answer. Not one of your cryptic non–answers that technically satisfy the question while telling me nothing.”

“You drive a hard bargain.”

“I learned from the best.”

His chest rumbles with a quiet laugh.

Silence settles over us, warm and comfortable. I should be drifting off, but my mind is still buzzing, still reaching for something to hold onto.

“I can’t sleep,” I admit after a few minutes. “My brain won’t stop.”

“What do you need?”

“Tell me something. A story. Something that isn’t about councils or threats or ex–girlfriends or Nathaniel.” I shift closer, pressing my face against his chest. “Something to quiet my head.”

“I don’t do stories.”

“Then make one up. Something boring enough to knock me out.”

The sound he makes might be a laugh. Might just be an exhale. Hard to tell with Knox.

“Fine,” he says after a moment. “A story. But if you fall asleep before the end, I’m not repeating it.”

“Deal.”

He’s quiet for a moment, and I can almost hear him thinking, searching for something to say that isn’t classified information or traumatic backstory.

“Once upon a time,” he begins, and his voice has shifted into something lower, softer, almost hypnotic,”

there was a wolf who lived alone in a castle made of ice.”

“A castle made of ice?” I murmur against his chest. “That sounds uncomfortable.”

J

“It was. But the wolf had been hurt badly when he was young, and ice was the only thing that numbed the wounds. So he built his walls higher and higher, froze everything he touched, convinced himself that the

cold was better than the alternative.”

I go still, realizing this isn’t just a story.

One day,” Knox continues, “a small creature wandered into his territory. Not a wolf. Something softer. Something that should have been prey.”

“What kind of creature?”

“Does it matter?”

“I want to picture it correctly.”

WAPTER 24-445 WOLF AND

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