Chapter Text
The loft was too quiet.
Isabelle stood in the center of it, arms wrapped around herself, bare feet cold against the wood floor. The city lights bled through the windows, throwing long shadows across the floor.
He’d been gone four days.
No text. No note.
No “I’ll be back.”
Nothing.
Her wolf paced beneath her skin, restless and anxious. Not angry. Not yet.
The elevator doors slid open. She didn’t turn at first. She knew the sound of his steps.
Peter Hale walked in like he’d stepped out to get coffee. Impeccable coat. Perfect hair. Not a scratch on him.
“Hello, darling,” he said smoothly, tossing his keys onto the table.
Her head snapped toward him. “You disappeared.”
Peter shrugged out of his coat. “Did I?”
“Yes.”
He glanced at her like she’d commented on the weather. “Hmm.”
Isabelle stared. “Four days, Peter.”
“And?”
Her breath caught. “And I didn’t know if you were alive.”
He moved past her toward the bar cart. Poured himself a drink. Ice clinked softly.
“I was,” he replied, taking a sip. “As you can see.”
“That’s not the point.”
He didn’t even look at her. “That’s precisely the point,” he corrected mildly.
Her hands curled into fists. “You don’t get to just vanish.”
Peter finally turned his head, one brow arching. “Watch me.”
The words hit harder than a slap. Her wolf recoiled. “I’m your wife,” she said, voice tight.
“Yes,” he agreed easily. “You are.”
“Then act like it matters.”
He set his glass down. “It does.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me where you were?”
Peter walked toward her slowly, predatory calm radiating off him. He stopped just inches away, towering over her.
“Because,” he said softly, “I don’t have to.”
The air went thin. Isabelle searched his face for something. Anything. Guilt. Regret. A flicker of softness. Something.
There was nothing.
“You knew I’d stay,” she whispered.
He didn’t deny it.
“You knew I wouldn’t leave.”
A faint smile ghosted his mouth. “You won’t,” he said simply.
The certainty in his voice hollowed her out. Her wolf whined low in her chest.
“That hurts,” she breathed.
Peter tilted his head slightly, studying her like she was a puzzle he’d already solved. “Does it?”
“Yes.”
He stepped around her, unbothered. “You’ll survive.”
The dismissal was surgical.
She spun. “You don’t even care.”
Peter picked up his drink again.
“You’re still here,” he said, almost bored. “You’re still mine. I don’t see the issue.”
Her nails bit into her palms. “You scared me,” she said, voice cracking despite her best effort. “I thought you were dead. I thought — ”
He cut her off with a look. “I was handling something,” he said flatly. “I do not require supervision.”
“I wasn’t trying to supervise you!”
“Then what are you doing?”
Her throat tightened. “I wanted to know you were safe.”
He exhaled slowly, like she was exhausting. “I am an alpha,” he reminded her. “Not a child.”
“And I’m not disposable!” The words ripped out of her.
Silence. Peter’s eyes sharpened. “Careful,” he warned.
She stepped closer instead. “You don’t get to treat me like I’m just… furniture you come back to when it suits you.”
His jaw tightened slightly. The only crack in the marble. “You’re being dramatic.”
Her laugh broke. “Thor, you really don’t hear yourself, do you?”
Peter’s expression went glacial. “I don’t need to report my movements,” he said. “And I don’t owe you reassurance every time I step outside the city limits.”
She stared at him like he’d just driven a blade between her ribs. “No,” she whispered. “You just assume I’ll be here. Waiting.”
He didn’t answer. Because he did. The truth hung there, heavy and suffocating. Her wolf, so fiercely loyal, pressed toward him anyway. It made it worse. The instinct to lean in. To apologize. To smooth it over. She swallowed it down.
“I deserve better than silence,” she said quietly.
Peter picked up his glass again. “If you truly believed that,” he replied coolly, “you’d leave.”
The final cut. Her breath stuttered. He knew she wouldn’t. He knew she was loyal to the bone. That once she claimed, she didn’t unclaim. That even when he was cruel, she stayed. He knew. And he used it. Isabelle’s shoulders trembled, just once.
Peter watched, detached and assessing. “Are we finished?” he asked.
She stared at him like she didn’t recognize him. “This isn’t you,” she said.
A flicker passed over his face, gone in an instant. “It is,” he answered.
She felt smaller in that moment than she had in years. Not weak. Just… unchosen.
Peter walked past her toward the bedroom. “Come to bed when you’re done spiraling,” he said lightly.
The door shut. Isabelle remained in the middle of the loft, breathing unevenly.
Her wolf curled in on itself. He knew she wouldn’t leave.
And that knowledge hurt more than the silence ever could.