Page 293 of Heart of Frost and Scars

“When you learned my real name was Montgomery Strakh, you were a fucking dick. Leo was convinced you spit in my food.”

“True.” I nod.

“How do you know I don’t spit in your food?” Oliver grins.

“Oliver…” Monty pinches the bridge of his nose. “You were pissed at me for not telling you my real name. Yet all this time, you kept your identity from me.”

“Oliver is my real identity. The Ghost is an alias.”

“Same difference.”

“Not the same at all.”

“Can you both forgive and forget?” Frankie anchors her hands on her hips. “It’s time to move on.”

Monty and Oliver incline their heads.

“The cabin is yours,” I say to Oliver. “My brothers and I want nothing to do with it.”

“We’ll leave you the extra plane under two conditions.” Monty steps back, returning to Frankie’s side. “Contact me every time you’re in town, so I know you’re not trapped here. And you will not use this place to imprison, harm, or kill innocents. Agreed?”

“Agreed.”

“Time for those showers.” Frankie takes my hand.

Monty motions her forward, and she leads him and me down the hallway.

It feels like she’s pulling me into a dark memory. The walls shiver, and the floors hum with whispers of everything that’s happened here.

The door at the end of the hallway looms ahead. Denver’s bedroom. We escaped this place. Fled for our lives. It doesn’t feel right to enter this domain again.

She pushes the door open, the creak of the hinges shuddering through me.

“This is his room?” Monty peers inside.

“Was.” She enters and flicks on the lights.

Lights that haven’t had power since before Denver died.

I hesitate, my eyes locked on the nest of bedding still piled near the hearth.

“Looks like Rhett only remodeled the main rooms.” She moves farther into the bedroom, her hand trailing along the mantle as she looks around, her expression unreadable.

Finally, she turns back to us, her eyes meeting Monty’s with a look filled with something I can’t quite name.

“Denver raped me in this room.” She points at the bedding on the floor. “I slept there with Leo and Kody during the darkest months of my life. We made good memories and bad ones.”

The tension in Monty’s posture matches mine. I have my own memories of what was done here. I know exactly what this room represents.

“This is where it stops.” She looks at both of us, her voice steady, resolute. “The pain, the abuse, the nightmares, it all stops here. We’re going to step into that shower and wash it off. Then we’re going to go home. We’re going to take our Wolf home and never look back.”

Without a word, Monty scoops her into his arms, his expression hard but his touch infinitely gentle as he cradles her against his chest.

The raw, unspoken need in the way he holds her is stunning. She’s the most precious thing in the world, and he knows it.

He carries her into the bathroom and lowers her feet to the floor.

The sound of water rushing through the pipes tells me Kody and Wolf are still using the upstairs shower.

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