TEMPORARY MATES PERMANENT CRAVINGS novel Chapter 219

Two hundred and nineteen

Franklin POV

“The Alpha is having a hard time. He’s not surrendering his throne.”

The roughness of my voice made Cameron, who was sitting across the room in a high-backed chair while the Oracle moved around him in slow circles, raise an eyebrow at me.

I turned away to avoid making him uneasy and took several steps out of their hearing range.

“A hard time doesn’t explain six missed appearances, Franklin. The council is hearing things. People don’t invent rumors when an Alpha vanishes,” Elder Robinson said.

I blew out a breath that rattled my lips as his words droned on.

“Tell me honestly, Franklin. If Cameron walked into this room right now, would I find the same Alpha who led this pack six months ago?”

A bark of laughter escaped me without warmth as the uncomfortable question settled in my stomach.

Rumors had started as whispers among council members after Cameron missed several appearances. Every explanation bought us a little time but created more questions.

Some elders were genuinely worried. Others were already calculating outcomes. I knew how quickly concern turned into succession politics. A few more weeks of this, and people would stop asking whether Cameron was well and start asking whether Matthias should prepare to take over.

My job had gone beyond protecting Cameron’s health. It had become protecting his throne, his reputation, and the stability of the pack from people who claimed they wanted to help while quietly measuring the distance to his seat.

“He is still the same, Elder Robinson,” I said. “When he’s ready, he’ll return to his duties. Until then, my concern is getting him back on his feet, not entertaining rumors.”

I ended the call and slipped the phone back into my pocket. The elders’ questions had grown sharper with every conversation over the past week.

Cameron had missed council appearances and delegated meetings he normally would have bulldozed through himself. And I gave the same answer I always gave: that the Alpha was recovering, that the doctors were monitoring him, and that there was no cause for alarm.

I lingered in the hallway, staring at the dark screen of my phone after the call ended. The silence gave me an excuse to stay where I was. Walking back into that room meant looking Cameron in the eye again. It meant pretending I hadn’t spent the past two days feeding him, helping him stand, and watching him drift in and out of himself. Every time he seemed better, something happened that reminded me how far this thing had already progressed.

Back in the room, the Oracle moved around him in slow circles. Thin ribbons of gray smoke rose from a brass censer suspended by chains in her hand. Bone talismans clicked softly against one another on her wrist whenever she raised her arm. The scent of burnt sage and myrrh hung heavily in the air.

She murmured prayers under her breath and pressed a thumb stained with ash against the center of Cameron’s forehead.

He watched her with tired eyes, waiting for something he no longer believed would work.

Two nights ago, he hadn’t recognized me. I’d spent half an hour convincing him I wasn’t an intruder in his own

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house.

The Oracle’s eyes met mine over Cameron’s shoulder. She didn’t say a word. She didn’t need to. Whatever she was looking for, she hadn’t found it.

The more I learned about the Meridian cult, the less this felt like something Cameron could fight his way out of. Alpha Kieran still carried scars from it. Evangeline had lived under our noses, eaten at our table, shared Cameron’s bed, and none of us had seen what she really was until the damage was already done. Every answer uncovered more questions.

Meridian was bigger than a cult. It had spread through territories, councils, businesses, and packs long before Cameron became a target.

The Oracle gathered the last of her things and rested a hand on Cameron’s shoulder.

“I’ve seen people come back from darker places than this.”

Cameron looked up at her. She nodded with a faint smile and gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze.

“Keep fighting. Whatever is holding on to you has spent a great deal of effort trying to break you. That alone tells me you’re giving it a harder battle than it expected.”

A faint smile touched Cameron’s face. The Oracle returned it.

“I’ll come back in the evening.”

Neither of us asked what she planned to do differently.

She picked up her satchel and headed for the door. The door closed behind her, leaving the two of us alone. I dropped into a chair across from him and stretched my legs.

Cameron let out a scoff.

“I’ve graduated from prayers to motivational speeches.”

“You’re still getting speeches because you’re still here to listen to them. She cares. We all do.”

He yawned and rubbed a hand across his jaw.

“I fired two people from the kitchen this morning,” I said.

“For what?”

“One of them asked whether you’d started recognizing people again.”

Cameron’s face hardened,

“And the other?”

“The other was caught copying visitor logs. Nobody could explain why a cook needed a list of everyone coming in and out of the Alpha’s residence.”

His eyes held no emotion.

“Elder Robinson called,” I said after a while, my gaze drifting toward the window. “Matthias is probably one speech away from thanking people for their confidence in his future leadership.”

The words had barely left my mouth when movement flashed at the edge of my vision. Years of instinct took over before my brain caught up. I dropped my head, and something made of glass tore through the space where it had

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Tab hundred and nineteen

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been. It exploded against the wall behind me, shards scattering across the floor.

The crash echoed through the room.

I straightened and turned to Cameron. His chest rose and fell hard, his hand still half-raised from the throw.

“NOBODY IS TAKING MY THRONE!”

The roar shook the room.

“GET OUT!”

His chest heaved violently.

“I NEVER WANT TO SEE YOUR FACE AGAIN!”

The room went silent except for the ringing in my ears.

Glass crunched beneath my shoe as I took a step back.

I didn’t recognize the man standing in front of me. Cameron’s face was twisted with a level of panic I’d never seen before. His eyes looked wild and unfocused, as though he were arguing with something only he could see. He looked like a man fighting an enemy inside his own head and losing ground.

The anger vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared. His hand went to his head, and confusion replaced fury.

“What…”

He looked at the shattered glass on the floor.

Then at me.

“Oh God.”

I stayed where I was.

The first time it happened, I’d panicked, but now I knew the pattern. Whenever the fog pulled back, regret rushed in behind it.

“What did I do?”

“You missed,” I said.

He didn’t laugh.

“What is wrong with me, Franklin?”

I looked away.

That question had become harder to answer every time he asked it.

“I need to get out of this house,” he said suddenly. “Every room feels wrong. Every hallway feels wrong.

Sometimes I hear things, and I don’t know if they’re real. Sometimes I think I know exactly what’s happening, and an hour later I can’t trust any of it.”

His jaw tightened.

“She’s in my head.”

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The words hung between us.

“You know why we can’t move you,” I said. “She tied this thing to you. She might be the only reason you’re still alive.”

That answer made him look sick.

“Come on,” I said, helping him up. “Let’s go for a walk.”

We left the room and walked the grounds. The afternoon air felt cleaner than the house.

For a while, neither of us spoke.

“When will it stop?” he asked. “I hurt Lisa. I keep hurting people I should protect.”

Out of everything Meridian had taken from him, that day with Lisa remained the wound he kept returning to. The guilt never seemed to leave him anymore. He remembered every detail of it and the horror on her face.

Although Lisa had been shaken, the reality was that she had shown more backbone than most fully trained wolves I knew. Shaken, sure. Anyone would have been. Broken was a different thing entirely.

I nudged his shoulder.

“That kid survived you, Evangeline, Meridian, and a pregnant mother who keeps getting dragged into supernatural nonsense. I’d say stubbornness runs in the family.”

I nodded.

“She’s safe. Your baby is fine.”

His shoulders loosened, and he stared across the field.

“Good.”

Nothing about his face changed, yet I knew he was fighting emotion.

“If something happens to me…”

“Don’t.”

“If something happens to me,” he repeated, “protect that child.”

I shoved his shoulder.

“You’ll tell the kid yourself.”

He shook his head.

“I don’t know if I will.”

The honesty caught me off guard.

“I can feel it getting worse,” he admitted. “Every day I lose something. A memory. A thought. A piece of myself. Sometimes I know what I’m supposed to feel, and I can’t reach it.”

His eyes dropped to the ground.

“I’d rather die than become Dominion.”

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I didn’t answer. There wasn’t a joke in the world good enough for that.

We kept walking in silence, two men pretending there was still a road out of this.

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