I’m glad to hear it,” he said as he pulled a penlight from his coat.
+25 BONUS
He lifted it and gently shined it into her eyes, first one, then the offer, his ow your eyes,” he murmured, moving it side to side. She did, her pupils reacting normally.
gaze sharp and analytical. “Follow the light with
“Can you smile for me?” he asked.
She gave a small, amused grin. “I’ve been doing that already, haven’t I?”
“Yes,” he said, managing a faint smile in return. “Good reflexes. How about lifting your arms for me–both of them, nice and steady.” She raised them easily. “Any dizziness, nausea, light sensitivity?”
“Nope,” she said. “Honestly, I feel better than I have in weeks.”
She glanced at me again, and the smile that followed was enough to punch the air from my lungs. There was something teasing in it. Something open.
The doctor’s lips pressed into a tight line.
“Okay,” he said, voice lower now, professional but clearly uneasy. He turned to me, touching my arm lightly. “Mr. King–come with me.”
I followed him, my pulse hammering.
In the hallway, Jacob and Aiden stood off to the side. Aiden was fiddling with the corner of a snack wrapper, eyes bouncing between me and the doctor.
The doctor didn’t waste time.
“Mr. Stormvale informed me Elena may be experiencing selective memory loss,” he said briskly.
I nodded. “She doesn’t seem to know who I am.”
“But she knows everyone else?” he asked, turning slightly to confirm.
Jacob and Aiden nodded in sync.
“She called me by name,” Jacob said. “Knew Aiden too. Her parents. Even the nurses. Just not-”
“Me,” I finished.
“I was about to tell her who I am to her,” I added. “Figured if I just explained-
“No.” The doctor’s voice turned sharp. “You mustn’t.”
My brow furrowed. “What?”
“You cannot tell her who you are,” he said firmly. “Not yet. Possibly not at all.”
Jacob stepped forward. “You want us to lie to her?”
”
“No. Not lie,” the doctor said. “But don’t trigger a confrontation. Don’t try to force recognition.”
My stomach dropped. “Why?”
The doctor glanced over his shoulder, then lowered his voice. “Because her memory is fully intact—for everyone and everything in her life. Except you.”
She remembers me,” Jacob said. “Remembers her pack, her duties. Her trauma. Just not…”
“The one thing she couldn’t process,” the doctor said. “You.”
1/3
stared at him. “Why me?”
The doctor folded his arms. “Sometimes, the mind severs what hurts the most. What she’s been through with you… it must be a lot. It must have been traumatizing for her.”
I felt the weight of that hit me in the chest.
I saw it all at once.
The way I’d pushed her away when I first met her, dismissing her because she smelled like a rogue.
The way I’d behaved at our wedding. Our wedding. What I wouldn’t give to have that day back.
I thought about the way I’d let Cassandra spin her lies while Elena stood alone. Always choosing Cassandra over Elena because I believed she’d saved my life. When all along it had been Elena.
Elena.
Q
Even when I had her back–I hadn’t known how to hold her. I kept failing her. Testing her. Watching her shatter piece by piece
and doing nothing fast enough to stop it.
Of course I was the thing her mind couldn’t hold.
Of course I was the place she broke.
‘But she felt the bond,” I argued. “She felt it.”
“Exactly,” the doctor said. “Her body remembers you. Her wolf remembers you. But her conscious mind can’t reconcile that feeling with the pain that preceded it.”
“And if I just explain–if I help her connect the dots-?”
“You could rip open the very wall her mind put up to protect itself, the doctor said. “It wouldn’t just be confusion or heartbreak. It could be a full system crash. Psychological. Neurological. Emotional.‘
Jacob stiffened. Aiden’s small hand slipped into mine, cold and still sticky from the candy.
“What are you saying?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper now.
The doctor looked between us. Then he said it. “If you outright tell her who you are… It could kill her.”
