“No message. Just tell her what happened. She’ll know.”
He nods. I turn to go, then stop. The thought has been forming since last night, since I stood in the meeting hall and watched the wolves leave and the wolves stay, and understood for the first time what the corridor had actually built. Not just a supply line. A network. And networks leave traces on both ends.
“One more thing.”
“Name it.”
“Whatever happens in there, anything I’ve gathered goes to Brenna.”
Ellis goes still. “Gathered?”
“They’re going to interrogate me. They’re going to ask questions. And questions go both ways, Ellis. Everything they ask me tells me something about what they know and what they don’t. Every facility they move me through has a layout, a staffing pattern, a security protocol. Every operative I meet has a rank and a function.” I hold his eyes. “I ran a logistics operation for years. I know how to read a system from the inside. I’ve just been reading the wrong one.”
He stares at me. Then something shifts in his expression, the loyalty that’s always been there rearranging itself around a new understanding of what his alpha is actually doing.
“You’re not just handing yourself over.”
“I’m handing myself over. That part’s real. The compound stays safe, and I take what comes. But I’m not going in blind, and I’m not coming out empty-handed. I’m not going to sit in their chair and not pay attention.”
“Garrett—”
“If I send back something useful, Brenna gets it. If I don’t come back, tell her I tried.”
He’s quiet. Then he nods. Not the slow, reluctant nod from earlier. Something sharper.
“I’ll tell her.”
I leave the kitchen and walk out to the patio. Pa’s out there already. I almost wonder if he never made it inside. The book in his lap today is one he’s been holding for weeks. I don’t think he reads it anymore.
“I’m leaving,” I say.
He looks up. His eyes find mine. Whatever’s behind them is the thing I saw last night. The ghost of a man, the grief that never resolved.
“Where?”
“Somewhere the Syndicate can find me. The compound stays out of it.”
His hand finds the arm of the chair and grips it.
“I handed you the corridor,” he says. His voice is thin. Unused. “When Maren died. I couldn’t keep running the pack. I handed it to you like it was a gift. And it was a weight I should have broken, not given.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
The apology has been ten years in coming. I don’t have time to absorb it properly. I don’t know if I ever will.
“Take care of Ma.”
“I will.”
I turn to go.
“Garrett.”
I stop.
“If you can come back, come back.”