Chapter Text
Billy
A joke.
That’s all this is. Some cruel, ill-timed joke. It has to be.
The man’s voice on the phone is clear, clipped, professional—but there’s something beneath it. Something careful. Like he’s trying to hide the truth behind procedure. He says I’m needed at the hospital, that a woman’s been found, and they believe she may be associated with me.
Before I can hear the rest of his words, the phone slips from my hand and hits the floor, shattering into useless pieces.
They found her.
It has to be Sarah. She’s only been gone a few hours. They found her—that’s good. That’s a good thing. So why does it feel like the ground’s giving out beneath me?
Why didn’t she call me? Why didn’t anyone call sooner? None of this makes sense.
Before the panic can pull me under, I move. Bones crack and stretch, skin rippling with heat until fur overtakes me. There’s no time to waste starting the bike. I need to see her. I need to hear her voice, feel her hand on my chest, hear her laugh and tell me this was all some mistake—that she’s fine. That she’s ready to come home to the kids and me.
She has to be okay.
The forest tears past in a blur of green and shadow, my paws hitting earth on instinct alone. Through the pack bond, I call out—someone watch the kids. Sue answers first, no questions, only calm assurance. I cling to that tiny mercy. One less thing for my mind to gnaw at.
The run to Forks Hospital feels endless and instant all at once. Time folds strangely when you’re chasing fear. Seconds stretch into hours. The sun dips low, a weak smudge on the horizon, and by the time I reach the edge of town, rain has started to fall—soft and cold.
I shift back, breath ragged, the steam rising from my skin where the rain hits. My clothes cling damply, my heart hammering so hard it aches. The hospital looms ahead, the red cross glowing like a warning. Like judgment.
I tell myself to calm down before I go inside, but my body isn’t listening. My thoughts are a mile behind as I slam through the double doors so hard the frame rattles and dust drifts from the ceiling.
A small, older woman at the reception desk startles, setting down her book with trembling hands. “H–hello,” she stammers, eyes wide. “Can I help you?”
I can hear the rush of blood in her veins. She’s afraid, and I can’t even blame her. I must look half feral.
“Billy Black,” I rasp. “I was called. Someone named Carlisle said they found someone—someone they think might be connected to me.”
She fumbles at her keyboard, knuckles stiff with arthritis, keys clicking slow and deliberate. My pulse is a thunder in my ears.
“Yes,” she says finally, voice shaking. “Doctor Cullen is waiting for you downstairs—in the examination wing. I can go with—Sir! Sir, wait!”
But I’m already gone.
My feet carry me before I can think, instincts pulling me toward the lower level. I don’t look at the signs. I just know. The scent of her threads faintly through the sterile air—muted, buried beneath the sharp sting of disinfectant. It’s her, but… it’s wrong. Thinner. Faded.
I focus on it, desperate to keep hold of her trail, and in doing so, I miss the other scent—the one that should have warned me.
By the time I reach the double doors, I’m not even sure if I’m breathing. I push through, and the chill inside hits me like a wall. All the heat I’ve been carrying drains out at once, leaving me cold, hollow.
The doors swing open, slamming against the walls with a bang that echoes through the sterile hallway. The sound dies quickly, swallowed by the hum of the ventilation and the low buzz of fluorescent lights.
And then—silence.
My eyes find her before anything else.
Sarah.
She’s lying on the metal table, the white sheet pulled up to her chest, her skin pale in the harsh light. Her hair—usually the color of glossy raven’s wings—is matted, streaked with blood. There’s a cut along her temple, another at the base of her throat, dried and ugly. Her hands rest limply at her sides, palms turned upward like she’s waiting for someone to take them. Waiting for me.
My knees nearly give. The air disappears from the room, sucked out in a single breath I can’t take.
For a second, I think I hear her breathing. A trick of hope. A cruel one.
“Sarah,” I manage to choke out, barely a whisper, the name scraping raw from my throat. I stumble forward until I’m at her side, reaching for her hand. It’s cold. Too cold.
No. No, no, no. This isn’t real. She was just baking this morning, laughing about how much sugar the kids go through. She kissed me goodbye. She kissed me goodbye.
And now—
Something moves behind me, and that’s when I smell it.
Sweet. Sharp. Wrong, like rotted fruits
My head snaps up, instinct roaring to life before thought can form. The man standing a few feet away is too still, too calm. Blond hair, pale skin that almost glows under the fluorescent lights. The scent coming off him makes every hair on my body rise.
A vampire.
“Get away from her,” I snarl, my voice low, trembling with barely restrained violence.
He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even blink. “Mr. Black,” he says evenly, tone maddeningly calm. “My name is Dr. Cullen. I’m—”
“I know what you are.” My body shakes with the effort to hold my ground instead of shifting. “And if you’ve touched her—”
“She was already gone when they brought her in.” His voice is quiet, but the words hit like bullets. “I did everything I could to confirm the cause of death. I’m sorry.”
Gone.
The word sinks its teeth into me. I can’t breathe. I can’t even see for a second, everything going white at the edges.
I hear another voice then—rough, human. A voice I know.
“Billy.”
The broken sound of my name brings me back like a slap. My head jerks up.
He’s sitting in the corner by a small metal desk, a clipboard in his hands, his eyes hollow. Charlie Swan.
Seven—eight years, maybe more, since I’ve seen him in person. He looks older, wearier. His shoulders slump, his skin sallow in the artificial light, eyes bloodshot and rimmed with exhaustion. For a second, he looks like a ghost, too.
“Charlie,” I breathe, but it comes out strangled and confused. The sight of him twists something deep in my chest, something I thought I’d buried years ago.
He looks up slowly. His mouth opens, then shuts again. Whatever he sees on my face stops him cold.
“I’m sorry,” he says finally. His voice is barely there. “I—she… we did everything we could.”
I can’t look at him. I can’t look at her. My eyes dart between them—the vampire, the man I once loved, and the woman who was my world—each one part of some cruel puzzle I can’t make sense of.
“She was supposed to come home,” I whisper. “Just groceries. Just an hour—”
I reach out again, pressing my hand against her shoulder. Her skin doesn’t yield like it should. It’s stiff, lifeless. My throat burns.
“I need you to step back,” the vampire says softly, and I can feel him edging closer. That cold, unnatural presence presses against my senses like static.
I spin on him, my voice breaking. “Don’t you dare touch her.”
His golden eyes flick toward me, unblinking, but his tone stays maddeningly level. “Mr. Black, I know this is difficult, but we need to move her soon.”
Move her.
He says it like she’s an object. A thing. My vision tunnels red. My body hums with the urge to shift, to tear something apart, to make the world feel the pain clawing through me.
“Billy.”
This time Charlie’s voice is closer. I don’t remember him standing, but now he’s between me and the doctor, one hand half-raised, like he’s not sure if he’s trying to calm me or protect me.
“Don’t,” I snap, but my voice falters when I meet his eyes. They’re wet. Haunted.
For a moment, it’s just the two of us—two men who’ve both lost everything, standing in a room that smells like bleach and blood and endings.
Something in my chest cracks.
He steps closer, slow, steady. “Let me take you upstairs,” he says quietly. “You can call your family. I’ll handle things here.”
Family. The word is a knife. The kids. How am I supposed to tell them—
My gaze flicks back to Sarah’s mangled face, and everything else disappears.
“I can’t leave her,” I whisper.
Charlie hesitates, then nods once, understanding in his eyes. “Then I’ll stay too.”
The vampire doesn’t move, but I can feel his attention on us, curious, assessing, like some immortal scientist watching a specimen break.
I hate him for it. I hate all of them—for existing, for breathing the same air as her when she no longer can.
And yet, beneath the fury, beneath the grief that’s eating me alive, something else stirs when I look at Charlie. Something sharp and old, rising from the ashes of what used to be.
I don’t know if it’s love or regret.
All I know is it hurts.