Outside the window, birds were busy weaving their nests in the morning light. The breeze was soft, the flowers were open, and everything outside looked exactly the way the world does when it doesn’t know something heavy is coming.

Jeffrey called Julian, Lewis, and Adam into the study, and they were in there for most of the day. I didn’t need anyone to tell me why. He was putting things in order.

I thought about everything she had set in motion the distance between Jeffrey and his grandsons, the fractures that had spread through the Hale pack and pulled the Sanders and the Blackwells into the wreckage alongside them. All of it traced back to one woman and a love that was never returned. Years of pain, engineered from a wound she never let heal. Jeffrey had spent so long holding the pack together through sheer will, with very little reason left to keep going.

I sat with Everett and Everly in my arms and let the sadness settle over me. That’s how life works one light slowly dims while two new ones come into the world. The pack had its heirs now, but the man who had held everything together was running out of time.

There was nothing I could do to stop it. I could only stay close and bear witness.

The study door opened, and the three of them came out with the same look on their faces. Hugo glanced over at me. "Mrs. Riley, Mr. Hale is asking for you."

I handed the pups to Lewis and walked down the hall, each step feeling heavier than it should have.

Jeffrey looked up when I came in and gave me that quiet smile of his the kind that had always made me feel steadier than I deserved. "Riley. Come sit with me."

It pulled something loose in my chest. In my past life, this study had been a kind of refuge. He would call me in to play chess or sit beside him in comfortable silence. If your heart is at peace, anything can be accomplished he used to say that like it was the simplest truth in the world. When the Sanders had turned their backs on me and I had no one, he was the one who hadn’t looked away. He was stern in the way that old Alphas often are, all quiet authority and careful restraint. But with me, he had always been gentle.

I sat beside him, trying to keep my face steady.

He spoke without any performance, just a slow and certain calm. "Life is like this full and bright like the moon at its peak, steady like the sun climbing higher. Don’t grieve over what must change. What’s ahead of you is worth looking toward."

No matter how much I fought it, Jeffrey had already made up his mind. There was nothing I could do to change it.

All I could do was stand back and watch as he quietly sorted through everything he owned stocks, properties, valuables making sure every member of the pack was taken care of. He even set aside something special for the twins, so they’d be looked after even without him.

Julian stayed silent through all of it. He knew he carried the blood of one of the missing twins, and I could see in his eyes that he wanted to go with Jeffrey. But Jeffrey refused him without hesitation, putting his son’s safety above everything else.

On the morning Jeffrey left, I grabbed Lewis’s sleeve. "Carl, can’t you stop him?"

He pulled me close, one hand resting at my waist, the other brushing my cheek. "Riley, I’ll do everything I can to keep him safe. But if he’s already decided this is how it ends, there’s nothing either of us can do. You know that. You can’t stop a man who’s made peace with dying."

My eyes filled with tears, because I knew he was right, and that made it worse.

"Be good," he said softly. "This is the path Dad chose. Life still means everything to you and me, but for him, it’s become a weight he no longer wants to carry. After everything he’s survived, he’s found his own kind of peace. Stay home, look after the children. Leave the rest to me."

My body was still too fragile to follow, and the memory of last time was enough to keep me from trying. I rose on my toes and pressed a quiet kiss to Lewis’s cheek. "Come back to me."

"I will." He kissed my forehead and walked away with Jeffrey, and my heart went with them both.

In just over a year, I’d said too many goodbyes. And I still hadn’t fully made peace with losing Whitney. It had been her choice, but the feeling of her hand slipping from mine never left me. It was like something deep and essential had been torn away the kind of ache that doesn’t have a name, only a weight.

I still dreamed about that night. The cliff. The moment she jumped. It played in my mind on a loop, especially in the quiet hours before dawn. If she were still here and knew the twins had arrived safely, she would have smiled. I was sure of it.

But that’s just how life goes. Some people walk into your world like a gift, and then they’re gone loudly or without a sound before you’re ready to let them go.

The little ones were now past four months old. Everett had already figured out how to roll over on his own, while Everly was still working at it with everything she had, arms and legs going in every direction like a tiny creature flipped on its back.

Watching her made me laugh softly through my sadness. I gave her a gentle nudge, and finally, she rolled over. Everett immediately poked her cheek with one chubby finger and grinned at Lena like he’d done something impressive.

They really were something close to miraculous.

I hadn’t left the residence in over a month, but being with them every day filled something in me that I hadn’t expected. The weather that afternoon was beautiful warm and still, the cherry blossoms in the yard thick and open, petals catching the light.

I brought the twins outside. Lewis had built them a small swing himself, layering it with cushions so they’d be comfortable. They lay side by side while the sunlight filtered down through the branches in soft patches, and a slow breeze shook loose a drift of blossoms that fell like pink snow around us.

On a day like this, I felt their absence most all the people I wished were here to see it.

Come back safe, I thought. All of you.

"Riley." Julian’s voice pulled me back. He came to stand beside me, his gaze dropping to the children, his expression gentle. He was thinner than before different, somehow, in a way I couldn’t quite explain.

The sharpness that used to live in his eyes was gone. What replaced it was quieter. More settled. He stood like someone who had finally stopped fighting himself.

"Are you worried about Grandpa too?" he asked.

I didn’t answer right away. I just looked at the twins, at the petals falling around them, and thought about how much had changed.

Maybe joy doesn’t always come back the same way it left. Maybe sometimes it comes back wearing a different face entirely.