His brows knit.
“That’s not a problem.”
“But it means…”
I swallowed hard.
“It means we’ve never shifted.”
He blinked.
Once.
Twice.
Then his jaw slackened, a tight breath leaving him like a punch to the gut.
“You what?”
“We’ve never shifted,” Rebecca repeated, her voice tight but steady. “Not once.”
“Not even at eighteen,” I said. “Not even during training. Not even during danger.”
Silence.
The kind that presses on your ribs.
The kind that fills your throat with heat.
The kind that feels like a storm pulling breath out of the air.
He stared at us like he was trying to find the lie.
There wasn’t one.
“We aren’t weak,” Rebecca added. “We train. We fight. We keep up.”
“I know you do,” he said immediately, fiercely—like he’d punch anyone who said otherwise “ and I sense both
