Chase’s POV
Dusk settled over the estate like a soft exhale.
The sky bled from gold to indigo, the first stars already pricking through the violet. I walked the perimeter path alone—no crutches, no brace, just the faint ghost of a limp that would probably never fully disappear. The knee still ached on cold evenings, still protested when I pushed too hard, but it held. It carried me. That was enough.
The air smelled of pine and the last cut grass of the season, the faint sweetness of roses clinging to the garden beds Amelia had replanted in spring. I passed the northern fence line—reinforced steel now, silver wire glinting in the dying light. No alarms tonight. No howls. Just quiet. The kind of quiet that used to scare me—empty, accusing. Now it felt earned.
I walked slowly. Let the rhy
