LENA'S POV
Her first shift at North Ridge Pack Hospital was a disaster from the start.
Lena had been at the reception desk for exactly three hours when the emergency alert came through. Accident on the north ridge road. Multiple casualties. All hands on deck. The emergency room transformed into controlled chaos in seconds.
Nurses ran past her desk. Doctors shouted orders. Paramedics wheeled in the first stretcher. Lena's training kicked in automatically. She stopped thinking about being terrified and started thinking about doing her job. She checked in patients. Got vital information. Answered questions. Stayed focused on anything that wasn't the panic rising in her chest.
Blake had gotten her the job in the ER. He'd told Patricia that Lena was struggling with morning sickness on the regular floor. That she needed something different. The ER had been the only option open. Lena had thought she could handle it. Thought she could work in Wyatt's territory without actually running into him.
She was an idiot for thinking that.
The ambulances kept coming. One after another. Pack members with injuries that ranged from minor to critical. Lena moved between the desk and the treatment areas, helping where she could, staying professional, keeping her emotions locked down tight.
Then everything stopped.
A man emerged from one of the ambulances like he owned the entire parking lot. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Dark hair. He was shouting orders with the kind of authority that made people listen without question. Nurses moved faster when he appeared. Paramedics straightened up. Even the injured seemed to sense that someone important was here.
Lena's heart forgot how to beat.
It was him. After three months. After carrying his child. After convincing herself that maybe she'd imagined how powerful he was. How commanding. How completely overwhelming his presence could be.
Wyatt Sterling was even bigger than she remembered.
He moved through the parking lot with the kind of grace that came from knowing exactly who you were. He wasn't asking questions. He was making decisions. He grabbed one of the most seriously injured pack members and lifted him easily. The man was probably two hundred pounds of muscle and pain but Wyatt carried him like he weighed nothing.
Lena told herself to look away. Told herself to focus on the computer in front of her. Told herself that seeing him didn't change anything. That she was just another nurse in his hospital. That he'd never know she existed.
He walked directly past her desk.
For one second, just one, everything became crystal clear.
He smelled like pine and power and exactly how she remembered. His presence made her whole body go still in a way that had nothing to do with fear and everything to do with recognition. The mate bond was awake inside her, responding to his presence like a flower turning toward the sun.
Then he stopped.
His entire body went rigid. Like he'd hit a wall. He turned his head slowly and his eyes found hers across the chaos of the emergency room.
Time stopped.
His expression changed. Confusion flickered across his face first. Then something else. Something that looked like remembering. Like lightning striking. His wolf came forward in his eyes. Dark and hungry and absolutely focused on her. She could see the exact moment recognition hit him. Could see him piecing together fragments of memory that his mind had been forced to forget.
His hand moved toward her. Slow. Deliberate. Like he was reaching across a distance that was much bigger than the ten feet between them.
Lena couldn't breathe.
Then a blonde woman appeared from somewhere and slipped her hand through his arm. Possessive. Claiming. The woman was beautiful in that polished way that came from money and breeding and knowing exactly what she was supposed to look like. She smiled at him like she owned him.
Everything changed in an instant.
Wyatt's expression closed off. The vulnerability disappeared. The wolf retreated back behind walls. He turned away from Lena like she'd never existed. Like their eyes hadn't just met across a room full of people. Like his entire body hadn't responded to hers.
He followed the blonde woman toward the hospital entrance without looking back.
Lena gripped the edge of her desk so hard her nails left marks in the wood. She couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. Couldn't do anything except feel the weight of what had just happened.
That was his fiancée. That had to be. The blonde woman who'd been mentioned in passing. Victoria Hart. The woman Wyatt was supposedly engaged to.
The woman who'd claimed him like a possession.
Lena felt something crack inside her chest. Not surprise. She'd known he was engaged. Blake had made that clear. But knowing it intellectually and seeing it physically were two different things. Seeing him turn away from her. Seeing him choose to follow another woman. Seeing him pretend she didn't exist.
She was still gripping the desk when Blake appeared next to her. He'd been taking a break but he must have come back. Must have seen everything.
"That's him," Lena whispered. She couldn't look away from the space where Wyatt had been. "That's the Alpha. The father of my baby."
Blake was quiet for a long moment. Then he reached over and covered her hand with his. His touch was grounding. Real. The only solid thing in a world that was spinning.
"Lena," he said quietly. "We need to talk about what we just saw."
But Lena couldn't talk about anything. She was too focused on the way Wyatt's scent still lingered around her desk. On the way her body was responding to his presence even though he was gone. On the way that blonde woman's possessive hand had looked on his arm.
On the way he'd turned away from her like she meant nothing.
She was carrying his child. A child he didn't know existed. A child she was going to have to hide from him while she worked in his hospital. A child that would grow up knowing their father didn't want them.
Just like she had.
History was repeating itself and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
The emergency room continued its organized chaos around them. Nurses moved between treatment areas. Doctors barked orders. Patients cried out in pain. Ambulance sirens wailed in the distance.
But all Lena could focus on was the space where Wyatt had stood. The moment his eyes had met hers. The moment she'd seen recognition flare across his face before he'd forced it away.
He felt it. He felt the bond. He felt her.
And then he'd chosen to pretend she didn't exist.
Blake squeezed her hand harder. "Hey. Look at me."
Lena turned to face him.
"We're going to figure this out," Blake said. "But right now you need to keep working. You need to act like nothing happened. You need to blend in."
She nodded because he was right. Because she had no other choice. Because showing weakness in this moment would only make everything worse.
She turned back to her computer and checked the next patient file. But her hands were shaking so badly she could barely type. And every time she breathed, she could smell pine trees and power and the man who'd just walked past her without acknowledgment.
The father of her baby was in this hospital. Right now. Somewhere in these walls.
And she had no idea what she was going to do about it.