Novels by Osemen

EVELYN — POV: “Evelyn—what the hell—” Lucien didn’t finish. He was still staring at me like he had no idea what I was or what I’d just done. My palm throbbed. My heartbeat was everywhere. “I didn’t mean to,” I said quietly. He ran a hand through his hair, looking… shaken. I’d never seen him like that. Not even in battle. “You’re coming with me,” he said. It wasn’t loud. Just flat. I took a step back. “Lucien, wait—” “Don’t pretend you didn’t hear me.” His tone snapped, sharp like he was trying to hold himself together. “I’m not pretending,” I said. “I just want to know—” “Pack your things.” “No.” That one word froze him. He moved toward me so fast the air shifted. His aura hit the room hard, and for a second I forgot how to breathe. “Evelyn.” The way he said my name

EVELYN — POVBloodborn.The word pulsed inside my skull long after Rowan closed the door. My hands were shaking so badly I nearly dropped the skirt I’d grabbed from the chair.I didn’t pack much. There wasn’t much to pack — two dresses, a comb, the little necklace my mother gave me, and the herbs I still had left from the greenhouse.My mother.My chest squeezed painfully. I needed to check on her. I needed to—The door slammed open again.Rowan didn’t even flinch.Lucien filled the frame like he owned the air around him. Rain had soaked through his shirt; droplets slid down the hard line of his throat. His jaw was clenched so tight the muscle ticked.He didn’t look at my bag.He looked at me.And something in his eyes… god, something in his eyes nearly buckled my knees again. Not anger. Not entirely.A kind of wildness.A kind of fear.A kind of mine.“I said five minutes,” he growled.“It hasn’t been—”He stepped forward, grabbed my wrist, and pulled me out of the cabin before I cou

EVELYN — POVThe moment Lucien’s voice fell silent outside the door, the world inside the cabin went dead still.My pulse felt too loud, pounding in my throat, in my ears, in the tips of my fingers.“Evelyn and her mother must never learn the truth.”The sentence replayed itself over and over, each time worse, each time colder. My breath stalled halfway in my chest.My mother?What truth?Why say it like… like she was dangerous?My legs moved on their own, carrying me closer to the thin wooden door. I didn’t dare touch it. I just listened, heart cracking through my ribs.Rowan’s voice came first — quiet, tight with concern.“Alpha… she heard part of it. She needs to know what she’s up against.”Lucien’s response hit like a slap.“No. She needs to stay out of it.”His tone was low, vibrating through the walls. Not just angry. Terrified.I’d never heard fear in his voice. Not once. Not even when he stared down rogue wolves twice his size. But now?Now he sounded like the world was crack

The door was still vibrating when silence swallowed the cabin whole. The blanket around my shoulders felt suddenly too heavy. Too warm. Too tight. Like I was wrapped in the echo of Lucien’s aura and couldn’t crawl out from under it. My heartbeat still hadn’t slowed. Rowan stood near the table, shoulders tense, jaw set, but keeping his distance the way a Beta should. Not crowding. Not touching. Not intruding. Just watching me with those steady eyes that never made me feel small. “You’re shaking,” he said softly. “I’m fine.” “You keep saying that,” Rowan murmured. “One day I might believe you.” My knees nearly buckled, but I forced myself to sit before he moved to help me. My legs folded beneath me as if the bond had stolen my strength. Maybe it had. The air still tasted like him — like cedar smoke and heat and something feral. Even gone, Lucien’s presence clung to my lungs like it didn’t want to leave me either. My wolf whimpered deep inside my chest. I dug my na

Azazel.Even in my mind, the name felt like cold fingers around my spine.Rowan’s kettle hissed over the fire, but it didn’t calm the shaking under my skin. I kept my hands hidden beneath the blanket, pressing them against my ribs as if I could physically contain the panic.My body still felt wrong — like something inside me hadn’t fully settled since the garden yesterday. Like the earth itself was breathing beneath my feet.Rowan didn’t turn around, but his voice came low and steady.“You don’t have to explain what your mother said.”My throat almost closed. “How do you know she said anything?”He gave a soft breath that might’ve been a laugh. “Because you look like someone suddenly waiting for the world to collapse.”I almost smiled. Almost.But the name echoed again.Azazel.Searching for you.I stared at my mother’s sleeping face, trying to breathe past the tightness in my chest.Rowan set the kettle aside and moved toward us. “The tea’s ready. I’ll help her drink it when she wake

“I won’t cry again,” I whispered into the dark.For a long moment, the only answer was silence — the heavy kind that presses against your ribs like it knows all your secrets. My eyes stayed fixed on the trees outside the window. Rain dripped from the branches like the forest was trying to catch its breath after drowning all night.Behind me, Rowan shifted in the chair by the fire. The sound was soft enough that if I hadn't been awake, I wouldn’t have heard it.I hadn’t slept. Not really.By the time Rowan started to wake, stretching like his spine had turned to stone overnight, I was already standing.His eyes found me instantly. He didn’t ask why I was awake or why I looked like I’d been frozen in place for hours. Rowan wasn’t the kind of man who asked questions he already knew the answers to.“You ready?” he asked quietly.I nodded, even though my body still felt hollow.He stood, rolling out the stiffness in his neck, then crossed the room and took a cloak from the hook. He held it

I push Marco’s door open with one finger; it gives the smallest inch and swings inward without resistance. Of course—he lives like he’s untouchable and leaves his door unlocked in a house full of people who would slit his throat for half the crown. I step inside and close the door behind me just enough so it looks shut but won’t latch; if he comes back unexpectedly I want the sound to warn me before the smile. The room hits me with the usual mix—old wood and cigar smoke softened by expensive cologne—and nothing about it matters except what it hides. Marco keeps his place neat because neatness is control; neatness is a story he tells the world about himself, not something I came to admire.I go straight to the desk. The top drawer yields pens and envelopes and the kind of stationery that means people write letters they don’t intend to keep; I don’t waste time scanning receipts. The second drawer offers a photograph of him and my father with the practiced handshake and polite faces that

Adrian POV The rain had stopped sometime before dawn, but the air still carried the aftertaste of the storm — that thick, damp heaviness that sticks to your skin and makes the whole city feel like it’s holding its breath. The kind of quiet that isn’t peace. Just… a pause. A warning. I stood on the balcony outside my father’s old office, palms resting against cold stone, eyes tracing the fog curling around the streetlamps. Nothing moved. Not the leaves, not the shadows, not even the wind. Stillness like that wasn’t natural. Not in my world. Not anymore. Behind me, the villa murmured: guards rotating shifts, steel dragging lightly against marble, someone giving low instructions that carried just enough urgency to bother me. Everything sounded normal. Everything felt wrong. I rubbed my thumb along my father’s ring — silver, worn, heavier than it looked. That habit used to calm me. Lately, it only reminded me that I’m sitting in a seat designed to turn men into monsters. A soft

Adrian POV Yhe sense that I’m walking straight into the same darkness my father lived in… and never got out of. I move down the west wing corridor, hands in the pockets of my coat, pretending the walk is casual. It isn’t. I want eyes on Marco’s territory — the people he talks to, the ones he avoids, the ones who practically bow when he walks past. Men reveal everything when they think you’re not looking. The halls are quiet, but the quiet feels staged. A little too perfect. A little too clean. Halfway through the corridor, I stop. A man — one of Marco’s guards — slips a sealed envelope into Marco’s room. Quick, precise, practiced. Like he’s done it before. He turns to leave. He freezes when he sees me. His eyes widen just enough. “Boss,” he says, straightening instantly. I keep my hands in my pockets. “You look nervous.” He swallows. “Just delivering something.” “Open it.” His throat bobs. “It’s—it’s for Marco.” “And I’m telling you to open it.” For a second, he seems

Adrian POV)The rain had stopped hours ago, but the air still carried that damp heaviness—like the city hadn’t decided if it wanted to breathe again or drown quietly. I stood on the balcony outside my father’s old office, watching the streetlights flicker in the fog. Everything felt too still. Too polite. Too… wrong.Silence like this never meant peace. It meant someone else was moving.Behind me, the villa murmured with the low hum of guards changing shifts. A few whispered instructions. The scrape of boots against marble. Nothing unusual, and yet… something inside me stayed alert, like a blade pressed against the back of my neck.I rubbed my thumb along the silver ring on my hand—my father’s ring—and let myself think for a moment. Not plan, not react. Just think.God knows I hadn’t done enough of that lately.A soft knock broke the quiet.“Enter,” I said.Luca stepped in, one arm still in a bandage, though he pretended it didn’t hurt. His face looked older today. More tired. Maybe w

Adrian’s POV:The storm outside felt like it wanted to tear the whole damn world in half.Maybe it already did.Luca and I drove through the rain with the wipers fighting for their life. I kept thinking about Isabella—her face when I told her I doubted her. The way her eyes shook like she was holding something heavy inside. Something she didn’t want me to see.God, I hated myself for noticing.I shouldn’t care.Not anymore.Not when everything around me is falling to pieces.But I did.And that scared me more than any bullet.“Boss,” Luca said suddenly, snapping me out of my head. His voice was tight. “The trail ends here.”I looked up. We had arrived at one of the old eastern watch posts—my father’s territory back when he was younger and meaner. The whole place smelled like rust and ghosts.I stepped out of the car. The rain smacked my face, cold and sharp. Good. Maybe it would wake me up from whatever the hell was happening in my chest.Luca checked his gun. I checked mine.The buil

Adrian’s POVThe drive back from the docks felt longer than it should’ve. Rain hammered the windshield in violent sheets, each drop like a warning from the sky itself. Luca sat beside me, silent, bandaged, staring at the road as if it might rearrange itself at any moment.Something had shifted tonight.Not outside.Inside me.As the gates to the villa groaned open, the guards stepped aside quickly, eyes lowered. They felt it too. The energy. The cold. The danger.I used to walk into this place as a son.Now I walked in as a storm.I headed straight to my father’s study—the one room in the house where ghosts still lived. The leather chair faced the window, its shadow long and sharp. I stopped just inside the doorway.A memory slammed into me: Vittorio sitting there, cigar in hand, telling me that one day this room would belong to me.I hated him for being right.I stepped behind the desk, my fingers brushing the scarred wood. Luca stood by the door, waiting.“You found nothing else at