Chapter 6

[Sera]

Mate.

The word doesn't come from me. It slides into my skull like warm honey, thick and golden and impossible to rinse away. Not a thought. His. Low and rough and aching, like the wolf is pressing its whole soul against the inside of my ribs.

I stare down at the massive black wolf still nuzzling my neck, its hot breath fanning over the mark that refuses to fade.

"Killian?" My voice cracks.

Golden eyes flash up at me—molten, desperate, relieved. A low whine vibrates through its chest, so full of raw need it makes my knees want to buckle. Then the shift starts.

Bones crack and pop like gunfire in the narrow hallway. Fur ripples and recedes, melting away in dark waves. The huge body shrinks, contorts, reforms with wet, sickening sounds that turn my stomach. I can't look away.

It should repulse me. Maybe it would, if the man crouching where the wolf was didn't look so completely wrecked.

Naked. Panting. Sweat gleaming on golden skin stretched over muscle that belongs in marble statues, not my shitty apartment building. Killian Voss. The Alpha King. The same man who rejected me like I was garbage eight days ago.

He lifts his head. Those impossible gold eyes lock on mine, and for one terrifying second, the hallway disappears. There's only him. Raw, open, starving.

I should run.

Instead, I stand there like an idiot while he surges up, hands cupping my face with a gentleness that contradicts the violence of the shift. His mouth crashes into mine.

It's not a kiss. It's a claiming. Desperate, messy, all teeth and hunger and months of suppressed instinct pouring out at once. He tastes like wild night air and something darker, something that makes my traitor body light up like a live wire. The mark on my neck flares hot, pulsing in time with his heartbeat slamming against my chest.

For one stupid, humiliating second, I melt. My fingers curl into his bare shoulders, pulling him closer because god, it feels like coming home after the longest exile.

Tomorrow, my brain screams. Remember tomorrow.

I shove him. Hard.

He staggers back a step, eyes wide with hurt so naked it steals my breath.

"No," I say, voice shaking. I hate how small it sounds. "You don't get to do this."

He makes a sound, low and wounded and barely human. Steps toward me again.

I back up until my spine hits the wall. "I said no."

He freezes. The gold flickers, confused, hurt in a way that makes my chest ache against my will. His hand reaches out, stops mid-air, drops.

Don't look at me like that. The thought is vicious. Don't you dare look at me like I'm salvation when tomorrow you'll wake up and remember I'm nothing.

But I can't say it. Can't explain to a wolf why I'm rejecting what every cell in my body screams to accept.

My gaze snags on the debris near the unconscious thug—the tall one still slumped against the wall like a broken doll.

Killian's phone. Keys. Wallet. All spilled during the shift.

I lunge for the phone. No lock screen. Recent calls: Liam.

My hands won't stop shaking as I hit call.

"Killian? Where the hell are you? We've been—"

"It's Sera. Sera Winters." I cut him off, voice steadier than I feel. "He's at my apartment. His wolf… he's not himself. You need to come. Now."

A beat of sharp silence. Then Liam's voice turns urgent. "Address."

I rattle it off. Hang up before he can ask more.

Killian hasn't moved. He's watching me with those molten eyes, crouched low like he's afraid sudden movement will spook me. When I look at him, he makes that sound again—half whimper, half plea.

My coat is on the floor where I dropped it during the attack. I throw it at him.

"Cover yourself."

He catches it. Doesn't put it on. Just holds it to his face and breathes deep, like my cheap polyester blend is the finest perfume.

Jesus Christ.

Liam arrives in twelve minutes with a white-haired woman I don't recognize. She's small, sharp-eyed, moving with the careful precision of someone who's seen enough to stop being surprised.

"Eva," Liam says by way of introduction. "Pack Elder."

Pack Elder. The kind of title you hear in bedtime stories. I didn't think they actually showed up at three in the morning to handle feral Alphas in apartment hallways.

Eva takes one look at Killian—still crouched near me, still clutching my coat like a security blanket, still gold-eyed and feral—and lets out a sigh that says I warned him.

"He doesn't move," I say, throat tight. "He won't even talk. Just—"

"His wolf is in control." Eva's voice is calm, clinical. "The human mind is suppressed. He can't hear us, the instinct has the wheel."

"What instinct?"

She looks at me. Really looks. Her gaze drops to the mark on my neck, and something softens in her expression.

"You are. You're what it's looking for."

Liam tries to approach. A growl rips out of Killian, low and warning and protective. Not aggressive. Like Liam is a threat to something precious.

"He won't leave you voluntarily," Eva says. "And we can't force a shifted Alpha without someone getting hurt." She pulls a small case from her bag. Inside: a syringe. "Sedative. But I can't get close enough."

I feel the implication before she finishes the sentence.

"You want me to distract him."

"I need you to calm him. His wolf trusts you. It's the only thing that will work."

I almost laugh. The wolf of the man who rejected me trusts me. The human who controls that wolf thinks I'm trash. And now I'm supposed to pet him into submission?

But Killian is looking at me. Those gold eyes, so different from the cold gray that threw money at my dignity, hold nothing but raw longing.

I crouch slowly. Eye level.

"Hey." My voice comes out softer than I mean it to. "It's okay. I'm not going anywhere."

Lie. Probably. I don't even know anymore.

But he believes it. The tension drains from his shoulders. He leans forward, pressing his forehead to mine, breathing deep like he's memorizing my scent.

Behind him, Eva moves.

The needle slides in. His eyes go wide, betrayal flashing through the gold, then dim.

He slumps. His hand finds my coat in the last second of consciousness, gripping the fabric like a lifeline.

Doesn't let go.

Liam has to carry him out with the coat still clutched to his chest.

I stay crouched in the wrecked hallway long after they leave. An unconscious thug at my feet. Glass glittering on the floor. The broken window letting in cold night air that smells like rain and distant sirens.

Six days ago I was a barista with a sad crush. Now I'm crouching in broken glass next to an unconscious loan shark, touching a mark that won't die on my neck.

I touch the mark. It pulses once, warm and steady, like it's laughing at me.

What the hell am I supposed to do now?

---

 

[Killian]

I wake to the smell of her.

Not faint. Not imagined. Overwhelming, filling my lungs like I've been drowning and this is air. My fingers are tangled in something soft—fabric, cheap cotton, carrying her scent like it's woven into every thread.

My head pounds. My body aches like every muscle was torn apart and put back in the wrong order.

"You're awake."

Liam's voice. I force my eyes open. Back seat of a car. Moving. Dawn light through tinted windows.

I'm in the backseat. Liam's driving. And beside me—

Eva.

"Why," I manage, throat raw, "am I holding a coat?"

"You wouldn't let go." Liam's eyes find mine in the rearview mirror. "Even unconscious. We tried."

I look at the coat. Women's cut. Faded blue. The kind of thing that costs twelve dollars at a clearance rack and looks it.

Sera's.

"What the hell is going on?"

"You went to her." Liam's voice is carefully neutral. "Your wolf took over. Full moon, total override. You tracked her across the city."

"That's not possible." My voice sounds wrong. "The bond was severed. The rejection ceremony—"

"It didn't work."

Eva says it quiet. Final.

I turn to her. She's watching me with patience and sadness, like she's watching someone walk toward a cliff.

"What do you mean it didn't work?"

"I mean exactly that. The bond is intact. Stronger, if anything. Your wolf has been fighting the rejection since the moment you spoke it."

"That's impossible. Rejection ceremonies are binding. The bond breaks—"

"For ordinary mates." Eva cuts me off gently. "Not for this."

The car is too quiet. Too still. I can hear my own heartbeat, too fast, too loud.

"Say it."

"She's your True Mate, Killian." No hesitation. No softening. "The kind the Moon Goddess weaves once in a generation. The kind that can't be rejected, only suppressed." She pauses. "The kind your father had with your mother."

The words land like a fist.

True Mate.

Like them.

"No." The word comes out hoarse. "You're wrong. If she were—I would know. I would feel—"

"You do feel it. You've been feeling it for Six days. The sleeplessness. The restlessness. Your wolf going silent because he's too busy fighting you for control." Eva's eyes don't waver.

I stare at the coat in my hands. Her scent rises from it, warm and devastating, and something in my chest twists so hard I can't breathe.

I don't say anything for a long time. The highway blurs past the window. The coat sits in my lap and I can't make myself put it down.

"There's more." Eva's voice drops. "Your wolf took full control last night. Seven hours, gone."

"What does that mean?"

Eva is quiet for a long moment. When she speaks, her voice carries the weight of something I've been running from since I was ten years old.

"It's called Mate Madness. It happens when an Alpha tries to sever a True Mate bond by force." She pauses. "Each full moon, your wolf will override you longer. More violently." Eva's eyes don't waver. "Eventually, you won't come back at all."

"Find a cure." My voice is hard.

"There is no cure, Killian," Eva says quietly. "The only thing you can do is accept your mate, repair this damaged bond."

Accept her.

The wolfless nobody. The girl I threw money at like trash. The woman whose scent is soaking into my skin right now, making my wolf rumble with satisfaction while my human mind recoils.

"And if I don't?"

Eva doesn't flinch. "Then you will die. Just like your father — raving, in chains, alone."