Chapter 1

Sienna

Why did the man I love try to kill me?

I do not know. I am just relieved that I got away. 

You're not going to die, Sienna. Not tonight. Just hold the car wheel and focus on the road. Felix can’t hurt you through the phone. 

I just wish he would stop speaking…

"I want you to come home, Sienna," Felix says, causing me to close my eyes and wish he would just stop talking.

Felix Miller is my abusive ex-boyfriend. The Alpha of the Evergreen pack and for the past five years, I’ve turned a blind eye to our problems. But not anymore. I’m done being Felix’s punching bag. I deserve better!

“No, I'm not coming back!” I scream into the phone while driving through the rain. I’m driving too fast, jumping over rocks with the old Subaru, but I don’t care. My adrenaline is pumping. Pulse hammering against my neck. “Not this time, Felix. It doesn’t matter what you say!”

“Why doesn’t it matter?” he asks, and I let out a strangled laugh.

How is this surprising to him?

“Because you're violent when you're angry. You throw me into things and hurt me and I just… I just don’t want to do this anymore!”

I lift my eyes to the rear-view mirror and cringe when I see the ugly bruises on my skin. Felix and I were arguing earlier. It was about something stupid. He told his mother that I am not ready to have children yet and that was PRIVATE! I told him I found it embarrassing that he said it during our dinner and he freaked out and slammed me into the wall. Told me not to speak up against him. Yelled in my face.

“I didn’t hurt you that bad!”

I sob into the phone. “I’m bleeding, Felix!”

“Sienna, shit… I’m sorry…” Felix is speaking in a softer tone now. The damn manipulator that he is. “What if I promise not to do it again? What if I change and become better?”

I swallow thickly. “I…I don’t know if I believe you.”

“You have to.” His voice drops lower until he sounds scarily calm. “You really think someone else would want you?”

There is a pause, the sound of his breath through the speaker. Then he starts speaking in that voice that he only uses behind locked doors. “You’re an orphan, Sienna. Poor. Weird. You have no friends. No one is waiting for you. If you leave me, you will rot alone in that sad little house, and everyone will be glad you’re gone.”

Another pause. “You need me, Sienna. You fucking belong to me.”

My heart pounds inside my chest. 

Felix is right. I don’t have anyone else. My family is all dead, and I’m terrified of being alone. That’s why I always forgive Felix and run back to him because it's better than the alternative of crying in an empty house.

He also keeps me safe. No one dares to bully me when I’m dating the Alpha, but I’ve made up my mind this time. I don’t want to be together with him anymore.

“Felix, look,” I wet my lips, unsure how to continue. I want to tell him to leave me alone, but since he is the Alpha, I have to choose my words wisely. “I understand where you’re coming from, but this isn’t working out between us. I…I think I want to break up.”

Silence falls, and at first, I think this is a good sign. That Felix is going to leave me alone, at least for a day to think, but instead, he starts laughing.

“Run if you want,” he says, voice cold. “But don’t forget that I’m the Alpha. There is nowhere you can go where I can’t find you.”

He ends the call, and the line goes dead. I want to scream or hit the wheel in frustration, but that's when the car slams into something hard and I shriek in surprise.

"What the hell?!"

I put the old Subaru into park and stare over the hood of the car. There is something huge and…blue lying on the ground. What? The rain is brutal and I cock my head to the side, wondering what I just ran over.

Is it an animal?

I open the car door and step out into the rain, leaving the headlights on. I’m just wearing a white t-shirt and fold my arms to keep some heat before walking around the car. It's hard to see in the storm, but what my eyes land on can’t be explained by poor vision alone.

There is an enormous man lying in the dirt and not any man—a Zareth. A demonic humanoid creature with blue skin, yellow eyes, horns, and catlike ears. He has muscles for days, thick, luxurious black hair, a black-tufted tail, and sharp claws instead of nails. His face would be pretty, really pretty, if he weren't glaring at me like he wanted me dead. 

Ice-cold fear immediately prickles down my back when I realize how easily this massive man could kill me. 

This is not good.

Zareths are large, muscular apex predators from another dimension. This creature is more dangerous than my Alpha! 

I should get rid of it. Kill it while it's weak, especially since it's hunting on my pack’s territory, but the second the zareth looks at me, the moon goddess runs the oldest trick in the book.

A fragrance wafts over me and the mate bond falls into place. One second I’m standing there, ready to attack the zareth. Scream bloody murder and rip into his skin in my wolf form and in the next, I’m gasping in shock and fighting my hormones.

I want him. I want him so bad that it hurts!

Heat is spreading between my legs until it feels wet and slippery between them. 

My entire body is shuddering. 

Do not look, Sienna. 

I can’t stop. 

My eyes are staring at his abs and the v-lines disappearing into his loincloth. He looks great, way more ripped than any of my pack members. More heat rushes between my legs until I'm THIS close to whimpering like a wolf in heat.

But while I’m aroused with my wolf howling in agony, the blue male looks pissed off. Judging by the curse leaving his mouth, he doesn't like that we are mates.

My heart is pounding. Is he going to hurt me? Did the moon goddess make a mistake?

I wet my lips. “Maybe this is a glitch? The moon goddess might come to her senses soon."

The zareth male narrows his yellow eyes before pushing himself off the ground and that's when it becomes hard to breathe.

My pulse is thundering in my ears while my wolf whines like she might die. 

Oh.

Oh no.

The mate bond is only growing stronger and the zareth hisses as if the bond won't stop pulsing in his ears either. He is bleeding from his leg, but that doesn’t seem to bother him. He stands up without any issues and that's when it becomes awfully clear that I’m not in control. 

He is huge and only wearing a loincloth.

Don't look, Sienna. 

I gawk. 

I’m staring straight into his lower abs, which must mean this monster is over seven feet tall, maybe right under eight. I’ve never seen someone so large and when I crane my neck to look into his eyes, I have to fight the instinct to run.

He is glaring down at me. All bulging muscles and sheer breadth. He opens his mouth to reveal his sharp canine teeth and I gulp since I know he could kill me by just releasing his primal screech.

But he doesn’t.

After one second of staring at each other he yelps and clutches his wound. Blood is spewing out from it and the zareth yelps as if in pain.

“Oh my god, you’re going to bleed out!” I kneel by his side. He might be a blue-skinned monster that my pack would love to get rid of, but I can’t let him die!

I scan him and come to the conclusion he is in bad shape. 

“We need to get you out of here, big guy. Do you think you can walk over to my car? My house isn’t far away. I could clean your wounds.”

The zareth lifts his head and growls low in his throat. He does not trust me.

It makes me roll my eyes. “No offense, big guy, but you’re not exactly in a position to try and kill me. I don’t know what kind of creature you’ve been fighting with, but you’re going to be in a world of pain if you aren’t treated. Your wound looks infected.”

The zareth growls at me again, obviously not caring that we are mates. He still has the most insane trust issues and I know why: our species do NOT get along. Those yellow eyes have turned into slits and when his growl grows stronger, I fear he is going to kill me.

This is it, I tell myself. He is going to murder me. I brace myself for death, but then the zareth cringes as if in severe pain and I sigh before getting enough courage to pick up his arm. That makes him hiss at me, but I don’t move.

I meet his gaze and say, “Look, I know you don’t trust me, but I’m your best chance at survival. So shut your mouth and let me help you get inside the car. I’m taking you home.”

He bares his teeth, a sound between a warning and a challenge, and my pulse thunders in my ears. I should run. I should leave him bleeding in the dirt. 

But I can’t. 

This enormous man is my fated mate and our bond is pulling me forward even as fear tightens my throat. 

“Please,” I tell him. “Please let me take you home.”

Another growl leaves his mouth, but then he stands up. He is tall. Very tall. My monstrous mate is towering over me and that is when I realize I may have just invited a monster to my house.

Now I hope I will live long enough not to regret it.