LOGINI had led wolves into open war before. I knew the smell of blood on a battlefield, the sound of bones breaking beneath a powerful jaw, and the terrible silence that followed when the fighting was over.But I had never ridden into danger with my heart lodged in my throat, afraid that by the time I reached Nadia, there might be nothing left to save.The growl came from the trees.My wolf reacted before I could think. My ears snapped forward, catching the rustle of leaves on both sides of the road, but the warning came too late.A massive gray wolf burst from the darkness and launched itself at Silas’s horse.“Incoming!”I threw myself from the saddle.My body twisted before I hit the ground. Pain shot through my bones as I shifted, but I landed on four paws and drove forward just as another wolf sprang from the trees. Its jaws snapped at my throat. I twisted aside, caught its foreleg between my teeth, and dragged it off balance.We crashed into the ditch.The wolf clawed at my face, its
I had read plenty of bad news in my life, some of it delivered in a single line on a page. None of it had prepared me for seeing a familiar name attached to a debt record that explained seven years of my worst decision.Silas had the folder spread across my desk by the time I reached the office. My knuckles was still aching from the sparring ring, and I could still taste blood at the back of my mouth.“Say it,” I told him. “Whatever name you’ve been sitting on since this morning, say it now.”“Dahlia,” Silas said. “Nadia’s closest ally. She’s been the one beside her at nearly every council function for the last five years.”I stared at him, waiting for him to explain. A name alone wasn’t enough.“The original debt wasn’t just my father’s,” Silas continued. He pulled out a second document and placed it beside the first. “It goes back further than that. Dahlia’s younger brother owed money to a shell account that eventually led straight to Dorian Vance. It took three layers of paperwork
KADE’S POVI had held this title since I was twenty-three years old, and I had never once been forced to defend it on the training ground in front of my own war council.Until this morning.News of the attack on Nadia had reached Ashworth territory within hours. Information like that travelled through pack channels faster than any human newswire, and by the time I entered the lower courtyard for the scheduled war council briefing, every senior wolf in my pack already knew what had happened on summit grounds two nights ago.They knew someone had tried to kill her. They knew the attacker had carried legitimate council security credentials. And they knew I had been at the summit, negotiating with Nadia, when someone decided she was worth more dead than alive.What I hadn’t expected was Marcus waiting for me in the centre of the sparring ring, stripped down to his training gear, his hands wrapped and his expression hard enough to make the wolves nearest him give him a little more room.He
NADIA’S POVI built Veyron Holdings out of a duffel bag and a positive pregnancy test. I was not about to lose it to a woman in a four-thousand-dollar suit who had never once had to decide between rent and formula.The attack had happened two days ago. Since then, the summit grounds had been crawling with Northern Alliance security, the unconscious man remained in custody and wasn’t saying a word, and I’d barely slept. Yet here I was, back on a secure line for the emergency board session Celeste Marlowe had called the moment word reached the human world that Veyron’s Alpha had nearly been killed on foreign territory.I’d barely had time to process what had happened before I was expected to defend myself against a different threat. Someone had tried to kill me, and now the people who were supposed to protect the interests of my company were questioning whether I should remain in charge.The conference screen came to life, bringing the board into view. Celeste sat at the head of the tab
I have been shot at twice in my life. Neither time scared me as much as the sound of my own security detail going silent on the radio at the exact same moment.The summit grounds had begun emptying for the evening reception by the time I left the private wing. Rhys was three steps behind me, with two of my guards covering the hallway ahead. The corridor stretched out beneath the pale ceiling lights, empty except for the low hum of the lighting system and the sharp click of my heels against the stone floor.Then the first guard’s radio cut out mid-sentence.Not a crackle. Not a warning. Just silence.Rhys grabbed my arm before I could turn toward the sound and yanked me backward. My shoulder struck the wall as he pulled me out of the open corridor, his other hand already reaching for the weapon beneath his jacket.“Down the east stairwell,” he said, his voice low and urgent. “Move. Now.”“Rhys, what the hell is happening?”“Someone’s in the building who shouldn’t be.” He leaned out jus
I did not open the door all the way. I had learned the hard way exactly what happened whenever I let that man all the way into a room with me.I opened it just wide enough to see him, keeping one hand braced against the frame, and found Kade standing in the hallway with his jacket gone and his sleeves shoved up his forearms. He looked like a man who had spent the last hour arguing himself out of this exact decision and losing.“You shouldn’t be here,” I said.“I know.”“Then go.”He didn’t move. His eyes dropped briefly to the hand braced against the door frame, and something in his expression told me he knew exactly how close I’d come to letting him all the way in before I’d even opened the door.“I keep telling myself the same things you’re about to tell me,” he said. “That this is reckless. That it doesn’t change anything. That coming down this hallway tonight was a mistake before I even left my room.”“Then why are you here?”“Because I signed that contract today with your hand un







