3

ZAND

Six months.

That was all the time the King had handed me before he planned to come back and take my life.

It was surprisingly generous of him to give me six months to fix Frostbite Ridge before executing me for putting my hands on his omega.

By now, most of the wolves had gone to bed. After everything that had taken place, the guests found the music and liquor uninteresting and had retreated to their rooms for the night.

Whispers had rippled through the halls when I came back into the building.

Why six months?

Why had he spared my life tonight?

It was not as if he lacked another alpha to step in and govern Frostbite Ridge.

It came down to plain curiosity.

I was on King Orion's radar now.

He wanted to figure me out before he got rid of me, and satisfying that curiosity mattered more to him in the moment than Amia's safety.

I had lied to him because I could not bring her to Frostbite Ridge.

I needed a functional omega, not someone tied to me by blood and fate.

I had lied because I still could not process that my omega belonged to him, and I had lied because I knew I would never truly trust where her heart lay.

But I could not just walk away from this.

One of King Orion's high-ranking alphas would certainly be standing guard outside her door, but that was not going to stop me from seeing her tonight.

I was already marked for death, all because of fate.

Years of patient work would be completely wasted unless I found a way to move faster—to take his life before he took mine.

That, however, was a problem for tomorrow.

Tonight, Amia was mine.

Going to her was a terrible choice, but tonight was already made of bad decisions.

She had almost ruined everything I worked for.

In fact, she still might, so there was no reason I should not take what I wanted tonight.

I needed to be with her while I still had the chance, because it might be my only one.

Fate had a cruel sense of humor, matching me with a woman who had been sleeping with the man I hated above all others.

Tonight, I was going to get my revenge.

My room sat on the third floor.

I had already checked the layout to locate King Orion's suite, and I was reasonably sure the room right next to his belonged to Amia.

If it did not, I was about to walk in on one of his violent alphas.

Stepping through the glass door onto my balcony, I felt the cool night air and looked along the facade of the building, counting the ledges.

I would have to scale across seven different balconies without waking anyone inside, then climb higher.

It was manageable.

I took off my jacket and pulled on a pair of soft sweatpants.

They would make shifting easier if someone spotted me, though I had spent years learning how to move through the dark unseen.

Excitement surged through my veins, making my blood run hot.

I smiled to myself.

It had been a long time since I went on a real hunt.

Though this was hardly a true hunt, since I knew exactly where she was trapped and had nowhere to run.

I stepped back onto the balcony edge and checked the courtyard below.

No one was walking around outside, which made sense.

Very few shifters wanted to unleash their wolves while the King was present.

Light spilled out from a few rooms on my floor, but the level below was mostly dark.

Those rooms belonged to betas, making them my best path across.

I swung over my railing and dropped silently onto the metal structure below, balancing without a wobble.

I held my breath and waited.

The window curtain inside was open, but nothing moved inside the room.

Keeping low, I slipped toward the next ledge.

I grabbed the cold metal, swung around the partition, and pulled myself up.

Someone moved in the room beside me, but the floor underneath remained quiet.

When I made my next jump, I grabbed the bottom of the railing above and pulled my legs tight against my body to keep from swinging.

Holding my core tight, I kept my legs tucked as I pulled myself across the face of the building.

I was nearly past the ledge when the balcony door slid open.

I froze completely, hanging in the shadows.

"It is so hot out here," a woman said, her voice slow and thick.

"Maybe you are wearing too many clothes," a man muttered from inside the room.

Only the woman had walked out.

"Get back inside. Lock the door. Take your clothes off."

"Why?" she asked, her voice growing fainter as she moved back into the room.

"If the door stays open, the whole floor will hear how loud you make me."

They were occupied, which meant I had a window.

My next jump was not going to be completely silent.

I let go of the frame, twisted mid-air, hit the lower ledge, and pushed off immediately.

The moment my fingers caught the metal bar of the balcony next to the couple, I pulled myself up and cleared the edge, landing on the flat surface.

"Did you hear that?" the woman asked, pausing.

"Do you think somebody is watching us?"

"I will make you scream loud enough that it won't matter," the man said.

They were definitely not paying attention to me.