LOGINDr. Sage Monroe’s world collapses when Alpha CEO Kade Blackwood demands her dead brother’s $500,000 debt. He offered Sage a chance to become his contracted mate for one year and her brother's debt will be forgiven. But Sage was hiding the secret of her being the daughter of the rogue who slaughtered Kade’s father. When her suppressed wolf explodes free during a deadly ambush, Kade recognizes the bloodline he’s sworn to destroy. Now trapped between a mate bond turning devastatingly real and a Beta’s betrayal that could kill them both, their enemies will exploit every given weakness they could get. Trust is impossible but Desire is undeniable. And the truth might shatter everything.
View MoreSage Monroe had her hands inside a man’s chest when Kade Blackwood walked into her operating room.
She did not look up immediately because she was busy clamping a bleeding artery, but she noticed when the doors opened.
The operating room had a kind of quiet tension that came with life-and-death work, and whoever just walked in had messed it up completely.
“Clamp,” she said to Jenny, her surgical nurse.
“Dr. Monroe.” The voice was deep and unfamiliar, it came from somewhere near the door.
Sage looked up and saw three men in dark suits standing just in front of the sterile field as if they had never heard of infection protocols.
The one in front was tall with black hair, with a face that looked like it had been carved from stone.
She recognized him from the photos she had found in Marcus’s apartment after he died.
Kade Blackwood.
Her stomach dropped, but her hands stayed steady as she worked on the artery.
“Gosh, this is an operating room. Get out.”
“We need to talk.” He did not move or even blink.
“I’m in the middle of surgery as you can see.” She put a stitch on another torn tissue and pulled it tight.
“Right now, whatever you want can wait.”
“It’s been three months already.”
Sage felt sweat cringe down her forehead but she kept her focus on the patient in front of her.
The man on her table had a name, a family and a life that depended on her not screwing this up, and she wasn’t about to let some debt collector ruin that.
“Then it can wait another twenty minutes,” she said. “Or you can leave, your choice.”
There was a long pause where she thought he might drag her out of the room by force, but then she heard him move to the side.
When she risked another glance, he was resting his back against the wall with his arms crossed, watching her like a predator watches its prey.
She ended the surgery in eighteen minutes, checked the stitches twice, and made sure the patient’s vitals were stable before she stepped back.
“Close him up,” she told Jenny, then stripped off her gloves and walked out without looking at Kade.
He followed her into the scrub room and his two men stayed by the door like guards.
Sage turned on the water and started scrubbing her hands, more to buy herself time, because she needed to. She already knew why he was here and what he wanted, and there was no good answer she could think of giving him.
“What do you want?” she asked anyway.
“You know what I want.”
She kept scrubbing even though her hands were already clean. “I’m working on it.”
“Are you?” He moved closer and she could perceive his cologne, something expensive that probably cost more than her rent.
“Because I have not seen a single payment in three months.” He said raising his right eyebrow.
“I need more time.”
“Your brother’s been dead for three months,” Kade said, with his flat and businesslike voice. “He owed me five hundred thousand dollars and he signed your name on the loan. That makes it your debt now.”
Sage turned off the water and grabbed a towel, hard enough her knuckles went white.
“Marcus forged my signature. I didn’t even know about that loan until after he died.”
“Then prove it.” He said it like a challenge.
“Take me to court. Hire a lawyer. While you are drowning in legal fees I’ll foreclose on this clinic and everything else you own.”
Both their eyes met. “I was busy burying my brother and trying to keep people alive. I haven’t had time to…”
“Not my problem.” He cut her off without raising his voice.
“You have forty-eight hours to pay what is owed.”
“That is impossible.”
“Then I take the clinic.” He looked around the scrub room like he was already calculating what it was worth. “Your apartment. All of it.”
The unfairness of it hit her like a physical blow. she had spent years building this clinic from nothing, treating patients who had nowhere else to go, and now this stranger was going to take it all because her brother couldn’t stop gambling.
“I do not have that kind of money,” she said, and hated how desperate she sounded. “I run a free clinic. My patients can’t afford to go anywhere else. If you shut this place down…”
“I do not care.” His expression didn’t change at all. “Your brother took my money and lost it. Now someone has to pay it back.”
“He is dead!”
“Which is why I’m talking to you.” Kade straightened his cuffs in a gesture that was probably meant to look casual but just made him seem more dangerous.
“Forty-eight hours, that is what you have Dr. Monroe. Five hundred thousand dollars is what I’m owed.”
“There has to be another way out of this.” Sage said helplessly.
He looked at her and reached into his jacket and pulled out a black envelope, the kind with heavy paper and a wax seal.
He dropped it on the counter between them.
“What is that?” she asked.
“An alternative to bankruptcy.” He stepped back toward the door. “Read it, then think about it. You have forty-eight hours.”
“Just tell me what it says.”
“Read the contract.”
He stepped toward the door. His men stepped aside immediately. He paused once more and looked back at her, there was no softness in his expression.
“And Dr. Monroe? Don’t waste time pretending you have options. We both know you don’t.”
Kade stared at the computer screen in his office until the footage blurred together and he had to blink to clear his vision.He had been watching the warehouse ambush for six hours straight. Playing it again over and over again. Focusing on different parts each time.The hunters dropping from the ceiling. The silver bullets. The wolfsbane gas. His wolves going down. The chaos and blood and screaming.And Marcus standing at the back doing nothing.Kade had watched that part at least twenty times now. His Beta was just standing there while a hunter ran past him. Not fighting. Not helping. Just watching.He played it again.Marcus turned his head when the hunter passed. Made eye contact. The hunter nodded and kept running.They knew each other.Kade held the mouse so hard that the plastic cracked.His Beta was working with the hunters. Had to be. Nothing else made sense.But he needed more than footage that could be interpreted in different ways. He needed proof that could not be argued
Sage sat on the floor of Kade’s bedroom with her back against the wall. She stared at her hands like they belonged to someone else.She could still taste blood in her mouth even though she scrubbed her teeth until her gums bled. The hunter’s blood, the same man she killed by biting his throat as a wolf.Her wolf was awake now and restless under her skin like something alive trying to claw its way out. Fifteen years she kept it buried with pills and meditation, now it was free and hungry and she didn’t know how to put it back.The bedroom door was locked from the outside. Kade had not come in since his men brought her back from the warehouse three nights ago. Food came in from outside the door twice a day but she barely touched it. She could hear him sometimes in the living room pacing back and forth until late into the night.The mate bond hurt worse than anything she had ever felt. Like someone was taking a hammer to her ribs from the inside. Headaches that made her vision blur.
Kade was on the phone when Sage walked into his office that evening and from the look on his face she knew something had changed.“Where?” he said into the phone. “Fine. Midnight. Bring everyone.” He hung up and reached for his jacket.“What happened?” Sage asked.“I got intel on the wolfsbane. It’s moving through Crescent Pack territory.” He checked his gun and slid it into a holster she had not noticed before. “I’m meeting their Alpha tonight.”“I’m coming with you.”“No.” He did not even look at her.“I’m a doctor. If someone gets hurt…”“You’re staying here where it’s safe.” He finally met her eyes. “Marcus will be here. You’ll be fine.”“Marcus hates me.”“He won’t touch you again.” Kade headed for the door. “I will be back in a few hours.”She waited until she heard the elevator doors close, then grabbed her medical bag and car keys. If he thought she was going to sit in the penthouse while people might be dying, he didn’t know her at all.She followed his car from a distance, t
Sage woke up confused for a moment trying to remember where she was and then she remembered the contract.Kade had been there before she fell asleep but he was gone now, which made Sage feel relieved because she did not know how to talk to him in daylight.She got up and found a robe, then went to the kitchen hoping coffee would help her brain start working again.Marcus was already there leaning on the counter with a mug in his hand. “Morning,” she said and went straight for the coffee maker.“You do not belong here.” His voice was flat and cold.She poured coffee and tried to ignore him. “Kade seems to think I do.”“Kade’s making a mistake.” Marcus set his mug down.“You’re human. Weak. You can’t shift, can’t fight. What happens when enemies come? Are you going to hide behind him like a coward?”“I’m a doctor.” She turned to face him. “I save lives. That is what I do.”“You are a burden.” He moved closer in a way that it made her heart speed up. “Everyone knows it. Half the pack t






Welcome to GoodNovel world of fiction. If you like this novel, or you are an idealist hoping to explore a perfect world, and also want to become an original novel author online to increase income, you can join our family to read or create various types of books, such as romance novel, epic reading, werewolf novel, fantasy novel, history novel and so on. If you are a reader, high quality novels can be selected here. If you are an author, you can obtain more inspiration from others to create more brilliant works, what's more, your works on our platform will catch more attention and win more admiration from readers.
reviews