Chapter two

He lifted my chin with his middle finger. "God, you're adorable when you're delusional. This isn't a negotiation, Selene. This is pack law. Your wolf will learn to accept me."

My vision blurred. I realized, distantly, that I was crying.

"I dare you," I groaned. "I won't make you break me."

"I won't have to. Your father will do it for me." Killian's hand moved to the small of my back, pressing me against him in a way that looked intimate from the outside but felt like being trapped. "The Rite is in six months. Winter Solstice. I'd start preparing yourself mentally if I were you. I hear the process is quite painful when the wolf resists."

Something inside me snapped.

I shoved him with rrrrenough force that he stumbled backward, and several people gasped. The music didn't stop, but it faltered. The entire ballroom had gone quiet, everyone turning to stare at us. At me.

"Selene..." Killian's voice was low. "What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm leaving." My voice was shaking but audible. "And you can tell my father that I won't be attending any more discussions about my future. Not with you. Not with anyone who thinks they can force me into a bond."

I turned and walked toward the exit. My heels clicked against marble. Every eye in the room was on me. I could feel my father's fury like a physical force, could smell my mother's fear, could hear the whispers starting like a wave.

She refused him. In public. At the Gala. Did you see—

I didn't run. Running would have been weak. I walked with my head high, my spine straight, my hands clenched into fists to stop them from shaking. I walked like a Sterling. Like someone who'd been trained since birth to command attention.

I made it to the terrace doors. Made it outside into the cold December air. Made it down the stairs to the parking level.

Then I ran.

My heels clattered against concrete. My dress was too tight, too long, not made for running. I kicked off the shoes and kept going barefoot, feeling pebbles cut into my soles, not caring. My wolf was screaming inside me, howling with relief and terror in equal measure.

*You did it. You actually did it. We're free—*

*We're not free. We're dead.*

I reached my car—a Tesla, paid for by my father, probably GPS-tracked—and realized I couldn't go home. Couldn't go to my apartment. Couldn't go anywhere my family would look for me.

I needed somewhere real. Somewhere they'd never think to find me.

The Greenway Community Center appeared in my mind, a memory from three weeks ago when I'd driven through East Oakland looking for places that weren't on any Sterling property map. I'd seen the building, seen the hand-painted mural, seen the flyer in the window: *Volunteers Needed - Tuesday and Thursday Evenings.*

I'd written down the address. Hadn't called. Hadn't followed up. But I still had it saved in my phone.

I got in my car. Pulled up the address. Started driving before I could talk myself out of it.

Behind me, through the rearview mirror, I could see the Sterling mansion blazing with light. My father would be making excuses right now. Killian would be furious. My mother would be terrified.

And I was driving toward East Oakland in a ball gown, crying mascara down my face, with no plan except *anywhere but here*.

My phone started ringing. My father's name flashed on the screen.

I threw the phone out the window.

The Greenway Community Center looked different at night. Smaller. More fragile. The parking lot was mostly empty except for a few beat-up cars and a bicycle chained to a rack. Through the windows, I could see fluorescent lights and movement—people inside, living lives that had nothing to do with pack politics or arranged matings or billion-dollar empires built on exploitation.

I sat in my car for ten minutes, breathing. Trying to stop crying. Trying to figure out what the hell I was doing.

Finally, I got out. Barefoot, in my ruined Dior gown, I walked to the front door and pushed it open.

A woman at the front desk looked up, startled. "Oh, honey. Are you okay? Do you need us to call someone?"

"No," I said. "I'm here about the volunteer position. Is it still available?"

She blinked. Looked me up and down. Probably thought I was having some kind of breakdown, which wasn't inaccurate.

"It's... yes. We always need help. But maybe you should come back when—"

"Please." The word came out desperate. "Please, I need somewhere to be. Somewhere that isn't... I just need to be useful. Is that okay?"

The woman studied me for a long moment. Then she smiled, tired but kind.

"Come on back," she said. "Let's get you some normal clothes first. Then we'll talk."

I followed her into the building, leaving my car and my old life and Killian Drake's threats behind.

I didn't know it yet, but in three days, I'd walk back through those doors and meet someone who would make my wolf sing for the first time in my life.

And I'd ruin his life just by touching his hand.