The Wrong Scent

Hana

The first sign my suppressant had failed was that every alpha in the ballroom smelled edible.

The second was that Luca De Santis looked across a room full of armed wolves and stared at me as if I did too.

His amber gaze caught mine between the crystal chandeliers and didn't let go. He stood with the Italian delegation, one hand in his pocket, his black bow tie already loose at his throat. I knew his arrest history, his offshore holdings, and the names of three restaurants he'd acquired by forgiving the wrong men's debts. None of my research had warned me what one slow sweep of his eyes could do to my breathing. Heat gathered beneath my silk blouse. Six hours too early.

I lowered my tablet before Luca could see my hand shake. The screen displayed a refrigerated shipment worth one hundred eighty-six thousand dollars. According to the invoice, it had left Red Hook that afternoon. According to the harbor records, the container didn't exist. One threat at a time. I opened the medication schedule hidden behind my financial files. Afternoon dose: three o'clock. Next dose: midnight. Aiko Tanaka had increased the strength two months earlier, after I admitted I could hear Kenji Sato's footsteps from the far end of our offices. At the time, she'd called that a dangerous breakthrough symptom.

Now Kenji was walking toward me, and I heard every measured step through the orchestra, the laughter, and two hundred wolves pretending they hadn't come prepared for war. Cedar and cold iron reached me first. My wolf lifted her head. I locked my knees before anyone saw them weaken. Kenji stopped at my shoulder in a tuxedo cut with the same ruthless precision he brought to everything else. Black hair swept back from the scar at his temple. Silver Sato-kai crest at his cuff. A body built for violence hidden beneath enough restraint to make powerful men lower their voices when he entered a room.

Tonight, I wanted to put my mouth against the clean edge of his jaw and find out whether that restraint extended to me. That thought should have sent me running for another dose. Instead, I inhaled. His scent filled my mouth.

“Hana.” His gaze dropped over my face. “What's wrong?”

Everything below my waist, apparently. I angled the tablet toward him. “Someone billed us for a refrigerated container that never entered New York Harbor.” His attention shifted to the screen, but he moved closer as he read. The heat of his arm brushed mine. My body tightened around an emptiness I refused to name.

“Clerical error?” he asked.

“That amount buys intention.”

“Whose authorization?”

“Ono's seal, routed through Montreal.” I pulled up the approval. “The timestamp uses Tokyo business hours, but it came through his New York terminal.”

Kenji looked toward Daichi Ono, his father's silver-haired adviser. Ono stood beside the private bar with three Moon Council representatives, sober and watchful. Across from them, Don Vittorio De Santis and Masaru Sato prepared to sign a peace agreement neither family wanted. The summit was supposed to end three years of hijacked trucks, missing money, and bodies left where the other organization would find them. I had spent six weeks calculating how much territory each side could surrender without calling it defeat. Someone had just placed a false shipment inside those negotiations. And someone else had done something to me.

Kenji's eyes returned to my face. Approval darkened them, warm enough to become intimate. “Trace it without alerting Ono. Send everything to my private server.”

“Already doing it.”

“Of course you are.” His attention settled on my mouth for one dangerous second. “Are you ill?”

“I'm surrounded by men preparing to argue over port percentages for four hours. Define ill.”

His mouth nearly curved. Then his nostrils flared. I stopped breathing. Kenji leaned closer, bringing his mouth beside my ear. Anyone watching would see an heir giving quiet instructions to an employee. No one would know his breath had turned rough or that my nipples tightened beneath my blouse when his voice dropped.

“Don't leave this floor,” he said.

It wasn't a request. My wolf loved it. I hated that she did. Masaru called Kenji from the signing table. He hesitated, his gaze searching mine, before duty dragged him across the ballroom. The moment he left, I slid my hand into the hidden pocket of my evening jacket and closed it around my suppressant case. Three vials. One used, two sealed. All exactly where they should be. The heat beneath my skin climbed anyway.

A server passed with champagne. The sour bite of it flooded my nose. Beeswax from the marble floor. Hot copper in the kitchen pipes. Gun oil beneath tailored jackets. Every scent sharpened until the ballroom became unbearable. Except Kenji's. Except Luca's. Across the room, Luca handed his water to another man and started toward me. His uncle, Raffaele, saw him move. Raffaele's gaze followed, found me, and sharpened with interest. Luca shifted his path until his broad body blocked his uncle's view. That frightened me more than the staring had.

He stopped where Kenji had been, close enough that roasted coffee, winter air, and alpha wrapped around me. My pulse kicked hard. His lazy smile disappeared as he inhaled. Amber swallowed the brown around his pupils.

“Who are you?” he asked.

My wolf pressed toward him. I forced my fingers to release the suppressant case before the glass cracked in my hand.

“The woman wondering why you're reading a confidential invoice over her shoulder.”

His smile returned with teeth. “Hana Mori. Financial analyst. Beta. Twenty-nine. No arrests, no debts, no known lovers, and a distressing habit of finding money my accountants believed they'd hidden.”

“Your accountants aren't very imaginative.”

“They're afraid of you.”

“They should be afraid of fractions.”

His gaze dropped to my mouth, then lower, lingering where my pulse beat at the base of my throat. The look touched me more intimately than a hand. Heat spread between my thighs, hot and humiliating. Luca stepped closer.

“You need to leave this room,” he said.

“With you?”

“If necessary.”

“We've spoken for thirty seconds, and you've already reached the kidnapping portion of the evening.”

His hand lifted toward my waist, then stopped before contact. Restraint shook through his fingers.

“Hana.” The humor had vanished from his voice. “Your scent changed.”