Progressing Steadily

After awakening years before the demise that once destroyed me, I, Lucy Hale, swear I will never again fall for Adrian Hawthorne. In my last life, loving him earned me nothing but humiliation, betrayal, and a future broken beyond repair. Now, armed with memories I shouldn't possess, I tuck myself away inside my boutique, determined to avoid him, avoid fate, avoid everything. But the universe has never been kind to my plans. No matter how I twist the timeline, Adrian keeps slipping back into my life, closer, impossibly entangled. His eyes linger longer than they should. His questions cut deeper than I’m ready to admit. And worst of all, he seems drawn to me in ways he never was before. And then there is Elias Ward, quiet, observant with eyes sharp enough to see through any disguise. Elias is nothing like Adrian. Where Adrian gleams with cold polish and empty promises, Elias is warmth wrapped in quiet mystery. A man who shouldn’t matter to me. Yet, somehow, he does. As I try to distance myself from the Hawthornes, Elias drifts steadily closer, noticing the cracks in my composure, the ache beneath my smile, the truth I’ve fought so hard to hide. He becomes the one thread I can’t cut, no matter how much I fear being stitched into someone else’s future again. With Adrian circling me like a ghost from the life I escaped, Elias begins to draw me toward a fate I never expected, a fate where for once, I might finally choose myself. And maybe him, too. But the past doesn't release its hold so easily. And neither do the Hawthornes.

“I should punish you.” “Maybe you should. Or maybe you’re all bark, no bite,” I shot back, my voice daring. His eyes darkened, and in a blur, I was over his shoulder, my skin burning where he held me and the cold air kissed my bare ass. “Your skin” His voice was low, almost reverent. “So fucking smooth.” Before I could retort, the world shifted, steam rising around us. He set me down, steadily, fingers brushed the hem of the shirt I wore, his shirt. He slipped it away without hesitation, leaving me bare under his gaze. “What are you doing?” I whispered. “Punishing you.” —— Rayna gave up everything for love. She abandoned her pack, killed her wolf when she rejected her destined mate, and gave herself entirely to the man she thought would stand by her forever, Alpha Dario. But when Dario found his fated mate, he didn’t hesitate to cast Rayna aside, leaving her broken, and utterly alone. One night of drowning her sorrows at a bar changes everything. Rayna witnesses a brutal murder—one carried out by none other than Alpha Sven, the ruthless Mafia leader feared across packs. What Rayna doesn’t realize is that fate isn’t done with her. Sven isn’t just her captor, her tormentor, her obsession—he’s the very mate she rejected long ago. He remembers her rejection like a scar carved into his soul, and he’s not interested in forgiveness, he doesn’t want her love. He wants to see her surrender in obedience, her body bound to his until she can’t deny him anymore. Rayna must decide whether to keep resisting the bond—or surrender to the one man who has both the power to destroy her and the claim to own her.