Chapter 40
Elara's POV
The bathroom mirror showed a stranger. Swollen lips. Unfocused eyes. Flushed cheeks that had nothing to do with the heat.
I turned on the cold water. Splashed my face once. Twice. Three times until my skin went numb.
Get it together.
Twenty years as Lynette and I'd never lost control like that. Not once. Not even when—
I gripped the edge of the sink. The porcelain was cool under my palms. Solid. Real.
Focus on that. Not on the way his mouth had felt against mine. Not on the sound he'd made when I'd grabbed his jacket. Not on the fact that thirty seconds had felt like drowning and I hadn't wanted to come up for air.
I forced myself to remember the ice storms in the north. The way frostbite felt creeping through your fingers. The absolute clarity that came with survival training.
My reflection stared back. Calmer now. Almost normal.
I dried my hands and reached for the door handle.
Voices drifted from down the hall. Male laughter. The kind that made my shoulders tense.
"Can't believe his plan to get Vivian to come out actually worked..."
I paused. Listened.
"About damn time. Liam's been planning this for weeks."
My hand dropped from the handle.
---
The booth felt smaller when I returned. Wrong somehow.
I scanned the room automatically. Vivian's seat—empty. Liam's spot next to it—also empty.
Liam's friends were clustered near the far end, heads together, phones out. One of them looked up when I entered and quickly looked away.
I grabbed my jacket from the back of the couch.
"Leaving so soon?" One of them—I didn't know his name—smirked. "The fun's just getting started."
I ignored him. Headed for the door.
Kael was leaning against the wall just outside the booth. Arms crossed. Amber eyes locked on me the second I appeared.
"We need to talk." His voice was flat. Controlled. "About what happened in there."
"Not now." I kept walking toward the stairs. "I have more important things—"
His hand caught my wrist. Not hard. Just enough to stop me.
"More important than us—"
"Than anything." I pulled free and ducked under his arm. Started down the stairs without looking back.
His presence followed me like a shadow but he didn't try to stop me again.
---
The main floor was packed. Bodies pressed together under strobing lights. The bass was so loud I felt it in my chest.
I pushed through the crowd toward the back exit. The parking lot would be the logical place to check first.
Except.
I stopped mid-step.
Something in the air. Wrong. Metallic and sharp underneath the sweat and alcohol.
Blood.
Not much. Not fresh. But definitely there.
I changed direction. Followed the scent toward a side corridor marked "Deliveries Only - Staff Access."
The door was propped open with a brick. Beyond it—darkness and the smell of garbage bins.
And something else.
Crying. Quiet. Muffled. Female.
My heart kicked against my ribs.
I slipped through the door. Let it close behind me with a soft click.
The alley was narrow. Dumpsters lined one wall. Broken bottles glittered in the weak light from a single bulb above the door.
Twenty feet ahead the alley turned. The crying was coming from around that corner.
I pressed my back against the brick wall. Edged forward. Every instinct Lynette had drilled into me screaming that this was wrong, wrong, wrong.
The corner.
I looked.
Liam was on the ground. Back against the wall. His shirt was torn open and three long gashes cut across his stomach. Dark blood soaked through the fabric. His face was chalk white.
Vivian knelt beside him. Hands shaking as she pressed them against the wounds. Tears streaming down her face. Her lips had no color left.
And in the shadows at the far end of the alley—
A figure. Tall. Male. Moving slowly toward them with the casual confidence of a predator that knew its prey couldn't run.
I needed Kael. Now. He couldn't have gone far. The stairwell was right—
My heel came down on broken glass.
The sound was tiny. A whisper of a crack.
The figure's head snapped toward me.
Gold eyes caught the light. Reflected it back like an animal's.
He smiled.
"Well, well." His voice was rough. Damaged. Like he'd screamed too much and broken something. "Another little Goldman lamb wandering into the wolf's den."
He took a step toward me.
Then another.
"This really is my lucky night."
My phone was in my purse. My purse was back in the booth. The only exit was behind me and he was already moving to cut off that angle.
Vivian's sobs got louder. "Elara—run—please—"
The wolf man laughed. "Oh no. Stay. We were just getting started."
His shoulders rolled. Bones cracked. The sound of a partial shift beginning.
I'd seen this before. In the north. Rogues who'd given up on control. Who stayed half-changed because it made the killing easier.
My hands were shaking. I balled them into fists.
Think. THINK.
He was bigger. Stronger. Faster. I had no weapons. No backup. And a body that could barely run a mile without needing an inhaler.
But I had something he didn't expect.
Twenty years of knowing exactly how wolves moved. How they thought. How they killed.
He lunged.
I dropped.
His claws whistled over my head. Hit the brick wall where I'd been standing. Scraped gouges into the stone.
I rolled. Came up on my feet. Backed toward the dumpsters.
Keep moving. Make him chase. Tire him out.
Except I was the one who'd tire first and we both knew it.
He grinned. Blood on his teeth from a previous meal. "You're quick for an Omega. But not quick enough."
He was right.
My chest was already tight. Lungs burning. The familiar squeeze of my airways beginning to close.
Not now. Please not now.
The wolf man stalked forward. Taking his time. Savoring it.
Behind him, Vivian was still crying. Still pressing her hands against Liam's wounds. Still completely helpless.
Just like I was about to be.
His muscles bunched. Ready for another strike.
I reached for my inhaler.
It wasn't there.
Fuck.
The wolf man's smile widened. "Looking for this?"
He held up my inhaler. Must have fallen out during the first attack.
He crushed it.
The plastic cracked. Medicine hissed out in a small cloud.
"Oops."
My vision was starting to narrow at the edges. Black spots dancing.
He knew it too. Could probably hear my heart hammering. Smell the fear-sweat on my skin.
"Any last words, little Omega?"
I looked past him. At Vivian. At the girl who'd asked me for one normal night. One chance to be happy.
At the blood still seeping through her fingers.
Something inside me went very cold.
Very calm.
Lynette's voice. Clear as ice.
You want to live? Then make him bleed first.
The wolf man charged.