Chapter 3 A Kiss That Shouldn't Exist
Aria
For a split second, I felt a savage rush of triumph. Then, the reality of what I’d just done crashed down. I had just burned the last bridge to my old life with a flamethrower in the middle of the Hart hotel lobby.
I didn't wait for their retaliation. I grabbed my suitcase handle and marched for the exit, the squeaky wheel providing a frantic soundtrack to my escape.
The security guards hurried to open the massive glass doors, seemingly eager to be rid of the whirlwind.
The night air hit me like a physical slap, wet, freezing, and smelling of exhaust fumes. The transition from the perfumed warmth of the hotel was brutal.
I was instantly shivering. My torn shirt offered zero protection against the biting wind.
I walked fast, head down, just wanting to put distance between myself and that palace of humiliation. I didn't know where I was going.
Home was a bus ride away I couldn't afford right now, and even if I got there, it wouldn't be home for long.
I turned down a side street, looking for a subway station, trying to ignore the tears that were finally spilling over, freezing on my cheeks.
"Hey, sweetheart. In a rush?"
The voices drifted out of an alleyway about twenty feet ahead. Four shadows detached themselves from the brick wall. They were big, smelling of cheap beer and aggression.
I stopped dead, my breath catching in my throat. I scanned the street. Empty. No cars, no pedestrians. Just me, the freezing wind, and four predators sizing up wounded prey.
"Aw, she's crying," another one taunted, stepping into the streetlight. He was missing a front tooth. His eyes dropped to the tear in my shirt, lingering on the exposed skin of my chest.
"Looks like someone had a rough night. Maybe we can help you feel better."
"Leave me alone," I said, trying to inject authority into my voice, but it came out thin and wobbly.
They spread out, forming a loose semi-circle, blocking the sidewalk.
"That's not very nice," the first one said, pulling something from his pocket. A switchblade flicked open with a deadly snick. "We just want to talk. Maybe share that suitcase."
Panic, primal and overwhelming, flooded my system. But beneath the panic, something else woke up. A deep, vibrating growl in the pit of my stomach.
The wolf.
I hadn't shifted in years. I couldn't afford to. Shifting meant needing more food, destroying clothes I couldn't replace, risking exposure in a city that didn't take kindly to my kind outside of designated zones.
But now, as the thugs closed in, the beast clawed at the back of my mind, demanding release.
My vision sharpened, the shadows deepening. My gums itched as my canines threatened to lengthen.
The cold air suddenly felt good, bracing.
Let me out, the wolf urged. Let me tear them apart.
I dropped the suitcase handle. My fingers curled into claws at my sides. A low snarl built in my throat, vibrating my vocal cords.
If I shifted here, on a public street, my life was effectively over anyway. But at least I wouldn't go down without a fight.
The lead thug stepped closer, the knife glinting.
Suddenly, high beams blinded me.
A car whipped around the corner, tires screeching on the asphalt.
It was a sleek, silver sedan, moving way too fast. It jumped the curb, mounting the sidewalk and sliding to a halt barely three feet from me, placing itself directly between me and the thugs.
The back door flew open before the car had even fully stopped.
"Get in."
The command was sharp, authoritative, and instantly recognizable.
Grayson Hart.
The thugs scattered like cockroaches under a sudden light, cursing as they retreated back into the alley.
They weren't stupid enough to mess with a car like that.
I stood frozen, caught between the retreating threat and the new, confusing one. The wolf receded slightly, confused by the sudden shift in power dynamics.
"Aria. Now."
I didn't argue. Shivering violently from cold and adrenaline withdrawal, I dove into the back seat of the sedan.
The door slammed shut, sealing me into a hushed, opulent world of soft leather and climate control. The heat was blasting, a balm to my frozen skin.
The car was already moving, accelerating smoothly back onto the street. I was huddled against the far door, my arms wrapped around myself, my breath coming in ragged gasps.
Grayson was sitting on the other side of the wide bench seat. In the dim light of the streetlamps flashing by outside, his profile was etched in stone.
He didn't look at me. He pressed a button, and a black partition slid up, sealing us off from the driver in the front.
He began to unbutton his suit jacket.
My heart slammed against my ribs. "What are you doing?"
He ignored me, shrugging out of the heavy black jacket. He leaned across the expanse of leather and draped it over my shivering shoulders.
The weight of it was instantly comforting. But more than the warmth, it was the smell. It was saturated with him-that dark, woody, stormy scent that I’d smelled in the hotel lobby, but concentrated now in the small space.
It filled my nose, my lungs, clouding my brain. It was intoxicating, overwhelming my senses.
"Why?" I whispered, pulling the lapels tighter around me, burying my nose in the silk lining without meaning to. "Why did you help me? You kicked me out five minutes ago."
He finally turned his head to look at me. The shadows in the car made his eyes look completely black, bottomless pits.
"We’ve met before," he said. It was a statement, flat and unyielding, answering a question I hadn't asked.
I frowned, confusion battling the strange fuzziness in my head.
"What?
No, we haven't.
I would remember meeting Grayson Hart. I've only seen you in magazines or from across a ballroom."
"You have," he insisted, his voice dropping lower, taking on a rough edge that sent a shiver down my spine that had nothing to do with the cold.
"Five years ago. The Winter Solstice gala. You were catering. You dropped a tray of champagne flutes near the service entrance."
I stared at him, a vague memory surfacing through the fog of trauma. A crowded hallway. Slippery shoes. The crash of glass.
A man in an expensive suit stopping to help me up before his security hustled him away. I had never seen his face clearly.
"That was you?"
"I remembered your scent," he murmured.
He shifted closer on the seat.
The air in the car suddenly felt too thick to breathe.
The heat coming from the vents seemed to double, but it wasn't just the car heater. A strange, liquid fire began to pool in my belly, spreading rapidly through my veins. It was an alien sensation, a desperate, clawing hunger that eclipsed the fear, the shame, everything.
My wolf, dormant seconds ago, woke up with a roar. But it wasn't angry. It was… interesting. Deeply, primal-ly interested in the alpha sitting two feet away.
He was looking at me now with an intensity that scorched. His gaze dropped to my mouth, then lower, to where his jacket fell open, revealing the tear in my shirt.
I should have been terrified. I was trapped in a car with the most powerful man in the city, a man whose family just ruined mine.
But my body wasn't listening to my brain. The scent of him was a drug, overriding every logical thought.
Without conscious volition, I leaned toward him.
Grayson let out a sound that was half-groan, half-snarl. He moved with predator speed, closing the gap between us instantly.
One large hand clamped onto the back of my neck, dragging me forward. The other dove into the V of his jacket, his hot palm pressing flat against the bare skin just above my bra, right over my racing heart.
His mouth crashed down onto mine.
It wasn't a gentle kiss. It was a collision. It was starving and rough and utterly overwhelming.
I gasped against his lips, and he took advantage, his tongue sweeping into my mouth, tasting me with a possessive arrogance that should have made me furious.
Instead, I melted. The stress, the fear, the anger of the last three days exploded into a desperate need for connection, for heat.
I kissed him back with equal fervor, my hands tangling in his thick hair, pulling him closer.
I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't care.
The fire in my veins was consuming me. I needed friction. I needed more.
I shifted, scrambling inelegantly across the leather seat until I was straddling his lap, my jeans rubbing against his expensive trousers.
I felt the hard ridge of his arousal beneath me, shocking and thrilling. He groaned against my mouth, his grip on my waist tightening to the point of pain, his thumbs digging into my hip bones.
For a few mindless seconds, there was nothing in the world but his taste, his heat, and the overwhelming, inexplicable need to be consumed by him.
The car lurched to a stop.
"Sir, we've arrived at the penthouse," the driver’s voice came over the intercom, tinny and jarring.
The sound was like a bucket of ice water dumped on us.
Grayson went rigid beneath me.
In a split second, the heat vanished from his body, replaced by glacial coldness.
He tore his mouth from mine, gasping for air. His hands, which had been kneading my waist, clamped down hard, and he physically shoved me backward.
I tumbled off his lap, hitting the far door with a muffled thump, dazed and breathless, my lips swollen and tingling.
He was already buttoning his shirt, his face a mask of stone, eyes averted. The transformation was terrifying in its speed. The starving wolf was gone; the ruthless CEO was back.
"Grayson?" I whispered, my voice wrecked, confusion swirling with a new, sharper kin
d of humiliation.
He didn't look at me. He stared straight ahead at the partition, his jaw clenched so tightly a muscle feathered in his cheek.
"We can't do this," he said, his voice devoid of any emotion, flat and final as a tombstone. "Get out.”