Page 6

Light seeps through the curtains, spilling across her petite, slender frame. The same long brown hair I fisted in my hands as I fucked her sprawls across my pillows and sheets. My wolf stirs at the sight, humming with satisfaction.

I clench my jaw. He shouldn’t be feeling anything for her.

Because this…she…shouldn’t have happened.

I had no intention of interfering with her night at the bar, but the moment I saw her, everything came to a standstill, and my wolf and I recognized what she meant to us.

A single taste, and all rational thought jumped out the window. I didn’t think twice before I took her raw, despite knowing exactly what was at stake.

And now, even hours later, my wolf still hums from the memory of her touch and thirsts to take her again.

Something he shouldn’t be doing because the woman tangled in my sheets isn’t just some stranger like I initially thought.

She’s Julian’s ex-girlfriend. And to be more precise, my nephew's ex.

Damn it.

I exhale sharply, forcing down the growl rising in my throat. My grip tightens around the ID in my hand as I read the name again.

Lila Winter.

Of all the women in that bar, she was the one I took home. She was the one who had me undone and had all my fucking attention.

Coincidence?

I don’t believe in fucking coincidences.

Julian played his cards, and I walked right into his game.

I smirk, the bitterness tasting like acid on my tongue. The kid played well. Even I have to admit that.

But if he thinks this will compromise my claim to the Alpha title, he’s mistaken.

I look at her again, drinking in her delicate features, willing myself to forget how good it felt to mark her skin, to claim her. My wolf snarls at the thought, but I shove the feeling down.

This ends now.

I stand up from the couch and cross the room, my voice cold as I wake the cunning little beauty.

“Lila.”

Her name feels like ash on my tongue.

She stirs in her sleep, lifting her hands above her head to stretch a little. Then her lashes flutter open, revealing the same green eyes that I wanted on me last night as I showed her a slice of heaven.

It takes her a minute to recognize she’s not in her home. A minute more to see me standing on the other side of the room.

I watch the realization sink in, the way her body stiffens, the way her fingers clutch the sheet to her tits in feigned panic and modesty.

I can’t even deny the feeling of her tits in my hands is something I can’t get out of my mind.

I should’ve paid attention to her face. I’d seen her with Julian once, but that was before the Alpha of the Blackwood pack gave us a mission to find Irene and marry her so we would claim the Alpha title. I thought Julian cut ties with Lila back then.

Maybe if I paid more attention to her features and etched them to memory, I wouldn’t be here.

She swallows hard. “A-Alaric?”

I let the silence stretch between us, let her squirm under my stare before I toss the plastic card onto the bed.