Constantine POV:
I stood at the edge of my territory, one hand resting on the silver head of my cane. The evening wind carried the scent of the neighboring Clay Pack—and something else, faint, that made my blood hum.
A dull ache throbbed in my leg, a permanent reminder of the cowards who'd ambushed me with silver and left me the "crippled Alpha King" of every whispered joke in the werewolf world.
My Beta, Nash, waited two paces behind me. He knew better than to speak when I was in this mood.
Then the scent hit me.
Jasmine in full bloom, tangled with rain on fresh grass. Sweet. And mine.
My inner wolf lunged against the cage of my control, a roar rolling through my chest. Hers! Ours!
Mate.
The word landed like a curse. Was the Moon Goddess mocking me? Granting a broken, silver-poisoned Alpha his fated partner at the edge of his own land?
I crushed the wolf's excitement under cold logic. "Nash," I said, "go see what's trespassing."
He returned fast, his face strange. "Alpha... it's a girl. I think it's Miss Alyssa Clay."
Alyssa Clay. The Omega everyone said I was meant to marry in some political farce. I frowned and moved toward him.
She lay in the moonlight, blonde hair fanned on the grass. She was soaked in blood—but it looked old, phantom, like a stain that had soaked through another life.
Then she jackknifed upright, gasping, blue eyes blown wide with terror. "No... don't kill me... Hope..."
Another performance. I snorted coldly. So she'd resort to this—a damsel act to wriggle out of a betrothal to a cripple? How tedious.
My wolf howled in my skull, screaming at me to gather her up, to shield her, to kill whatever had frightened her. I strangled the instinct with ice. I did not show weakness to a woman who could be a spy.
I closed the distance and loomed over her. "Alyssa Clay," I said, voice dripping. "Your performance is clumsy."
She didn't seem to hear me. Her hands flew to her face, her neck, her stomach. No wounds. Her body was whole.
And then the terror in her eyes cracked open and poured out something else—a wild, disbelieving joy.
"I'm alive... I'm really alive!" Tears of happiness streaked her face. She ignored me entirely.
The feeling of being dismissed burned. I, the Alpha King of the Blackwood Pack, ignored by an Omega.
I seized her chin and forced her face up. "Look at me, Omega. Do you think playing games on my land will free you from your fate?"
Her skin was silk. The contact sent a jolt of fire up my arm. My wolf purred in satisfaction. Damn it all.
I snatched my hand back as if burned.
Alyssa finally focused on me. And the look she gave me was not fear. It was appraisal. Cool. Knowing. As if she could see straight through to a wound I kept hidden from the entire world.
Her gaze slid to my cane, then to my stiff leg.
My jaw locked. I hated that. It was the mark of my shame, carved into my pride.
But there was no mockery in her eyes. No pity. Only something I couldn't name.
She rose, swaying once before she steadied. Then she looked into my eyes, and it was like stars igniting in her blue irises.
"Constantine Witt," she said, tasting my name like it already belonged to her.
The sound of it in her mouth did something to my chest.
She took a slow breath, as if deciding the rest of her life.
She did not cry. She did not beg. She did not simper.
She simply watched me, as if confirming a truth only she could see.
And through the invisible thread of the mate-bond, I felt her. Steady as a blade. And already mine.
