Character's POV
A blinding blade of morning sunlight cleaved mercilessly through my skull.
My eyelids scraped against my eyes like sandpaper. The metallic, bitter aftertaste of Mia's heavily spiked wine still coated my tongue, a vicious reminder of the monumental disaster I had orchestrated last night.
I groaned, shifting violently on the cheap mattress.
"You snore. Quietly, but you snore."
The deep, rumbling baritone didn't come from the hallway. It came from the armchair directly across my bed.
My spine locked. Every single latent predator instinct screamed in my blood.
My eyes snapped open. Caleb Blackwood sat engulfed in the shadows of the corner, his long, muscular legs carelessly stretched out. He wasn't wearing his ruined tactical shirt. His massive torso was entirely bare, exposing a horrifying landscape of old battle scars and brutally sculpted muscle.
The ruined fabric was tossed onto the floorboard like a discarded rag.
His golden eyes were pinned to me. They weren't clouded with chemically-induced lust anymore. They were glacial. Calculating. Lethal.
My throat was painfully dry. "What time is it?"
"Late enough for a single mother from the slums to explain how she perfectly executed an S-tier Krav Maga throat lock on an active combat veteran," he stated evenly, completely devoid of any emotion.
My stomach dropped. The adrenaline forcefully purged the lingering fog in my brain.
He didn't forget. Lycans never forgot.
I gripped the frayed blanket, desperately pulling up the terrified, fragile facade. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You pinned a two-hundred-and-forty-pound Alpha to a couch," Caleb pressed, leaning slowly forward. The sheer gravitational pull of his aura suffocated the tiny bedroom. "Your reaction time was zero-point-three seconds. Who taught you that?"
"A women's self-defense seminar at the community center," I shot back, injecting the exact amount of defensive tremor into my voice. "The neighborhood isn't exactly safe, Mr. Blackwood. You learn to aim for the throat or you don't survive."
Caleb stared at me. For ten excruciating seconds, the silence stretched, thick enough to choke on. He was peeling back the layers of my lie, ruthlessly searching for the Nightshade Queen beneath the terrified civilian.
Finally, his sharp jaw shifted.
"Get dressed," he ordered smoothly, standing up. The sheer dominance rolling off his towering frame made my skin prickle. "You owe me a thousand-dollar bespoke shirt. We are going shopping."
The air-conditioning in the VIP floor of Armani's flagship store was obnoxiously freezing.
I stood in the center of the plush, velvet-lined room, wearing my oversized thrift-store sweater and faded jeans, sticking out like a bloody thumb. Caleb stood by the towering mirrors, a terrifyingly handsome monolith in a tailored black suit jacket the manager had practically sprinted to fetch him.
"Mr. Blackwood! Oh, goddess, I didn't expect to see you here!"
A sharply shrill, overwhelmingly cloying voice shattered the quiet exclusivity of the room.
I didn't turn around. The sickening scent of artificial jasmine and desperation assaulted my nose.
A woman in a tight scarlet designer dress practically threw herself into the VIP lounge, her heels clicking aggressively against the marble. Selena. The woman parading around the high-society circles claiming to be Caleb's 'destined savior' from an ambush years ago.
Caleb's brow twitched in absolute annoyance, but he remained silent, exuding a cold, impenetrable wall.
Selena halted, her manicured hand hovering in the air as her gaze finally landed on me. Her lips curled into a sneer of pure, unadulterated disgust.
"What is this doing here?" Selena scoffed, her eyes raking over my frayed sleeves. "Did the charity bins overflow onto the VIP floor? Get her out before she soils the leather."
My pulse flatlined. No anger. No embarrassment. Just the cold, clinical detachment of an apex predator observing a very loud, very stupid insect.
I completely ignored her existence. I turned my back to her, my eyes raking over Caleb's torso. My assassin's training took over, automatically calculating his kill-zones and body mass. Same monstrous shoulder-to-waist ratio as Victor, my former head enforcer.
"Forty-six chest," I commanded quietly, picking up a charcoal silk shirt and tossing it toward the terrified manager. "He needs a tactical cut across the shoulders. Your standard Italian runway fit will rip the second he moves."
The manager gaped at me.
Selena's face contorted in vicious outrage at being so thoroughly dismissed by a peasant.
"How dare you ignore me!" she shrieked, stepping dangerously close. "Do you have any idea who I am? I am his savior! I am—"
"You are suffocating the entire floor with that cheap jasmine perfume," I interrupted quietly, finally turning my head just a fraction.
Selena gasped, her face flushing an ugly purple. "Teach this filthy rat a lesson!" she violently snapped her fingers.
A shadow moved behind her. Her massive, heavily augmented bodyguard stepped forward, forcefully cracking his thick knuckles.
I didn't step back.
My thumb slowly stroked the smooth, razor-sharp edge of the silver tie clip I had casually picked up from the display table.
The man lunged.
I raised my eyes to meet his, the terrified single mother instantly vanishing, replaced entirely by the dead, freezing gaze of the Nightshade Queen.