RHEA’S POV The bright white lights of the hospital hallway made my eyes ache.
I signed my name at the bottom of the last patient chart, let out a long breath, and handed the clipboard to the nurse behind the counter.
“You look like a walking ghost, Dr.
Voss,” Sarah said, offering me a sympathetic smile.
“Go home.
Get some sleep.” “Believe me, I’m already on my way,” I said, offering a small smile back.
I pulled my phone out of my coat pocket to check the time.
It was 2:45 AM.
When the screen lit up, my heart softened.
My lock screen was a picture of my five-year-old son, Elias.
He was grinning at the camera, his dark hair messy, tucked behind his left ear.
Looking at his sweet face made my chest tighten.
The older Elias grew, the more he resembled the man I had spent five long years trying to erase from my memory.
The same sharp jaw, the same pale gray eyes—a constant, living reminder of the single night that had altered the course of my entire life.
Five years ago, the air in the back room of the banquet hall was thick with the suffocating scent of heavy incense and cheap wine.
My head throbbed.
My skin felt like it was on fire, a strange, searing heat burning through my veins.
I was lying on a cold stone floor, my limbs too heavy to move.
Outside the heavy door, I could hear two men laughing.
“The old Alpha promised md three gold chests and fifty acres of border land for her,” my father, Darius, said, his voice loud and greedy.
“Not bad for a useless, wolfless girl.” “She’s finally good for something,” my brother, Cassius, chuckled.
“Drink up, Father.
Let’s celebrate.” They had drugged my drink.
They were going to sell me like I wasn’t worth anything .
I squeezed my eyes shut, hot tears slipping down my cheeks.
I couldn’t move.
I couldn’t run.
Suddenly, the heavy door slammed open.
A tall man stumbled into the dark room, breathing in heavy, ragged gasps.
Even through the darkness, I could feel the scary, crushing force of his aura.
He slammed the door shut and leaned his heavy back against it, his fists clenched so tightly his knuckles cracked.
His muscles strained as he visibly fought against his own body, trying to force down the wild, drug-induced urge raging in his blood.
He had clearly sought out this empty room to fight the poison off alone, but the moment his eyes adjusted to the dark and found me on the floor, his control shook.
“Who’s in here?” he growled.
His voice was deep, rough, and laced with the same dark heat burning in my veins.
“Stay…
stay away,” I whispered, but my voice trembled.
In a single second, he moved.
He was over me before I could even draw a breath.
His massive frame blocked out the moonlight.
He pinned my wrists above my head with one large hand.
His skin was burning against mine.
His jaw clenched, his posture stiffening as a visible struggle waged inside him—his obvious noble, restrained nature fighting against the artificial fever consuming his mind.
“I can’t…
stop,” he croaked against my neck.
His breath sent a wild shock straight down my spine.
“Please…
I’ve never…” I whimpered, my heart hammering against my ribs.
He hesitated.
For a tiny fraction of a second, he closed his eyes, digging his fingers into the stone floor beside my head as if trying to anchor his remaining sanity.
But whatever poison was in our blood was too strong for either of us to fight.
He pulled at the thin fabric of my dress, exposing my bare skin to the room’s freezing air.
When his heavy, warm hand slid down my stomach, a sharp gasp ripped from my throat.
“Wait—” He didn’t wait.
He drove into me in one relentless push, breaking through my innocence in a single move.
A sharp cry tore from my throat.
Tears stung my eyes at the sudden, sharp pain.
I stiffened, my fingers digging blindly into the hard muscle of his broad shoulders.
He froze inside me.
A low, heavy groan escaped his chest as he felt how tight I was.
His eyes snapped open, filled with a sudden, agonizing wave of guilt and restraint.
For a moment, his forehead rested against mine, his ragged breath washing over my lips as he waited for me to breathe.
“I’m sorry.
Shh…
quiet,” he whispered, rough and low.
He began to move.
At first, it was slow, calm and gentle, letting my body adjust to him.
But the drug in our blood quickly turned the pain into a searing, overwhelming feeling I had never known before.
The slow movements turned into hard, steady thrusts.
Every time he pressed deep against me, a broken moan escaped my lips.
I wrapped my legs around his hips, completely lost in the rhythm.
We collided over and over in the dark, two poisoned strangers holding onto each other just to survive the night.
When the final wave of our orgasm shattered through us, he buried his face in my neck, holding me so tight against his broad chest I could barely breathe.
Hours later, as the gray light of dawn started to flow through the window, loud screams and the sound of clashing swords broke out across the pack grounds.
The stranger rose to his feet instantly as if he had never been lying down at all.
His body was tense, like an elite warrior ready for battle in a split second.
I was too weak and exhausted to open my eyes.
He paused for a heartbeat, his warm fingers gently brushing a strand of hair off my forehead.
Then, he vanished into the morning without saying anything else.
I blinked hard, snapping myself out of the memory.
I slid my phone back into my pocket and buttoned up my heavy winter coat.
Before I left for my shift six hours ago, I had dropped Elias off at my friend Maya’s house.
I kissed his forehead and promised him, “I’ll be there the second you wake up tomorrow morning, baby.” I couldn’t wait to get back to him.
I pushed through the heavy glass doors of the emergency exit and stepped outside.
A blinding snowstorm was pouring down, covering the street in thick, white powder.
The freezing wind slapped my face, burning my skin.
I pulled my scarf higher and started walking toward the street where Maya lived.
That was when a thick, metallic smell hit my nose.
Not human blood.
It was the heavy, iron scent of a werewolf instead.
I stopped.
“Hello?” I called out into the dark, snow-filled alley near the ambulance bay.
“Is someone there?” There was no answer.
A part of me wanted to leave but my feet turned instead.
I stepped closer to the dark corner.
Tucked behind a large metal trash bin, a massive man lay collapsed face-down in the snow.
Red blood was pooling quickly beneath his body, staining the white snow a dark crimson.
“Oh my god,” I gasped, dropping to my knees beside him.
I grabbed his broad shoulder and rolled him onto his back.
He was unconscious, his skin deathly pale and cold as ice.
I quickly unbuttoned his heavy coat and pulled back his shirt.
My breath caught in my throat.
Four deep claw marks tore across his entire chest.
They were so deep I could see his bones.
Black veins were spreading out from the edges of the open flesh.
This was no ordinary wound at all.
“You’re dying,” I whispered, panic rising in my chest.
Human medicine couldn’t fix wounds made by a beast like this.
But as I stared at his bloody, mangled chest, a terrifying wave of doubt hit me.
If I take him in, my entire world is over.
If a werewolf entered my home, my carefully constructed human life would be exposed completely.
What if he woke up and realized what I was hiding?
What if his presence forced us to pack up and run again, dragging Elias into another relocation?
Worse, what if he woke up, lost control over his wolf side, and attacked me before he even realized where he was?
And Elias.
I had promised my son I would be there when he woke up.
Bringing a dying wolf home meant breaking that promise.
It meant leaving Elias with Maya while I dealt with this man in my home.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
I was torn between the selfish need to keep my son safe and the doctor’s oath that I took before I became a doctor.
I couldn’t just leave a man to bleed out in the snow.
He could die.
Gripping his arms, I pulled him up with all the strength I had, dragging his heavy, limp body down the street toward my small apartment two blocks away.
It took every ounce of my strength to get him up the stairs and place him on my living room rug.
I rushed to the bathroom, grabbed a bowl of warm water and clean towels, and knelt beside him.
“Stay with me,” I pleaded, pressing the dry cloth firmly over his torn chest to put pressure on the bleeding.
The second my skin made contact with his blood, a strange, violent surge of heat erupted from the center of my chest.
Before I could breathe, a soft white light began to pulse from beneath my palms.
I gasped, terror shooting through my veins.
I tried to yank my hands back, but they felt glued to his skin by an invisible magnetic force.
What was happening to me?
Right before my eyes, the dark corruption on his flesh vanished into thin air, and the torn skin pulled together and closed.
The light died out as abruptly as it had appeared, leaving my hands trembling violently.
I backed away on my hands and knees, clutching my wrists and staring at my palms in horror.
I was a wolfless, ordinary human doctor.
I had no magic.
Was I going crazy?
Was the exhaustion I was feeling making me hallucinate?
The man let out a long, shuddering gasp.
His chest rose and fell as air rushed back into his lungs.
Suddenly, his nose twitched.
His head turned slightly toward the hallway that led to Elias’s small bedroom.
His eyes didn’t open, but his throat worked as he took a deep, desperate breath of the air inside my home.
“Alpha…” the man rasped, his voice weak and barely audible.
“Why…
Why do you smell like my Alpha?”