Maya's POV :
"Put some clothes on," I muttered, staring hard at the ceiling where a water stain had morphed into the shape of a sad owl. Or a melted raccoon. I didn't care—anything to keep my eyes off the very naked, very real werewolf standing three feet away in my exam room.
My face was on fire. Literally felt like my cheeks were cooking.
Kai blinked, slowly, like I'd just yanked him out of some deep fog. He looked down at himself—first his chest, then... yep, the rest.
"Oh Sorry."
Not that he looked sorry. He turned away, casually, like nudity was just... normal. And of course, the muscles in his back had to ripple like that. My stomach flipped. Hard.
I reached back blindly for the counter, misjudged, and almost knocked over a tray of syringes. They clattered. I yelped. Smooth, Maya.
"Does my nakedness bother you, Maya?"
His voice was like smoke—soft, curling around me, slipping beneath my skin. I could feel it more than hear it.
"Your nakedness makes it hard to think," I blurted, instantly regretting it.
Silence followed—thick, stretched out by the sound of rain ticking against the windows. I wished the floor would crack open and swallow me whole.
When I dared a glance, he was watching me as he pulled a pair of scrubs from a plastic bag. His expression was unreadable—somewhere between amused and dangerous. But beneath all of it was that heat again. Possessive. Raw.
"Good," he said, voice lower now. Thicker. The word hung in the air between us, a shared secret.
He tugged the shirt over his head and suddenly I could think again—sort of. I tried to shake off the fog. "Okay, focus," I mumbled. "You're not some teenager with a crush."
"The dreams," I said, latching onto something that wasn't his chest. "How do you know about them?"
He adjusted the scrubs on his frame, and the crinkle of fabric grounded me. "Because I've had them too. Dreams of you. Of protecting you. Of..."
He stopped. Jaw tight. Something flickered behind his eyes.
I swallowed. "Of what?"
His eyes met mine—stormy, intense, and startlingly honest. "Of things I probably shouldn't say out loud. Not yet."
My breath caught. "We didn't just meet, though... did we? You knew my name. You said I was yours."
He nodded once, slow. "The mate bond doesn't care about introductions."
He took a slow step toward me. His scent reached me first—pine needles after rain, electricity, and something wilder underneath. I felt like I could drown in it.
"My wolf recognized you the second you touched me," he said. "You're my mate, Maya. The one fate chose."
A laugh burst out of me—loud, shaky, way too close to hysterical. "Your mate? I don't even believe in werewolves, and now I'm destined to end up with one?"
Kai raised an eyebrow. A smirk tugged at his mouth. "What do you think you just witnessed, then?"
"A hallucination," I snapped. "Too much stress. Not enough sleep. Maybe a triple espresso was a mistake."
His smile sharpened. "Want me to shift again? Prove it's not a caffeine dream?"
"No!" It came out way too fast, high-pitched and panicked. "God, no. I'm good. Totally convinced."
I pressed a palm to my forehead, trying to calm the spiral. "Okay. So let's say I believe you. Werewolves, fated mates, whatever. That still doesn't explain the part where some demon-eyed psychopath wants to murder me. Or why you think I'm some magical Moon Baby."
His smile faded.
"The Shadow Council's been hunting the last daughter of the Lunar Bloodline for over twenty-five years," he said. "They need her power—you—for a ritual. One that'll tear the wall down between the supernatural and human world. They want to rule both."
I blinked at him. "Right. Sure. Because I'm so powerful. I'm a vet, Kai. I clean up dog vomit and talk people out of overfeeding their cats. The most magical thing I've done this week is convince a Great Dane not to pee on my shoes."
"You healed me," he said, voice quiet but solid.
I stared. "What?"
"When you touched me," he continued, "the venom in my bloodstream disappeared. My wounds closed. That doesn't happen, Maya—not unless someone has the true gift of healing. It's one of the rarest powers our kind knows."
I opened my mouth to argue, but nothing came out. I just… stood there, trying to make sense of a world that had flipped upside down in less than an hour.
"That's insane," I finally said. "If I had magic healing powers, I'd know. I would've… done something. Saved someone. Felt something."
"Your abilities were dormant," he said. "Suppressed. Probably by the same spells that hid you from the Council after your parents died."
That word—died—hit like a punch.
"No," I said, instantly. "No, my parents are alive. They live in Portland. I talked to my mom last week about Thanksgiving."
Silence.
Kai's face changed. Softer now. Careful.
"Maya... who do you think raised you?"
I frowned. "Marcus and Helen Chen. They adopted me when I was three. My birth parents died in a car crash—I've seen the certificates."
He nodded, slowly. "Those documents were fake."
My chest tightened.
"Your real parents," he said gently, "were Elena and David Silvermoon. Alpha and Luna of the Lunar Pack. The Council murdered them when you were a toddler."
The air left my lungs.
Silvermoon.
The name echoed somewhere in the back of my mind—familiar but foreign, like a dream I'd forgotten and suddenly remembered.
I shook my head. "Marcus isn't some stranger. He's my dad. He taught me how to ride a bike. He showed up to every school play. He packed my lunch with those stupid dinosaur notes."
Kai's gaze didn't waver. "He's your handler, Maya."
That word felt... wrong. Cold. Like something from a movie where no one ends up happy.
"A handler is someone assigned to protect and monitor a hidden asset," Kai said. "To keep you safe—but also keep you hidden. Keep your powers asleep until the Council needed you."
I backed up a step. "No. No way. That's not who he is."
"When was the last time you got seriously hurt around him?" Kai asked, voice calm but cutting. "Something that would've triggered your healing? A broken arm? A bad fall?"
I opened my mouth. Then closed it.
Images flickered—me crashing my bike at nine, spraining my wrist in high school, slicing my palm on broken glass in college. Every time... Marcus hadn't been there. He was always just—gone.
I grabbed for the one explanation that still made sense. "Coincidence. It doesn't mean—"
"Call him," Kai said, pulling out his phone. "Right now. Tell him you were attacked. See what he says."
I hesitated. My hands felt cold.
"He's your dad, right?" Kai said softly. "He'll be worried. He'll ask if you're okay. That's what dads do."
The phone felt too heavy in my hand.
I dialed.
It rang once. Then—
"Maya?" Marcus's voice came sharp, awake, not even groggy. "What's wrong?"
Relief surged in my chest. "Dad, something happened tonight. At the clinic. I—I was attacked by this woman, and she had these red eyes and claws, and—"
"Are you hurt?" he cut in. His tone was sharp with concern.
"No, I'm okay. But she said something about—"
"Did she mention any names?" he asked. "Any groups?"
I froze.
He hadn't asked where I was. Or if I was safe. Just… what she told me.
"She mentioned something called the Shadow Council," I said slowly.
The silence that followed was dead cold.
Then: "Maya," he said. The warmth was gone. His voice was all business now. "Where are you?"
"Still at the clinic."
"Are you alone?"
My eyes flicked to Kai. "No."
"Who's with you?"
I felt the trap tightening. "A… friend."
"Listen carefully," Marcus said. "Get away from whoever you're with. Come home now. Don't trust anyone until I get there. Do you understand me? No one."
The line went dead.
I stared at the phone. My heart felt like it had shattered inside my chest.
"He didn't ask if I was safe," I whispered. "He didn't offer to come get me. He just… wanted information."
Kai didn't speak. He didn't have to.
"Twenty-three years," I whispered. "He lied to me for twenty-three years."
A tear slipped down my cheek before I could stop it. I wiped it away, furious at myself for breaking.
Kai stepped closer. "Not all of it was fake. He must care about you, in his own way. But his loyalty was never yours."
I nodded, slowly, like my body was on autopilot.
"So what now?" I asked, my voice hollow. "What do I even do?"
"You come with me," Kai said. "My pack will protect you while we figure this out."
Thunder rolled again, low and rumbling like the world itself was groaning.
Somewhere in the distance, a howl rose. It should've made my blood run cold.
But instead… it stirred something inside me. Something ancient and aching.
"Your pack," I said. "How many of them are there?"
Kai smiled faintly. "Thirty-seven, last I counted. They're family, Maya. Real family. And they'll fight for you."
"Because I'm your mate."
"Because you're one of us now," he said. "That's what pack means."
The word hit me harder than I expected. Belonging. I'd spent my whole life feeling like I was circling a place I couldn't quite reach.
"What if I can't be what you need?" I asked, voice cracking.
He brushed his thumb along my cheek, light as breath. "You already are. Just by being you."
And then—a sound outside.
Engines.
Kai stiffened. "They're coming. We need to move."