Three days. I'd spent three days thinking about Alexander Kane's impossible request, and I still didn't have an answer.
Well, that wasn't entirely true. I had an answer. I just didn't like it.
I stood in the parking garage beneath Kane Tower at eleven thirty PM, wearing all-black tactical gear and carrying enough silver ammunition to take down a small pack. My hands were steady as I checked my weapons for the third time, but my heart was beating like a drum.
Tonight was the full moon. Tonight, Alexander Kane would either prove he could control his curse, or I would put him down like the monster he claimed to become.
The elevator ride to the sixtieth floor felt like it took forever. I'd used my security access card to get into the building after hours - one of the perks of being Alexander's head of security. The building was empty except for a skeleton crew of guards, and I'd made sure to avoid them.
Alexander had given me detailed instructions three days ago. If I decided to help him, I should come to his private office before midnight. If I decided to kill him, well, his office was still the best place to do it. Soundproof walls, no witnesses, and a private elevator for easy body removal.
I'd thought I was ready for this. I'd killed forty-three werewolves without breaking a sweat. How hard could one more be?
But as I walked down the empty hallway toward his office, my steps slowed. This felt different from every other hunt I'd ever been on. For the first time in nine years, I wasn't sure I was doing the right thing.
The office door was unlocked. I pushed it open and stepped inside.
Alexander was standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows, looking out at the city lights. He'd changed out of his business suit and was wearing jeans and a dark t-shirt. Even in casual clothes, he looked every inch the Alpha - tall, powerful, dangerous.
But when he turned to face me, I saw something in his expression that I'd never seen in a werewolf before. Relief.
"You came," he said quietly.
"I said I'd think about it."
"And what did you decide?"
I looked at him standing there, so calm and controlled, and tried to imagine him as the monster he claimed to become. It was hard to picture. Even knowing what he was, Alexander Kane seemed more human than most humans I knew.
"I'm here, aren't I?"
He smiled, but it was sad around the edges. "That doesn't answer my question. Are you here to help me, or to put me out of my misery?"
I pulled one of my silver-loaded pistols from its holster and set it on his desk. "That depends on what happens tonight."
Alexander nodded like he'd expected that answer. "Fair enough. Thank you for giving me a chance."
"Don't thank me yet. If you hurt anyone tonight, I will put a bullet through your heart without hesitation."
"I know. That's why I trust you to be here." He walked to his desk and sat down heavily in the chair. "How much time do we have?"
I checked my watch. "About twenty minutes until the moon reaches its peak."
"Twenty minutes." Alexander closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I should warn you, Scarlett. What you're about to see... it's not like the controlled transformations you might have witnessed before. This is violent. Painful. And once it starts, the man you're talking to right now will be gone."
"For how long?"
"Usually about six hours. Sometimes longer if I fight it too hard." He opened his eyes and looked at me. "I want you to know, before this begins, that I'm grateful. Whatever happens tonight, you've given me more hope than I've had in five years."
"Hope for what?"
"Hope that maybe this curse can be controlled. Hope that I don't have to spend the rest of my life as a prisoner in my own body." Alexander stood up and walked to a wall safe I hadn't noticed before. He punched in a code and pulled out a set of heavy silver chains. "Hope that maybe there's another way to handle this besides suicide."
The chains made my stomach clench. "What are those for?"
"Insurance. There's a reinforced panic room behind that bookshelf. If you can get me in there and chain me down before I fully transform, you might be able to contain me without having to kill me."
I looked at the chains, then at Alexander. "And if I can't?"
"Then you use whatever force is necessary to stop me. No hesitation, no mercy. Promise me that, Scarlett."
The intensity in his voice made me meet his eyes. "I promise."
"Good. Because what's coming next is going to test every instinct you have as a hunter." Alexander set the chains on his desk and began pulling off his t-shirt. "You might want to step back. This is about to get ugly."
I'd seen werewolves transform before, but always during fights, always when they were already pumped full of adrenaline and rage. I'd never seen a controlled transformation, and I'd definitely never seen a cursed one.
This was nothing like what I expected.
Alexander doubled over like someone had punched him in the stomach. A low groan escaped his throat, and when he looked up at me, his silver eyes were already starting to glow with an unnatural light.
"It's starting," he gasped. "Scarlett, whatever happens, remember that the thing you're about to see isn't me."
His body convulsed, and the sound he made was pure agony. Not the growl of an angry werewolf, but the scream of a man being torn apart from the inside.
I'd seen rogues transform in seconds, their bodies flowing smoothly from human to wolf. This was the opposite of smooth. Alexander's bones were breaking and reforming with sounds like gunshots. His muscles were tearing and rebuilding themselves. His skin was stretching and splitting as black fur erupted from every pore.
And through it all, he stayed conscious. I could see his human awareness trapped behind those glowing eyes, watching in horror as his body betrayed him.
"Alexander," I said, taking a step toward him.
His head snapped up at the sound of my voice, and for a moment I thought I saw recognition there. Then his face began to elongate into a muzzle, and his human expression disappeared entirely.
The transformation took almost five minutes. Five minutes of watching a man be replaced by something that should have been physically impossible. When it was over, the thing standing in front of me was barely recognizable as the Alexander Kane I knew.
This wasn't a normal werewolf. Normal werewolves kept some human intelligence when they shifted. They were bigger and stronger than humans, but they were still fundamentally people wearing a different shape.
This thing was something else entirely.
It stood almost seven feet tall, covered in black fur that seemed to absorb the light around it. Its claws were longer than my fingers, its teeth were like ivory daggers, and its eyes burned with a hunger that made my skin crawl. When it looked at me, I didn't see any trace of human intelligence. Just predator instincts and barely contained violence.
The cursed wolf tilted its head and sniffed the air. Then it smiled, showing far too many teeth.
And that's when I realized it could smell my fear.
"Easy," I said, reaching slowly for my weapon. "Easy, Alexander. You know me. I'm not a threat."
The wolf's response was a growl that vibrated through my chest like a bass drum. It took a step toward me, and I could see the muscles in its legs coiling for a jump.
I drew my pistol and pointed it at the wolf's chest. "Don't make me do this."
For a heartbeat, we stared at each other. Woman and monster, hunter and prey, silver bullets and supernatural strength. I could see the wolf calculating its chances, deciding whether I was food or threat.
Then the office door burst open.
"Mr. Kane? Sir, we heard shouting and—"
The security guard stopped mid-sentence when he saw the massive wolf standing in the middle of the office. His face went white, his hand reached for his radio, and he opened his mouth to scream.
The wolf moved faster than anything that large had a right to move. One second it was across the room, the next it was airborne, claws extended, jaws open wide enough to bite a man's head clean off.
I didn't think. I just acted.
The silver bullet caught the wolf in the shoulder, spinning it away from the guard and sending it crashing into the bookshelf. Books and awards scattered everywhere as the wolf hit the floor hard.
"Get out!" I shouted at the guard. "Call in a gas leak evacuation and clear the building! Now!"
The guard didn't need to be told twice. He ran like his life depended on it, which it probably did.
The wolf struggled to its feet, silver blood streaming from the gunshot wound. It looked at me with those burning eyes, and this time I saw something new in them. Not just hunger, but rage. Pure, focused fury directed entirely at me.
"That's right," I said, keeping my gun trained on its chest. "I'm the threat here. Come and get me."
The wolf snarled and launched itself at me again. This time I was ready for its speed. I dove to the side and put two more silver bullets into its ribs as it flew past.
The impact sent the wolf tumbling into Alexander's desk, which exploded into splinters under its weight. But instead of slowing it down, the pain seemed to make it angrier.
It spun around and came at me again, claws raking the air where my head had been a second before. I rolled behind the couch and came up firing, but the wolf was already moving, using its supernatural speed to stay one step ahead of my aim.
This wasn't working. The silver bullets were hurting it, but not enough to stop it. And I was running out of room to maneuver in the confined office space.
The wolf seemed to realize this too. It stopped its frantic attacks and began stalking me slowly, using furniture as cover, cutting off my escape routes. It was hunting me now, and despite the silver poisoning in its system, it was winning.
I backed toward the windows, trying to keep as much distance as possible between us. But the wolf matched me step for step, those glowing eyes never leaving mine.
"Alexander," I said, though I knew it was useless. "If you're still in there somewhere, I need you to fight this. I need you to remember who you are."
The wolf tilted its head like it was listening. For just a moment, its eyes flickered, and I thought I saw something human looking back at me.
Then it lunged.
I emptied my clip into its chest as it flew toward me, but momentum carried it forward anyway. Two hundred pounds of cursed werewolf slammed into me, driving me backward into the window.
The reinforced glass cracked but didn't break. The wolf's claws raked across my ribs, tearing through kevlar like it was tissue paper. Its jaws snapped inches from my throat, held back only by my forearm pressed against its neck.
This was it. This was how I died. Killed by the one werewolf I'd actually tried to save.
But as the wolf's weight pressed me against the window, something unexpected happened. The moment our skin made contact - my bare arm against its fur - I felt the same electric tingle I'd experienced when Alexander and I first shook hands.
The wolf felt it too. Its eyes widened, and for the first time since the transformation began, it stopped trying to kill me.
"Alexander?" I whispered.
The wolf's head tilted, and I saw recognition flicker behind those burning eyes. Not full human awareness, but something. A connection. A memory of who it used to be.
The moment stretched between us like a held breath. Then, slowly, the wolf stepped back.
It sat down on its haunches like a giant dog and studied me with curious eyes. The rage was gone, replaced by something that almost looked like confusion.
"That's it," I said softly, not daring to move. "You remember me, don't you? I'm Scarlett. I'm here to help you."
The wolf whined softly, a sound that was heartbreaking coming from something so terrifying. It lowered its head and looked up at me with an expression that was pure Alexander Kane - frustrated, ashamed, asking for forgiveness.
I reached out slowly and touched the top of its head. The fur was softer than I'd expected, and warm beneath my fingers. The wolf closed its eyes and leaned into my touch like a pet seeking comfort.
"It's okay," I said, running my hand behind its ears. "You didn't hurt anyone. You're okay."
The wolf made a sound that might have been agreement. Then it curled up on the floor like an enormous dog and went to sleep.
I sat there for the next four hours, keeping watch over a cursed werewolf while silver bullets burned in its bloodstream and sirens wailed in the distance. I called in the gas leak story to cover the evacuation, arranged for the security guard to be transferred to a different shift with a significant raise and a story about hallucinations from gas exposure.
And I tried to figure out what the hell had just happened.
At four in the morning, the wolf began to shrink. The transformation back to human form was gentler than the first change, but still obviously painful. Bones resetting, muscles reshaping, fur receding into pale skin.
When it was over, Alexander Kane lay naked and unconscious on his office floor, covered in silver burns and claw marks.
I found a blanket in his private bathroom and covered him, then sat in the one remaining chair to wait for him to wake up.
He stirred twenty minutes later, groaning softly as consciousness returned. When he opened his eyes and saw me, his expression went through about five different emotions in rapid succession - confusion, memory, shame, fear, and finally, gratitude.
"Did I..." he started to ask, then stopped. "The guard. Is he alive?"
"He's fine. Transferred to days with a promotion and a convenient memory issue."
Alexander closed his eyes in relief. "And you? Did I hurt you?"
I looked down at the claw marks across my ribs. They were already healing faster than they should have, which was strange, but not life-threatening.
"Nothing I haven't survived before."
"I remember," Alexander said quietly. "Not everything, but... pieces. You shot me. Silver bullets."
"You were about to kill someone."
"I know. Thank you for stopping me." He struggled to sit up, wincing as the movement pulled at his healing wounds. "But that's not what I remember most clearly."
"What do you remember?"
Alexander looked at me with those silver eyes, and I saw wonder in them. "I remember your touch. The moment you put your hand on my head, the rage just... stopped. The wolf didn't want to hurt you anymore. It wanted to protect you."
"That's impossible."
"Is it? You felt it too, didn't you? That connection?"
I had felt it. The same electric sensation from our first handshake, but stronger. Like touching a live wire that somehow made me feel more alive instead of electrocuting me.
"I don't know what that was," I said honestly.
"Neither do I. But I've never maintained any awareness during a cursed transformation before. Tonight was different." Alexander managed to pull himself into a sitting position. "Tonight, for the first time in five years, I had hope that this curse might not be permanent."
"Because I shot you full of silver?"
"Because you touched me and made the monster remember it was human." He reached out slowly and took my hand. The moment our skin made contact, that electric feeling returned. "Scarlett, I think you might be the key to breaking this curse."
I stared at him. "What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about the fact that you're not just any hunter. There's something special about you, something that affects werewolves in ways I've never seen before." Alexander's grip tightened on my hand. "I'm talking about the possibility that you could save me."
"Or kill you."
"Or kill me," he agreed. "But for the first time since this nightmare began, I think there might be a third option."
I looked into his eyes and saw hope there. Real hope, not the desperate kind that led to bad decisions. The kind that came from actual possibility.
"What kind of third option?"
Alexander smiled, and it was the first genuine smile I'd seen from him. "The kind where we figure out why you can calm a cursed werewolf with just a touch. The kind where maybe, just maybe, we both get what we want."
"And what's that?"
"You get to save someone instead of killing them. And I get to be human again."
As I sat there in his destroyed office, holding hands with a naked werewolf while dawn broke over Los Angeles, I realized that everything I thought I knew about my life had just changed.
Alexander Kane wasn't just another target. He was a puzzle, a challenge, and possibly the key to understanding something about myself that I'd never even known was there.
But most dangerous of all, he was becoming someone I actually cared about.
And that was going to make everything that came next a whole lot more complicated.
End of Chapter 4