Alexa paced in her bedroom length, like a restless panther on the rug, her bare feet making no sound. The disastrous, soul-searing kiss with Lysander, it all swirled in her head like a toxic fog. She felt…agitated. A low-grade electrical current seemed to hum under her skin, and she didn't know the source.
"This is ridiculous," she muttered to the empty room, her voice sharp in the stillness. "Get a grip. He's a monster."
But the memory of his smirk, the possessive feeling of his kiss, the way his silver eyes seem to penetrate her being.
One moment she was staring at her reflection in the mirror, the next she was pulling on a hoodie and dark leggings. The next, she was going down the stairs.
Her mind was a chaotic mumble. 'Just checking on a threat.' 'Ensuring he hasn't manipulated the guards.' ' I need to probe him.' The lies were flimsy, transparent even to herself. The truth was visible. She needed to see him. To feel that dangerous energy again, to prove to herself that maybe the kiss had been a fluke, a moment of temporary insanity.
Her heart hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs that she willfully ignored. She slipped past a guard dozing lightly at the entrance, her steps silent on the polished floor. It was alarmingly easy. 'Too easy,' a part of her whispered. As if the universe itself was conspiring to deliver her to him.
She reached the familiar, reinforced door to his cell. The cold, sterile air of the maximum security wing raised goosebumps on her arms. Her logical mind, finally screaming through the haze, kicked in. 'What are you doing? Turn around. Go home. Go back to your safe, pleasant life.'
She took a shaky step back, the spell momentarily broken by the sheer insanity of her actions. This was it. This was the line. She would turn around, walk away, and never look back.
And then his voice came, a low, soft rumble that seemed to vibrate through the very metal of the door, wrapping around her like a touch.
"Missing me already."
It wasn't a question. It was a statement of fact, laced with a knowing amusement that sent a jolt of pure, undiluted sensation straight to her core. That voice. It did things to her body, things she had no control over, warming her from the inside out and turning her bones to liquid.
She froze, her back to the door, her eyes squeezing shut. Denial was her only shield. She turned slowly, forcing a mask of cool indifference onto her face as she faced the bars.
"No," she answered, her tone deliberately nonchalant, a masterclass in acting she didn't feel. "I was just hoping you haven't dropped dead yet before my brother deals with you."
He chuckled. A low, rich, deeply masculine sound that seemed to resonate in the hollow of her stomach. Oh, God. She hated how much she liked it. She hated the way it made her feel seen and disarmed, how it stripped away all her defenses with a simple, auditory caress.
Inside the cell, Lysander watched her through the bars. The frantic, restless energy she'd carried with her was almost palpable. She was a storm contained in a beautiful, fragile vessel, and he found her utterly, devastatingly amusing. For a fleeting second, a rare and genuine warmth flickered in his silver eyes. This woman, with all her strength and false bravado, was the most interesting thing to have happened to him in millenniums. But the warmth was quickly banked, replaced by the familiar coldness of his eyes. Love was a luxury he couldn't afford. She was a tool, a pawn, a distraction. Nothing more.
"Come here, wild kitten," he beckoned, his voice a soft command.
The endearment, so absurd and yet so fitting, sent another shiver through her. She felt the urge to obey, a primal pull that was as terrifying as it was irresistible. But sanity held a tenuous grip. 'What was his game? What if this was it? What if the moment she stepped within reach, he decided to end the nuisance, to snap her neck and be done with it? The chains looked strong, but he was Lysander. Rules didn't seem to apply to him.'
As if reading the debate in her wide eyes, eyes he was beginning to find intensely captivating, he smirked. "I'm not going to kill you."
The assurance, delivered with that infuriating smirk, should not have been comforting. But it was. Against all logic, against every instinct of self-preservation, she believed him. The danger wasn't in her death, it was in everything else he could do to her.
Her hand trembled slightly as she reached into the small, hidden pocket of her hoodie. Her fingers closed around cold, forged metal. A spare key, the click of the lock disengaging was deafening in the silent corridor. The heavy door swung inward with a soft click.
She stepped inside, the air in the cell feeling different now, charged, intimate, thick with unsaid things. She stopped a few feet from him, close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body, to see the flecks of darker grey in his silver irises. He was so devilishly handsome. The sharp planes of his face, the dark slash of his brows, the perfectly sculpted mouth that had branded hers… His eyes held hers, drawing her in, promising ruin and revelation.
Lysander's mind was in a mess. The moment she stepped inside, her scent, peonies filled the small space, overwhelming the sterile air. His wolf, a presence he usually kept locked down with willpower, surged to the forefront of his consciousness.
"Kiss her," the beast growled in his mind, the voice raw and possessive.
"No," Lysander snapped back inwardly, his frustration a tight coil in his gut. This was unacceptable. She was a weakness.
"Just do it. I know you want to. She wants it too. Can't you smell it on her? The fear… and the want. They're the same scent." The wolf's logic was primal and undeniable.
"It's a trap. She's Lucian's sister."
"She is ours," the wolf insisted, the claim reverberating through his very soul.
Alexa watched, dumbfounded, as a series of expressions flickered across his face, frustration, conflict, a raw. His jaw tightened, his eyes flashing with an inner light. It was as if he was holding a furious, silent conversation with someone… or something… inside his own head. The sheer intimacy of witnessing this private war left her breathless. There was a battle raging within him.
Before she could process it, before she could step back and reclaim the safety of distance, his hand shot out. The movement was blindingly fast, the chains rattling a sharp, metallic protest.
His fingers closed around her waist.
The touch was electric, searing through the thin fabric of her hoodie. It wasn't a gentle hold, it was filled with possessiveness. The cold links of the chain brushed against her side, a stark contrast to the heat of his palm.
The world stopped.
Alexa's breath caught in her throat. Her eyes, wide and stunned, were locked on his. The rattling chains faded into a distant echo, and all that existed was the pressure of his hand on her waist, the storm in his silver eyes, and the terrifying, thrilling realization that she was exactly where some deep, hidden part of her had always wanted to be.