Isla Grey, the wolfless disappointment her family pretends doesn't exist, has remained invisible for seventeen years. Isla suffers in quiet as she counts down the days until her eighteenth birthday, when she will finally be able to flee, while her ideal sister Celeste shines as the pack's golden child.

However, fate has a nasty sense of humor.
Rowan Blackwood, the future Alpha, her sister's fiancé, and the boy who made her upbringing a living nightmare, is the last person she would ever want to form a mate bond with when her wolf finally appears on her birthday.

Isla makes an instant decision to reject him and flee.
She is no longer the terrified youngster who hid in the dark after five years. As "Grey," a well-known architect in the human world, she is stunning, prosperous, and at last free. However, she learns three things when she is forced to return to Blackwood territory due to a career opportunity:

One: Rowan never came to terms with her rejection. Two: He has spent the last five years looking for her. Three: The most terrifying thing of all is that he's not the harsh boy she remembers.
For Rowan Blackwood wants more than just her return. She is necessary to him. And in order to demonstrate that he is deserving of another opportunity, he will employ every tactic in his toolbox, including coercion, seduction, forced intimacy, and the irresistible pull of a mate link that never really shattered.

Isla, however, has her own secrets. The reasons behind her actual running. secrets about her transformation. And mysteries about the true reason their relationship has the power to either entirely ruin or save the werewolf world.
Rejection, she believed, would liberate them both. She was mistaken.

"Maya's fine. The guards got her out safely."


Rowan's voice cuts through my panic, his hand steady on my shoulder. We're still in the diner booth, my phone face-down on the table between us.


"How do you know?" My voice cracks. "How do you—"


"I called Finn the second you dropped your phone. He contacted the warriors protecting her. They're taking her to a safe house right now." His silver eyes are fierce. "No one is touching Maya. I promise you."


I want to believe him. But Elder Mira was supposed to be safe too.


The funeral was yesterday. Closed casket. The entire pack pretending to mourn while I stood there knowing someone killed her because she was kind to me.


"No." Rowan's hand tightens on my shoulder. "This is the fault of whoever is doing this. Not yours. Never yours."


But it feels like mine. Everyone who shows me kindness ends up hurt.


Chapter 10 - The Growing Feelings