I stare around me at the villa that Kent has brought me to under the cover of night. It's beautiful: an airy, spacious house nestled in the countryside outside the city. The furnishings are modern, clean, and bright, and the large windows will surely light up the entire place during the day.It's gorgeous, and I don't want any of it.Kent takes me on the tour anyway, leading me through the expansive kitchen and dining room toward the staircase that leads to the upstairs bedrooms.There are four bedrooms, the largest of which has been turned into a sort of detective office. Photos of Charles and his associates, the Alpha family, and various copies of documents are pinned to all the walls."Sorry to take over the master bedroom," Kent says. "But we need all the space we can get if we're going to bring these assholes down. The other bedrooms are just as nice, I promise.""It's fine," I say dismissively. "I don't need a fancy bedroom. I'm going to sleep in that little servant's room.""Wh
Marcus paces around the meeting room behind the library, feeling uneasy. There is still no word of Nicole, despite his staff's best searching. Everything they investigate turns up only the news that Nicole is dead, plain and simple. She isn't, Marcus can almost swear to it. He doesn't know how he knows – despite their other supernatural gifts, werewolves aren't psychic – but he just knows. Or, more accurately, his wolf knows. Marcus still isn't sure what to make of that.
"Are you ready?" Kent asks me. He's sitting at the kitchen table in my villa, drinking a cup of coffee from the fancy espresso machine on the countertop and scrolling through his phone. He hasn't even looked up, and I clear my throat impatiently. "What?" he asks, finally raising his head. "You look great. I told you that you would – you don't need me to approve your outfits." "Well, excuse me for being a little nervous on my first day a
Nine o'clock in the morning was nothing compared to the early shifts I had when I was an intern at the hospital, and I've always been an early bird, so I'm feeling bright and cheerful when I pull up in front of the Alpha's mansion the next morning. It's a truly beautiful building, I can't deny that. A little ridiculous for one family, but then again, I guess a lot of the staff do live and work here, too. It's a three-story brick home with a circular drive, a marble statue of a wolf standing in the middle of a fountain out front.
A week later, I'm woken up in the middle of the night by someone roughly shaking my shoulder. "Nicole, get up," Kent says frantically, shaking me relentlessly. "Hurry. It's Ty." I snap to attention immediately, throwing off my covers and scrambling for my robe, years of medical training having honed me to be instantly alert under these circumstances.  
I am, quite predictably, exhausted at the Alpha's mansion the next day. Fortunately, there's a lovely little staff kitchen on the same floor as my office, and it's always stocked with very good, very strong imported coffee. I lean back in the leather chair behind my desk, sighing gratefully as I inhale the rich aroma of hazelnut wafting up from my third cup of the day. Man, this coffee is delicious. I think they have it specially flown in from some fancy little cafe in Paris, Claire said.
Marcus checks his watch again. Lydia subscribes to the idea of being "fashionably late," a concept that Marcus personally cannot stand. His mother does it, too, and it drives him up the wall. In Marcus's view, a dinner reservation is for seven, you should arrive at the restaurant by seven at least, if not a few minutes before. To do otherwise is disrespectful to the establishment and the workers' time. However, he can't seem to get the rest of h
"How are we feeling this morning?" I ask, keeping my voice cheerful and light as I enter Ty's room. It's Saturday, so I'm off from my work at the Alpha's mansion today. I draw back the daffodil-patterned curtains to let the sunlight stream into the room and across the bed. Normally, a free Saturday would mean that I'd be looking forward to a day of takeout food and trash TV. Unfortunately, poor Ty is still in rough shape, and my evenings and weekends are devoted to his recovery for the foreseeable future.