The calculating bastard. He’s been planning this. The threat rolls through me like ice. Because he’s not wrong—my reputation is hanging by a thread, and he knows it. There isn’t a news outfit out there that would believe me.
My jaw works, grinding so hard I might crack teeth. Every instinct screams at me to end him right here, right now. But the calculating part of my brain—the part that’s kept me alive this long—knows he’s got the power to follow through.
For now.
“We understand each other?” he asks, backing away with that satisfied smirk.
My jaw works, grinding so hard I might crack teeth. “What do you want?”
“Good choice.” He tucks the phone away. “I want you to stay the fuck away from James. Get in my way, cross me on this, and I’ll bury you both so deep you’ll never see daylight again.”
He takes my silence as agreement.
“Good boy. Keep it that way.”
Then he’s gone, leaving me alone with my rage and the lingering scent of her fear.
I drag in a breath, hold it, and let it burn on the way out as I try to push back the tide of white-hot rage that’s threatening to pour out of me. God, I hate that man.
The press is waiting, cameras ready to splash my smile across headlines by morning. But all I can think about is the terror in her eyes when she saw Felton. The way she’d gone pale as death, like she was seeing a ghost.
Or a monster.
Whatever history they have, whatever hold he thinks he has over her—I meant what I said. This ends now.
Even if it means risking everything I’ve worked for.
THREE
willa
“Easy, pretty girl.”
The mare flicks an ear back, muscles rippling under her glossy hide as I crouch beside her hind leg. My breath fogs in the cold barn air, sawdust packed tight beneath my boots. Even with the propane heaters rumbling overhead, the chill still finds its way into my bones.
She shifts nervously, hooves scraping against the floor, the scent of horse and hay mixing with faint antiseptic—comforting and sharp all at once.
“Don’t give me that look,” I murmur, forcing a smile that feels too thin. “I know my hands are cold.”
But it’s not the temperature that bothers her. Horses are sensitive, and whatever I’m giving off right now is a mess. My pulse hasn’t settled since Felton cornered me outside the alley. I knew it was only a matter of time before it happened, but I didn’t think he’d try anything in front of staff—right there on the damn floor.
And before Felton, there was Beau McCrea.
My traitorous heart does that stupid flutter thing again, just thinking about it. About him. Standing there in the chute, all confidence and controlled power, those ice-blue eyes findingmine across the arena like he knew exactly where to look. Like he could sense me watching him.
Get a grip, Willa. He’s just a guy. Just another Alpha cowboy with an ego the size of Wyoming.
Except he’s not just another Alpha. He’stheAlpha. The Saint of the Circuit. The man who stole my father’s championship and somehow made it look like poetry. The subject of every girlhood crush I ever had, plastered across my teenage walls in all his glory—eight seconds of perfection frozen in glossy magazine prints.
And seeing him in person? Watching him move with that easy grace, the way he settled onto Ghost Pepper like he was born there? The way those impossibly blue eyes locked with mine for just a heartbeat?
God, I’m pathetic.
I’m a professional. A veterinarian. A woman who swore off cowboys and their complications. And yet one look from Beau McCrea and I’m seventeen again, starstruck and thoroughly undone, my Omega perking up with interest despite every suppressant I’m on.
That’s exactly the problem—my Omega stirred, curious and traitorous, responding to an Alpha I have no business responding to.
And Felton—that bastard—smelled it. I know he did. Saw it in the way his pupils dilated, the way he leaned in too close, inhaling my scent that was slipping past the blockers after watching McCrea’s ride.
