Outside, the snow piles up.
Inside, Nash sets the bike back into a stable position, swings me into his arms, and walks us deeper into the glowing fortress of color and chaos that is his garage.
Christmas music, sugar, and sex in the air with Nash Rivera Callahan’s voice in my ear.
Fair to say, the holiday season just got a lot more interesting.
CHAPTER 1
The Past Knocked, So I Brewed Coffee
~REVERIE~
The nightmare always starts the same way.
Kael Draven's voice—smooth as winter bourbon, cold as the frost creeping across my windowpane—slithering through the dark corridors of my subconscious like smoke from a dying fire.
You're nothing without us, Reverie.
Just a broken little Omega playing pretend.
The words wrap around my throat, squeezing, suffocating, until I can't breathe, can't scream, can't?—
I shoot up from bed, gasping.
My heart hammers against my ribcage like it's trying to escape, and for a wild, disoriented moment, I'm not sure where I am. The darkness presses in from all sides, thick and suffocating, and I can still smell it—that awful combination of leather and expensive cologne andwrongnessthat always clings to Kael and his pack like a second skin.
Then reality filters back in through the panic.
The soft glow of my fairy lights, strung haphazardly across the slanted ceiling of my attic apartment. The familiar scent of vanilla buttercream from the candle I forgot to blow out before bed, now mixed with the crisp bite of November air seeping through the cracked balcony door. The weight of my favorite fuzzy blanket—the one covered in dancing snowflakes and sugar cookies—tangled around my legs.
Safe.
I'm safe.
I press a shaking hand to my chest, willing my heart to slow down, and flop back against my pillows with a theatrical groan that would make my online followers laugh. Except there's nothing funny about waking up drenched in cold sweat, my sleep shirt clinging to my skin, anxiety crawling through my veins like ice water.
How are you supposed to move on from a toxic ex when your brain keeps dragging you back to their dungeons every night?
I ran away to this small town specifically to escape the past, to build something new, somethingmine.
And yet here I am, still haunted by the ghost of Kael Draven and his pack of pretentious Alphas who treat me like a pretty toy to show off at events and discard when I no longer serve their purposes.
A sigh escapes my lips as I wipe the cold sweat from my forehead, my fingers trembling slightly.
I hate this feeling—this bone-deep anxiety that makes my stomach twist and my hands shake.It's like carrying a backpack full of stones everywhere I go, invisible to everyone else but crushing me with every step.
Kael is so good at making me feel small.
At taking every insecurity I ever whisper to him in vulnerable moments and weaponizing them.
You're too much, Reverie.
Too loud, too needy, too emotional.
No wonder your family didn't want you.
His Beta, Thorne, is even worse, with his cruel smile and cutting remarks disguised as concern.
