It washer.
Ava said Nadia was made of sunlight. I’d pictured someone soft. Breakable.
Someone I’d have to shield from the world.
What I got was a woman with shaking hands and a stare that didn’t flinch.
Curves built to wreck a man’s focus.
Dark hair a mess over her shoulders like she hadn’t had time to care.
Brown eyes full of fear, but not surrender.
She was scared.
She wasn’t broken.
And she wasgorgeousin a way that made instinct slam into control, hard and fast.
Something low in me tightened. Something like possession. The brutal kind that doesn’t ask why.
It hit me all at once—
She wasmineto protect.
And I’d kill anyone who made her flinch like that again.
By the time I got her moving again, the Wolves were gone, but I didn’t trust gone. I trusted patterns. Wolves didn’t sniff once. They circled back.
And I’m not letting them find her twice.
Getting her moving was the easy part. Keeping her safe is the rest.
I keep her in my mirrors and take the narrow road first, holding the lead. She follows in her car at a careful distance, headlights steady behind me.
Good.
She’s shaken, but she’s not reckless. She keeps her distance. She doesn’t rush. She follows my lead.
The cabin sits a few miles off the main road, tucked between pines like it’s trying to disappear. It’s an old hunting place the club keeps stocked for exactly this kind of situation. No neighbors. No cameras. No casual traffic.
A locked cabinet with supplies.
A second locked cabinet with solutions.
I pull up and cut my engine. Nadia’s car rolls to a stop behind me.
She doesn’t get out.
She just sits there with both hands on the steering wheel like she’s afraid if she lets go, the world will tilt.
I give her a few seconds. Then I walk back and knock lightly on her window.
She jolts so hard her shoulders hit the seat.
Her eyes find mine. Wide, dark, and furious about it. Like she hates that her body still startles. Like she hates that I saw it.
Damn it.
