The groom blinked, confused. "What? I—what are you talking about?"
I ignored him. My gaze locked on hers. My mate. Only her answer was of consequence.
The need to claim her pulsed inside me like a living thing. The beast screamed for me to take her, to destroy any rival, to claim what was mine. But I held still. Waiting. Because if she had already chosen… I would let her go.
2
Tori
* * *
I was supposed to be getting married. The thought circled through my mind like a drunk moth, bumping clumsily against reality and bouncing away again before it could settle. Nothing about this moment made sense. Nothing about the world around me felt real anymore.
One second, I had been standing at the altar, my bouquet clutched in hands that had gone numb sometime during the opening prayer. The pastor's voice had droned gently through the sanctuary, the words blending together in a soothing rhythm I'd stopped listening to halfway through. Derek stood beside me, handsome and perfectly composed in his tailored tuxedo, exactly what a groom was supposed to look like—wealthy, confident, admired. The entire church smelled faintly of roses and polished wood, sunlight pouring through the stained glass in warm, colored ribbons across the floor.
Everything had been quiet. Predictable. Controlled.
Then the doors exploded. The sound shattered the air like a gunshot. Time fractured around the noise. I noticed the chaos first—the startled screams, the sharp scrape of chairs, the echoing thunder of heavy boots striking marble floors. Someone gasped. Someone shouted. The music stuttered to a halt.
Then came the light. Golden afternoon sunlight poured through the splintered doorway, illuminating the towering figure standing there as though the world itself had paused to frame him.
My breath caught. Because he was a monster. He had to be. No human man was that large. No human being moved with that kind of predatory grace, every step deliberate, controlled, powerful. He filled the doorway completely, shoulders nearly brushing the frame on both sides, his head almost scraping the top as he stepped inside.
And he was— Good God. He was half naked.
For a moment my brain simply stopped working. Fear should have been the first thing I felt. Terror. Panic. My heart was certainly behaving that way, hammering wildly against my ribs as if trying to escape my chest. My fingers trembled so violently my bouquet nearly slipped from my grasp. But my eyes… my eyes betrayed me completely. Because instead of screaming or fainting like a sensible bride under attack, I found myself staring at the most extraordinary male body I had ever seen in my life.
He wore leather pants. If those strained, struggling pieces of fabric could actually be called pants. The material clung to thighs the size of tree trunks, stretched tight across powerful hips that narrowed in a way that should have been physically impossible for a man of that massive size. The waistband rode low along his waist, revealing a sculpted abdomen that looked less like flesh and more like something carved by a master sculptor. Hard. Defined. Every muscle visible as he moved. Dark hair dusted that powerful stomach, trailing downward in a line my eyes followed before I could stop myself.
My breath caught. Because the leather didn't leave much to the imagination. The bulge beneath the tight material was impossible to miss. Huge. Thick. The shape unmistakable even from halfway down the aisle. My pulse thundered so violently behind my ribs it almost hurt. My body reacted before my brain had any chance to intervene. A slow, dangerous warmth curled low in my stomach. I wanted him. Wanted all that huge, hot man on top of me. Filling me up. I wanted to run my tongue over his skin and find out what he tasted like.
Oh god. What the hell was wrong with me? I was standing here, getting married, drooling over a complete stranger.
I forced my gaze upward, determined to reclaim some shred of dignity. That turned out to be a mistake. Because above that narrow waist was bare skin. Acres of it. Golden and powerful, stretched over a chest so broad it looked like it could stop a moving truck. Thick muscle shifted beneath his skin as he moved, each step making his shoulders roll with controlled strength. His arms were enormous, biceps flexing like coiled steel cables as his hands slowly curled into fists at his sides. He looked like a warrior carved from sunlight and violence.
And he was sparkling. Actually sparkling. Tiny flashes of light danced across his chest and shoulders as he walked, glitter catching the sun in ridiculous shimmering bursts. For one surreal second, I wondered if I'd finally snapped under the pressure of this entire insane wedding. Had someone slipped mushrooms into my tea? What the actual hell was happening?
I blinked hard, expecting the hallucination to vanish. It didn't. There was actual glitter on his chest. Something shiny and absurd that caught the light with every movement he made as he stalked down the aisle toward us. On anyone else it would have looked ridiculous. On him it looked like armor. Like war paint. The strange shimmer only emphasized the brutal beauty of him, turning his skin into something almost otherworldly as the sunlight struck it.
My pulse stumbled. He looked like something ancient and dangerous. Like a pagan god who had stepped straight out of myth. Or worse— like a warrior who had come for something. For someone.
Me. He was here for me.
My throat went dry.
I tore my gaze away long enough to glance at Derek standing beside me. My groom. My friend. The man who had asked me for a favor. A very expensive favor. Derek stood rigid now, his earlier confidence gone, his attention locked on the enormous stranger striding toward us. His jaw tightened, tension creeping through his shoulders beneath the perfect tailoring of his tuxedo. A small, ugly knot twisted inside my chest.
Because the truth was… Derek and I weren't here for love. Not even close. He was a billionaire. Famous in his own right. Brilliant, ambitious, ruthless in the way powerful men often were. He needed a wife for something complicated—some legal or financial arrangement I had never fully understood and never asked about. And I needed something too. A future.
Six months of marriage to an old friend. That was the agreement. Six months of playing the role of his devoted wife and I would walk away with enough money to start over completely. A new life. A clean slate. Freedom from the suffocating financial hole I'd been drowning in for years.
When I'd signed the contract in his lawyer's office, part of me had quietly died inside. The part that still believed in love. The part that had once imagined a wedding like this meaning something real. By the time we'd gone to the courthouse two days ago and quietly said our vows in front of a judge, I was already numb.
This ceremony was just theater. A performance.
The world thought today was our wedding day. In reality… we were already married. Fucking married. No one knew except the lawyers. Not the guests. Not the pastor. Not even Derek's mother, who sat in the front pew smiling through misty eyes, clearly dreaming of grandchildren that would never exist.
I had absolutely no intention of sleeping with my new husband. None. That wasn't part of the deal. We were friends and that was all we would ever be.
