Prologue - Maeve
Prague - Nine months earlier
I was standing ina Prague alleyway at ten o'clock at night with a steak knife in my trembling hand, slick running down my thighs, and a brain that was so hazy that I had forgotten what I was supposed to do. Hazy enough for my legs to shake.
I’d waited in the dark with my back pressed against the cold stone wall while I listened for the footsteps to echo at the mouth of the alleyway. And then three shadows filled the narrow entrance, cutting off the amber glow of the street behind them.
Three alphas stared at me as the knife in my hand shook. With them came the scent.
It was gorgeous yet I’d never smelled anything like it before. It rolled in the air and into my veins. Warm and dark at the edges. Rich. Sweet. It was everything at once.
“Fuck!” I hissed under my breath as they blocked me from the safety of the street.
The plan had been elegant. One very hot blonde wig, a white coat, too much make-up, but now my plan was ruined.
The tallest one stepped forward first. His hazel eyes caught what little light the alley offered and held it. He moved with slow, deliberate steps, taking up the last gap I had to escape. He had sandy-blond hair. A scar above the right eye and a second one tracing his jaw, pale against tanned skin.
He said nothing but he stared at me as though I had two heads or perhaps it was because I still held the knife raised in front of me.
Then the scent hit me again. It was caramel, champagne and something darker. Storm-light, maybe. It threaded through the alleyway and straight into my bloodstream like it was mine.
The knife shook in my hand.
The ache in my body that I had been carrying for weeks like an infected wound, now flared so violently that my vision blurred.
I need to kill the ache.
The second man stepped up behind the first. Black hair. Pale blue eyes, the color of the sky when it’s about to snow, and something about the line of his shoulders. He looked powerful, dangerous. He stood like everyone around him always waited for instructions.
The third man filled the far side of the alley entrance without appearing to move at all. Dark brown hair, deep blue eyes and nostrils that flared like a bull about to run. He was bearded and broad in the chest. He said nothing but he looked at me the way a man looks at something he intends to have.
The knife was getting very heavy.
"You need to leave," I said. My voice came out steadier than I felt, which was the only win I could claim the entire evening. "I have a job to do. Get out of here."
"Put the weapon down, malen'kaya." The bearded one's voice was a low, gravelled command that landed somewhere between my ribs and my better judgment. "You’re in no condition to stab anyone."
I groaned. Humiliating as much as it was, but he was right. I was in absolutely no condition to stab anyone. The pain that normally wracked my body now turned into an ache in the last thirty seconds. Not just an ache but a rolling, disorienting wave of heat that had nothing to do with the cold Prague night. And my knees were still wobbly, making me look like I had too much to drink at the bar this evening.
"You don't understand—" The knife slipped from my hand, clattering against the cobblestones.
I looked down at it as the sound echoed in the narrow space.
“Fuck!” I looked up. The three men looked at me. There was a very long second in which I processed the profound gap between who I had been three hours ago and who I apparently was now.
I dropped to my knees… but large hands lifted me onto my feet again. “Leave it.”
“I need…”
“Leave it,” he growled.
Hot, wet slick rushed down my thighs at the sound of his command. What the hell was happening to me? I didn’t come here for this.
I pressed both palms flat against the tallest man's chest and pushed. He was built like a wall. Hard muscle, height, and heat.
He chose, for reasons I wasn't going to spend time analyzing, to step aside.
I ran.
