As Ethan made his way to his guests in the ballroom, he kept thinking about her, couldn't get over his fascination to his new wife. She was amusing. Terrible liar, too. He could see the way she was terrified of him but she stood her ground like a good little soldier. That brave little kitten.

Where did Cain find a woman like her?

He didn’t quite understand why his cousin would choose Sookie as his accomplice. Ethan wasn’t stranger to professional grifters with beauty, silver tongues and knock-out bodies. He brushed up with all kinds of characters in the underworld. Cain could have hired some pro but he didn’t. Did Cain choose her because she looked innocent? Or because she was his type?

Or maybe because Sookie was his mate?

The thought made him pause.

Nah, he dismissed it quickly. Cain couldn’t possibly know that fact. And there was no reason to announce that yet. No. He’d better keep that discovery to himself.

Was this whole thing nothing but pure coincidence? And why was his mate a human? A wolf always found his mate with another wolf, it had always been so since the beginning.

Over the centuries, intermarriage between packs had caused the numbers of purebloods to dwindle. To keep their unbroken line pure from the First—their progenitor ancestors—House Hunter practiced some degree of consanguinity. Humans might call them immoral but then again werewolves were not humans, though they were bound by the laws of humans. A pureblood Hunter often forsook the call of his true mate in favor of preserving the bloodline.

Ethan had heard some endless tales of loveless unions in his family, often ending in doom. Like his parents’ marriage. His mother couldn’t even stand his own father. She drank herself to death before Ethan reached the age of ten. Being a Hunter wasn’t always an easy, happy life. His father, the previous alpha, was a cold-hearted wolf who was unable to show his love to anybody. For him, duties to the pack came first. He drilled that creed into his son’s head religiously. Ethan had never been troubled with the mate problem before. To him, all females were the same. Nothing but sexual partners. Never form an attachment. Definitely not love.

Until he met Sookie.

The wolf within him wanted to howl and shed his skin. An overwhelming urge to claim her, mark her and make her his forever roiled inside him, threatening to destroy his level-headedness.

So, this is what it feels like to be head over heels toward a mate, he thought. Love is a scary thing. It hits you when you least expected and pulled you into a current of madness because logic and the voice of reason no longer mattered.

Even though she was planted by his cousin to deceive him, the thought of not being able to be with her made him irritated. She’s crazy if she thinks I’d let her go. What would Cain do after this? Would he lay low? Or would he prepare to rebel?

Ethan stopped before the double doors of the ballroom, hands paused on the handle. Shit, why did everything have to come at the same time? He had a lot to deal with already. Finding his mate was a distraction he didn't need. Nor one he could ignore.

With an inward sigh, he pulled the doors open and strode in. He made small conversation with a few guests before he announced that he'd be retiring for the night. He thanked everyone for coming to the party. His beta, Graystone, asked for his attention just when he was about to return to his chamber.

The investigator waited in his office. Jensen Weber was an invisible pack member, a spymaster who had served since the previous alpha. He was an old wolf with no remarkable features. His face and figure were so ordinary, he could blend into the wall and nobody would have noticed him. But Weber himself was intelligent, ruthless and dangerous. During his father's reign, Weber had disposed of countless enemies in the name of House Hunter and the pack. His service was invaluable.

The spymaster rose from the chair and inclined his head when Ethan entered the room. Graystone closed the door and remained standing while Ethan and Weber took their seats. Weber quickly launched his report. He opened a brown folder and extricated a stack of eight-by-eleven photographs.

Ethan examined them in silence.

Picture after picture of mangled, decapitated bodies. Some humans. Some werewolves. Then he saw the dead new breed. Ethan paused, examining them carefully. The new breed faintly resembled common werewolves. While the common werewolves shared ninety percent of their traits of Canis lupus, only three times bigger, stronger, faster and deadlier, the new breed was a bipedal beast with the body of a man and head of the wolf, coarse hair that covered its entire body, misshapen skull, and grotesque in appearance. The stuff of a madman's nightmare.

"These new breeds, are they formerly humans?" Ethan asked.

"I didn’t perform a necropsy on this particular incident. My best guess is our kind.”

“Does Alpha Strain affect humans the same way it does wolves?”

The spymaster’s expression turned grave. “Humans who had been infected with the alpha strain couldn’t be controlled once the transformation took place, unlike common-born werewolves. There was no sign of their intelligence nor humanity left. Their life span is also short unless the infected take continuous doses of the alpha strain. An infected human wants nothing, but kills the next creature and feeds. With werewolves, the infected retains some degree of cognitive functions and intelligence. They can be somewhat controlled until the effect is wearing off."

“And how long is that?”

“Infected humans will last ten days unless they are given a continuous dose. With werewolves, one moon cycle or so.”

Interesting, Ethan pondered heavily on that information. As a purebred direwolf, his very blood was toxic to others. A drop of his blood in an open wound could make a common werewolf or human suffer sporadic transformations before they succumbed into madness. The only way to obtain a pureblood power was through breeding. A halfling usually retained fifty percent of its sire’s power. Less if the dame was the purebred direwolf. And now, somebody had found a way to stabilize the alpha strain. If they succeeded, any werewolf could be made to be as strong as a direwolf.

This would only spell disaster.

Wolves were pack animals with a strong alpha who maintained the law and the pack dynamic. If everybody was an alpha, there would be fights for dominance and territory. Chaos would soon follow and it would attract unwanted attentions from humans. Werewolves had been successfully running under the radar within the general population because the alphas of each clan kept everybody’s paws on the line.

“What's the incubation period for the virus to manifest from infection to full transformation?" asked Ethan.

"With the latest strain?” Weber made a face as if he just tasted something distasteful. “Minutes, for both humans and wolves. I’ve witnessed it myself before I cut the poor suckers down.”

Ethan was taken aback. He hadn’t expected whoever hired these goons had made such advanced progress with the strain. This isn’t good. If they perfect the formula, all hell breaks loose, he thought grimly.

Rumor had it that his grandfather was the one who started to create manmade werewolves when he was the alpha. Fearing that pureblood direwolves would one day be extinct, his grandfather had his scientists extract the essence of what made a direwolf the king of all wolves. The substance was later named the Alpha Strain. His grandfather had slaughtered many old purebloods for his research. His action caused dissent within packs that ended with a coup d’etat. Ethan’s father assassinated his grandfather and took control as the alpha, preventing a civil war within the pack. He shut down the research and silenced the scientists that made them.

During his father’s reign, the Alpha Strain was a taboo subject to even whisper between the walls of Lunar Mansion. Ethan thought that was the end of House Hunter’s dark chapter. Then, two years ago, some beasts were reported killing pack members in a most gruesome way, and once again, the cursed Alpha Strain resurfaced.

Someone had revived the project. Ethan was convinced that the mastermind behind it didn’t only seek to preserve the pureblood line, he also wanted a global domination. Get rid of humans from the planet and populate the earth with only cryptids.

Contrary to popular belief, a man didn’t turn into a werewolf because he was bitten by one. A wolfman was born, the genetic anomalies were passed from parents to child. A common wolfman usually transformed into a regular wolf: fur, tail and quadrupedal, albeit stronger, larger, and more agile than their animal counterpart. A direwolf retained human characteristics when transformed. They walked on two feet, with fully functioning sharp and deadly five-digit claws instead of paws. Their heads morphed into the heads of a wolf, longer snout, razor-sharp teeth, a sharper sense of hearing, sight and smell. A direwolf was far larger than a common wolfman, hence the enhanced strength.

The spymaster’s information made Ethan uneasy. He tapped his fingers on the armrest. “Did you find any direct link that Cain’s the one responsible for these monstrosities?”

“That’s the problem. I haven't been able to find any connection to Cain. I suspect Cain financed this project and we’re still chasing the leads. An associate of mine is a former FBI forensic accountant. He had been working on this since last spring. We went through everything with a fine-tooth comb. We're sure we'll find some evidence sooner or later. Nothing can stay hidden in this day and age."

"What about the facility where these new breeds are manufactured?"

"We're still trying to locate it. I have a feeling it's an underground lab with the capability to generate its own electricity to avoid detection. We monitor any place that uses large energy consumption. With this level of sophistication in genetic engineering, I highly doubt they run a rinky-dink operation."

Ethan furrowed his brows. “Without concrete evidence that Cain’s the mind behind this project, all we have are rumors. I can’t mete out punishment based on rumors. It is not done.”

Weber looked chastised. “Forgive me. I haven’t been able to find the person behind your plane accident. If I may speak freely, Alpha. . .”

“Speak.”

“Why continue to pretend that you have amnesia? The one who came up with your marrying a mysterious woman was Cain. That alone is enough to bring him to tribunal trial.”

Ethan leaned back on the backrest. “I can. To be honest, I’m curious.”

Weber gave him a questioning look.

“I’m curious how far my cousin will carry on with this charade. Cain always played it safe before. One might wonder why he took such a risk now. Don’t you find this most intriguing, Jensen?”

Judging from his expression, the spymaster didn’t share the same opinion. He only inclined his head in silence.

Ethan decided it was time to see his waiting bride. His cock stirred just thinking about her. Would she hiss and bare her claws? She might look meek but she had a fiery temper in her. He smoothened his trousers as he rose. “Let me know when you find anything else.”

The spymaster got up and bowed.

Graystone opened the door for Ethan and shadowed him through the corridor like a wraith in haunting on his tail. His beta was a large wolfman but his steps were as silent as a ghost. “Keep a clear head, Alpha,” he said. “You might as well avoid liquor tonight. I didn’t like the look of your cousin earlier.”

“Oh? You never liked Cain’s face before.”

“This time is different.”

“Something I need to worry about?”

“Just a hunch for now.”

Graystone possessed sharp instincts. His hunch was usually dead on. Ethan clasped his hand on Graystone’s shoulder. He heard his beta’s warning loud and clear. “I wasn’t planning on drinking anyway.”

* * *

Sookie woke up with a pounding headache and parched throat. Her mouth tasted as if she’d been munching on a sandpit. A dull, reverberating pain thumped behind her eyeballs. Jesus Fucking Christ. Where am I? For a second she didn’t recognize where she was. She was in a stranger’s bed. She pushed herself to sit up, grimacing. Her bones felt like molasses. She just wanted to crawl under the covers and never see daylight ever again. Gah. This is why I hate drinking. Stupid hangover.

“Ah, you woke up. Good.” The grand alpha’s voice loomed out of nowhere. “We have to go. Be ready in five minutes.”

Hazy memories came back to her. Right. They were supposed to be getting to know each other intimately, but instead, I chugged down some vodka so I didn’t have to deal with it. Sookie winced. “Go? Go where?”

“Are you okay?” Ethan pressed his hand on her forehead. “You were out cold when I returned. You’re really a light drinker.”

So, he didn’t know that I got drunk on purpose.

Ethan grabbed a bottled of water from the mini fridge and handed it to her. “You have four minutes to get ready.”

What? “Why?”

He looked irritated by her question. “Just do as I say.”

Sookie scowled. She didn’t feel good. “Can I just stay? I feel nauseous. I have to go…” She quickly ran to the bathroom and bent over the toilet. With one foot, she closed the door shut. She washed her face and gurgled with mouthwash she found in the medicine cabinet. Great job, she thought. I manage to make myself look like a drunken idiot. When she finished, he was waiting, looking twice as irritated.

“Minus six minutes,” he remarked. He dressed her with the her silk gown. He grabbed his coat and draped it around her shoulders. He then found her shoes and patiently slipped them on her feet.

Sookie blinked, confused. What he did wasn’t alpha-y at all. Weren’t they supposed to be macho and all? “Can you tell me what’s going on?”

Ethan grabbed an overnight duffel bag from the bed and herded her outside. His stone-faced beta waited for them in the hallway.

“Car ready?” Ethan asked.

“At the south gate.”

Ethan tugged her elbow, signaling her to move faster. She had no other choice but to comply. The pack beta opened the door that lead them into the basement of the mansion. They descended through two flights of stairs and entered the door that brought them to a long narrow tunnel.

Her heart pounded. Something must be going on. Something bad. But neither Ethan nor his beta offered any explanation. She struggled to match the men’s long strides with her stiletto pumps and now her feet started hurting. It was a miracle she didn’t fall over. Ethan’s grip on her was too tight.

The tunnel eventually ended at a small landing with more stairs. Oh, yay, Sookie grumbled in silence. They glided up over it with great haste. Graystone opened another door that led them to the garage with a waiting SUV. Two men dressed in black acknowledged the alpha. The beta took the driver’s seat while she and Ethan sat in the back. The duffel bag that Ethan carried thumped against the floor. Sookie was certain that Ethan didn’t carry a change of clothes in it. Curiosity got into her but she didn’t dare to ask.

Ethan sat next to her, his expression betraying nothing. As soon as he shut the vehicle door, the pack beta gunned the accelerator. The SUV lurched into the street at high speed.

Sookie was sure that Ethan didn’t wake her up in the middle of the night for a midnight stroll. They were under attack, that much she could see. But from whom? Cain and his goons? Already? She didn’t expect that she’d be with Ethan when Cain did his thing. She thought she would be somewhere else, safe and reunited with her brother. The tension inside the SUV was like a high tensile string ready to snap. Ethan and Graystone didn’t speak a word. Judging from the look on their faces, they seemed ready to tear into anybody who stood in their ways.

Scary.

Her headache was gone and replaced with a new fear. How am I going to survive this? She didn’t know how long she could keep up this deception. If Ethan decided to question her on the spot, her defense would crumble down in an instant and she’d sing like a canary.

She bowed her head and put her hands on her lap. Anxiety crept into her like a sneaky thief, cold sweat on her nape. Where are we going? What will he do to me when he finds out the truth? Her stomach knotted so hard it gave her nausea. She couldn’t imagine what would happen to her if Ethan found out the truth. He’d kill her for sure. A big, tall man like Ethan would have no trouble snapping her neck as if it were a twig.

Oh, God. If I die, who’s going to save Jesse?

She couldn’t face the prospect that she failed her mother.

Mom, I fucked up.

Unexpectedly, Ethan covered her hands with his as if he wanted to comfort her.

It surprised her.

When she looked up to him, she found he was watching her, his gaze oddly warm. So, he didn’t suspect anything? Seriously? Serioooously? That was kinda too good to be true.

Graystone tore down the road that was cloaked by midnight like a demented Nascar driver. The SUV took them to the outskirts of the city. She closed her eyes, thinking about Jesse. Right now, her brother was locked in his cell under a remote facility somewhere, whose location she hadn’t been able to memorize. Cain’s goons had put a blindfold on her whenever they took her out.

Is he hungry? Do they feed him something at least?

She truly hoped they didn’t torture Jesse. She blinked her eyes so she wouldn’t cry. Crying was for suckers. For the weak. She had to be strong for her brother. Jesse had lost his twin and his mom and dad in a blink of an eye and even though he had never said it, it had been hard for him, too. Sookie and Jesse only had each other.

It’s you and me against the world, Jesse. Alone.

Half an hour later, Graystone stopped at the shoulder of the road, pulling behind a parked sedan. Ethan told her to get out. They changed vehicles. Graystone didn’t go with them. He stayed in the SUV, while Ethan drove the sedan.

Then they went on their separate ways.

She thought Ethan was covering their tracks pretty well if he didn’t want to be found out. Sitting on the passenger seat, she observed the situation. Ethan still didn’t speak a word other than telling her to buckle up. His face was serious. Grim, even.

Her skin pricked with uneasiness. The same feeling one gets when one stands next to a deadly animal in a cage. One knows it can’t get out, but if one stands too close to the cage, tempting fate, anything can happen. And at that very moment, Ethan was dangerous. She could feel it deep in her bones. She knew he was nice to her. So far. But the instinct to flee from him grew with every second. It took a strong will to squelch that urge.

Did he regain his memory?

Did he find out she was a fake?

She clasped her clammy hands together, praying to God for a big miracle.

Ethan exited the highway and drove toward a preserved park and land that hadn’t been developed yet. The road turned into a narrow street, then became an unpaved dirt path. Sookie held the side of her seat as the car glided uneventfully from the bumps and rocks. When the path ended at a rusty gate bearing a Do Not Enter sign, Ethan stopped the car and motioned her to get out. He gave her a flashlight.

She obeyed without a peep.

Even though the moon was bright, the woodland was quite dark. After Ethan shut off the car engine, she could no longer see her surroundings. She turned on the flashlight, wondering where he was planning to take her. The trees swayed gently by the midnight breeze, casting shadows on her puny source of light. It felt like phantoms were dancing in the background, ready to sweep in and devour her. A shiver crept to the base of her skull. This whole ambiance was freaking creepy.

Ethan grabbed his bag and slammed his car door shut without bothering to lock it. “Are you okay to walk?” he asked solicitously. He navigated his way with ease; he didn’t need a flashlight at all. He seemed fine walking in the dark. Then again, a wolf was supposed to have excellent sight.

“Yeah,” she answered meekly. “Where are we going?”

“A safe house. I have a cabin by the lake.” When she stumbled on the uneven ground, he grabbed her hand and led her onto a hidden path beyond the rusty gate. He noticed that her shoes weren’t meant for trekking in the woodland. Without a word, he shouldered his bag and then swept her off her feet, lifting her in princess carry.

“Ethan!” Sookie wasn’t expecting this. He supposedly had just recovered from a life-threatening accident. “What are you doing? Put me down.”

He replied with a grumble. “You’re too slow.”

“I can walk by myself just fine.”

“Nice try. You’re falling all over the place. We won’t get to the cabin until morning with your snail pace.”

“But—“

“Stay still. Or I’ll throw you over my shoulder and carry you like a sack of potatoes. You won’t like it.”

Eeek! Sookie quieted in an instant.

She clung to him while pointing the flashlight on the skinny path before them. Ethan moved with ease as if she weighed nothing. She was impressed with his strength considering she wasn’t exactly a pixie. Being so close to him like this stirred some new feeling inside her. Not fear. Something like… fondness? Oh God, she mentally smacked her head. He carries me like this and I fall for him? Just how desperate are you, Sookie?

Ethan’s cabin was situated next to the river’s edge. It had a boathouse and a pier. The moon bounced the light from the surface of the placid water, dimly illuminating the surroundings. He put her down on her feet. Even though the cabin was built in this secluded place, it was equipped with a high-tech security system. Ethan didn’t need keys to open the front door. He only punched the numbers and scanned his thumb on the keypad. The door whispered open. It was reinforced steel cleverly disguised with a wooden façade. She thought that the whole cabin was built the same way. It wasn’t just a safehouse. It was a fortress. Not even a tank could easily blast its way inside.

Actually, the cabin was very cozy. It wasn’t that big. It boasted one bedroom on the main floor and two upstairs. It had two bathrooms, a pantry, a medium living space and decent-sized kitchen with a table that could seat eight people.

Ethan put his bag on the floor next to the kitchen counter. She heard a metallic sound from it. She wondered if Ethan was packing some firepower instead of clothes.

“There are some clothes in the main bedroom if you’d like to get changed,” he said.

That was a good idea. Pretty as it was, the silk gown was a pain in the ass to wear.

“You can take a shower or bath too if you’d like,” Ethan added. “I imagine you might want to get comfy.”

“I’d like a shower. I think I still have a bit of a hangover.”

“I have some anti-nausea pills if you’d like.”

She shook her head. “A shower is just fine.”

“I’ll make you some coffee when you’re done.”

“Thank you.” Sookie watched him settle behind the desk in the living room area. It looked like Ethan’s personal workspace. The desk had a kickass computer with dual screens. A stack of unopened letters was haphazardly perched next to a writing pad. He powered on the computer and worked on his e-mails. “Do you come here often?” she asked.

“Quite.”

Sookie had a lot of questions to ask him but she hesitated.

“Yes?” he prompted when she didn’t do what she was going to do.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “You carried me over when you just recovered from a terrible accident. It was a long walk from the car.”

That earned her a smile, more like a smirk from him. “Are you worrying about me, wife?”

Her face heated in an instant. The way he said “wife” was heavily intoned with mocking. “Why shouldn’t I be?”

Twinkles of amusement danced in his eyes. “Werewolves heal faster than humans, in case you don’t know.”

“I heard something like that. Is it true that werewolves are also allergic to silver?”

“Hmm? Curious, are we? Are you going to stab me with silverware while I’m sleeping?”

A tiny annoyance bubbled up inside her. Can he just answer a straight question? “Yes, I was curious. And that was a legitimate question.” Her voice came a bit harsher than she intended. Whatever. She tried playing nice.

A pause. Another smile. “Common werewolves perhaps. A purebred like me is impervious against silver.”

Purebred. Gah. He sounded so arrogant about his pedigree, as if he was sired by the Holy Pope, Queen of England and the President of United States rolled together. Sookie wanted to ask whether he was registered with the American Kennel Club as well. “Good to know,” she said simply and sauntered to the bedroom.

She could feel the weight of his stare on her back.

That bastard enjoyed this very much.