But my gaze lands on Arion, while everyone else listens to the fast-approaching pack of wolves that want everyone to know they’re coming.

Just as Emit’s dark wolf bursts out of the forest—a savage animal in need of a kill, so unlike the Emit I know now—my gaze jerks to Arion again, as he leaps onto one of the men, knocking the guy from the horse.

He rides the man to the ground, landing on top of him, and I barely catch a glimpse of his fangs before he jabs them into the man’s throat.

Even Emit slams to an abrupt halt, and all eyes turn to the savagery of Arion feeding for what seems to be the first true time since the day he slaughtered my ancestors.

The men on the horses all drop their weapons as though they’ve grown unable to hold them anymore, paling, while Arion moans and groans in so much pleasure, ripping through the flesh of the tender throat like nothing has ever been better.

The wolves all take a step back when Arion’s head lifts, and his eyes darken just barely, as a bloody grin crawls over his face.

When he moves again, it’s not so slow or uncertain. He’s fast as he flies onto another man, and right behind him, a dainty young woman, with soft blonde hair, licks her lips, staring at the dying man Arion’s left on the ground. Without another second of hesitation, she goes for him.

As if the shark-infested water has recently been chummed, seven more come leaping out of nowhere. Vampires act like bloodthirsty vampires, quickly hunting down their corralled prey, who’ve unknowingly set their own trap.

Blocked by a crescent of wagons, a short but steep mountainside, and an army of wolves slinking out of the woods to get a closer look at the vampires in a feeding frenzy—

My phone blares next to my ear, playing some annoying, ridiculous song about hands clapping. Who the hell did that to me?

I blink, my eyes taking in the sunlight pouring through the cracks in the curtains, as I glance around the familiar room.

Annoyed, I sit up, numbly fumbling around, idly remembering I fell asleep while Vance was dealing with a phone call. I’ll process that crazy dream later…when I’m finished processing every other crazier thing in my life.

“If I didn’t appreciate you waking me up during the strangest dream I’ve ever had in my life, I’d hate you for calling while this very obnoxious ringtone is on my phone,” I mumble by way of greeting, unsure about who I’m even talking to.

“I’m just glad you’re alive. It’s okay if I was still high this morning; I still got here in time to open the shop. People love our quirk, so business is booming,” Tiara assures me over the phone as I screw my eyes shut again.

“So is my mounting credit card debt, if these new texts are any indication,” I say on a heavy sigh, peeking open one eye to read through the many alerts I already have, after I put her on speaker.

“Oh, that. Yeah…that’s just some things to spruce up our room. Think of it as an investment, since we’re doing a lot of updates around the house. Are you just waking up?” she asks, abruptly shifting the topic. “Because we’ve wonderfully handled the store all day and we’re about to close it,” she adds like that affords some ridiculously priced hat my newest alert informs me about.

“For the record, this is the first time I’ve gotten quality sleep in I can’t remember how long. And I was drained by a vampire,” I inform her in a dry tone.

Another text comes through—a very costly, very large bed being custom made...

“So…you gave the beta vampire an invitation,” Tiara drawls.

She says it in a way that makes me feel as though she’s leading me into a trap.

Another text. Another expensive item.

Oh, so I’m being punished for inviting Shera in, and those wicked omegas are going to hit me in the pocket since they can’t fight any other way.

“I think I need to turn off my alerts before I get sick,” I murmur, half emotionally hung over, half still asleep. “And, yes, that happens after you’ve survived a kidnapping together.”

She sniffs. “If I were a beta, you wouldn’t have even been abducted.” She clucks her tongue. “Unfortunately, the fight or flight instinct doesn’t allow for that. Flight is always attempted first. Purebloods are even more driven by instinct than the turned wolves, under normal circumstances.”

“Under abnormal circumstances?” I ask.

“It’s no coincidence that Idun is rising and all of us feel stir crazy and more aggressive than usual—which is hard to top, even under normal circumstances.”

“Tiara, I’m sorry, but I can’t do this conversation this early.”

“The sun is starting to set,” she dutifully points out, but rushes to add, “but I get what you’re saying. We’ll discuss Idun later, since we’ll all be dead when she rises. No big deal.”

She hangs up on me, and I stare up at the ceiling.

“Anna, it’s times like these when I could really use you,” I say on a huff.

“You should fuck Arion already,” a familiar young voice says, causing me to shriek and go with my own flight response to being startled.

Unfortunately, my legs get tangled in the sheet and I crash to the ground with a hard grunt and a muttered curse.

“Violet?” Vance calls from…somewhere else in the house, almost sounding amused.

“Just perfect,” I bite out, glaring over at the ghostly triplets, who are smiling at me from the window right beside me.

My own flight response landed me closer to the intruders. Not farther away.

“Sorry not sorry,” the middle one says, smiling like an ass. “It’s sort of sad hearing you speak to Anna so much, so we’ve decided to forgive you now that the spirit draining piece is gone from you.”

I touch my chest reflexively. Surely I should have felt something like that missing. The first triplet arches an eyebrow.

“Are you disappointed it’s gone?”

“Just confused by the mysterious appearance and disappearance of it.”

“Back to the point of Arion,” the one closest to me says, growing impatient. “You need to be with him before Idun rises. It’s important to break their bond.”

I give her an incredulous look. “What happened to not interfering with the living? And since when do you care about monster politics?”

“We don’t,” the other two say with a dramatic roll of their eyes, before giving the odd-ball triplet the stink eye.

“What we want is for you to do more curse breaking, because it’s brought us out of the very beginnings of the ghost sickness. She’s just starting to debilitate again,” the middle one says, tossing a thumb in the other sister’s direction, who is no longer an odd ball.

Now I realize they were just annoyed she was rushing their agenda too eagerly.

“I’m sorry, but breaking alpha curses is easing your ghost sickness? When did you even get sick?”

“We had a few crazy weeks where we had to use a lot of our ghostly, very costly gifts to evade some of your Portocale kind who sneak in at a different time once a year to wipe out harmless, easy-to-kill spirits haunting this town, in an effort to keep themselves alive,” the no-longer-odd-ball says.

Couldn’t they have died in pajamas that had their names on them? Is that too much to ask? Or maybe not be identical or something?

“The point is, we need you to break some more curses—preferably all of them for every alpha—that way we also get our immortality,” the one on the other end chimes in.

“But for now, you can start with bedding Arion. If Idun rises before Arion’s bond to her is truly broken, he’ll be on her side and the new war will take precedent over the curse breaking,” the eager one goes on, her knee bouncing as she stares very intensely at me.

“How long has the spirit draining…thing been gone?” I ask by way of diverting the conversation.

“Unimportant,” the now-aggressive one says as she moves even closer to me. “What is important is Arion. He’s making it easy, and you’re being stubborn. Break his bond to her so you can focus on the rest of his family and all the other alphas, erasing curses one by one.”

“I had to screw Damien while he was a monster to break his curse. I’m not having sex with every man or woman in his family,” I tell the ridiculous ghost.

“Why not? You’re opening your legs to all the other pretty monsters,” the one on the far end drawls.

“You wear a lot of red,” the one in the middle randomly interjects as she absently stares at her nails. “Our mother always said only whores wear red.”

“Your mother also killed you so she didn’t have to be a mother, so I think she’s the worst person to take advice from,” I reasonably point out.

“You paint yourself with a scarlet letter and hold back when it can help. You prove over and over you don’t care about ghosts. Either you do as we say, or we’ll—”

I spot my folded bra on the bottom of the table, cupping my pile of bottled armor, and I grab a salt ball and toss it over my shoulder, cutting off the aggressive one.

I feel them leave, because the air lightens immensely. It’s sort of an empty threat when a little salt can make you disappear.

“This is why I shouldn’t make eye contact. They’re not all like Anna,” I mutter under my breath as I force myself to my feet.

Wearing the shirt Vance left me after my shower, I round the hallway, following the direction of his nearly muted voice that grows louder the closer I get.

“She’s coming up soon, so make sure the front lines understand their role. We can’t afford to lose too many men right now. Not with Arion still claiming neutrality,” he’s saying.

When there’s no response, I realize he must be on the phone. Again.

“Five are on the list for turnings. That will give us a boost in—”

His words pause when he’s suddenly walking out, and his eyes collide with mine.

Great. Now it looks like I’ve been eavesdropping instead of just deciding whether or not it was okay to simply walk in without an invitation.

Seemingly unconcerned, he rakes his gaze over me and starts talking into his phone again.

“I’ll check in later,” he says before hanging up, and I awkwardly fidget.

“Sorry. Just wanted to warn you that the triplets are trying to meddle in monster matters. I’m not sure as to what severity they can cause issues,” I say in an effort to recover.

It looks like he almost smiles, but it’s gone before I can be certain. He slides his hand to the back of my neck and pulls me to him like he’s about to kiss me.

I cover my mouth, causing his eyebrow to arch. “It’s morning, and I don’t have a toothbrush.”

He pulls back, an amused expression on his face as he gestures inside.

“It’s actually late evening. I made breakfast for dinner, in case you’re hungry.”