I don’t know where it comes from— something inside me has snapped. Rage pours out, blinding and hot. There’s something else—something not me—rising to the surface. An instinct. A beast.
My nails sharpen into claws.
Lydia tries to scramble away, but I’m faster. My hand lashes out, claws raking across her face. Fabric tears. Skin splits. She screams—sharp, panicked—and still I don’t stop. My fists pound down on her as blood pours from her face, her hands useless as she tries to cover it.
“Stop this, Cleo!” one of the guards yells, grabbing me from behind. His arms lock around my waist, dragging me back.
The world snaps back into focus.
Lydia lies sprawled, blood seeping through her fingers. Her sobs fill the hallway.
“Get off me!” I snarl, still shaking with fury.
“Lydia!” Maya’s voice cracks, rushing to her side.
“Look what you did!” Maya shouts, eyes wide with horror.
“Me?” I bark, chest heaving. “She brought this on herself!”
“Enough, Cleo.” The guard’s voice is tight, his grip firm. “Calm down. Or we’ll have to call your father.”
His name hits me like a slap—cold and hard. Everything goes still.
My hands tremble. Claws still extended. Lydia’s blood coats my fingertips. And the weight of what I’ve just done begins to settle in my bones.
I blink, trying to clear the red haze from my vision, and I finally see her—Lydia, crumpled against the wall, her face a mask of blood-red agony.
“You’re going to pay for that, Cleo,” she gasps between sobs, her eyes bright with unshed tears and hatred. Her threat slices through the last wisps of rage within me, leaving a cold, hollow space in its wake realizing what I’ve done.
“Go cry to my father, Lydia. Make sure you tell him what you said, though!” The words call back at her as I keep walking.
Upon reaching safety, I shove the door open and slip through, slamming it shut behind me. The guards, those watchful hawks, remain outside, their presence a reminder of the gilded cage I’m trapped in.
Before I can sigh in relief, a hand clamps over my mouth, silencing the scream that instinctively rises. My elbow shoots back, connecting with a wall of muscle—a familiar firmness that halts my panic. “Gotta do better than that, love,” Zayn’s voice rumbles against my ear, his laughter a low vibration.
“Zayn!” I gasp out his name, spinning in his grasp, my hands splayed against the hard planes of his chest. His gray eyes dance with mischief, a spark of wildness that mirrors the tumultuous storm within me.
“Missed me?” He smirks, the arrogance that so defines Alpha Zayn Holt written all over his infuriatingly handsome face.
“Like a thorn in my side.” Even as I say it, my body betrays me, leaning into his touch, craving the heat of his skin on mine.
“Is that why your heart’s racing? Or just the adrenaline of smacking Lydia about?” He chuckles as his thumb strokes my cheek, wiping away an invisible smear of her blood. “You heard?”
“Someone live streamed it,” he tells me. Great, my father is going to hand me my ass.
I jab a finger toward the door, my pulse racing with a mix of alarm and excitement. “You shouldn’t be here,” I hiss, acutely aware of the danger his presence poses.
“Relax, Cleo.” He closes the distance between us in two easy strides. His smirk widens, and there’s a predatory glint in his eye that both alarms and thrills me. “They won’t hear a thing. And talking was never on the agenda.”
Before I can muster another protest, his hands are cradling my face, thumbs stroking my cheeks with a tenderness that contradicts his brazen nature. Then, he’s leaning down, his lips mere inches from mine, and I’m caught in the gravitational pull of his kiss as his lips brush mine.
My fingers tangle in the fabric of Zayn’s shirt, pulling him closer as our kiss deepens. The world outside—the whispers, the guards, Lydia—dissolves into nothingness. There’s just Zayn and his delicious scent. My hands, driven by a desire that feels bone-deep, slip beneath his shirt, craving the warmth of his skin against mine.
“Easy, love,” he murmurs against my lips, his voice a deep rumble that resonates within me. He takes my wrists gently but firmly, easing my hands out from under his shirt. “Soon.”
I want to protest, to pull him back to me and lose myself in the heat of his embrace, yet the reality of my situation presses in. “You can’t stay here,” I whisper, my words laced with an urgency that mirrors the frantic beating of my heart. My gaze darts to the door, half expecting it to burst open and my world to shatter into chaos.
Zayn’s gray eyes lock onto mine, steady and unshakable. “Let them try to take me away,” he says, the corner of his mouth lifting in a half-smile that does dangerous things to my resolve.
