Chapter 3 : Sienna

The music dies mid-beat. At first, I thought it was a glitch, but then the screaming start, cutting through the smoke-heavy air. The floor shakes as bodies shove past me, spilling drinks, knocking over stools. A crush of perfume, sweat, and fear slams into me all at once. My skin prickles. I push up on my toes, trying to see. People are running for the exits, others frozen in place, their wide, horrified stares fixed on the back of the club. And then I see it. Oh God. Near the back door is a body—what's left of one. A werewolf, torn apart mid-shift. The body is caught between forms, human limbs twisted at wrong angles, fur matted with blood, bones exposed like someone ripped the wolf out from the inside. Werewolves don't die like this. They're not supposed to. They heal. They survive. They're untouchable. This one isn't. Something stole that from him, and I've seen this before. Not in person, but in my mother's secret notebooks. The ones I'm not supposed to have, the ones my father doesn't know about. She wrote about kills exactly like this. Wolves torn apart by something that shouldn't exist, something that could make them weaker and less strong than they are. She called it Project Fenrir. And she died three days after writing that name. Kieran steps between me and the body, blocking my view like a wall of muscle and menace. His eyes aren't on me—they're fixed on the corpse, glowing faintly, gold bleeding through the dark. He inhales once, sharp, nostrils flaring. His hands twitch at his sides. For a terrifying second, I think he's going to shift right here, right now, tear the club apart to find whatever did this. My voice catches in my throat. I want to say his name, but I can't push the sound out. He turns then, finally looking at me. And the weight of it—the raw, feral thing inside him—pins me harder than any hand ever could. But there's something else in his eyes. Recognition. Like he knows why I'm really here. Like he can see straight through my Luna Chaser disguise to the researcher underneath, the girl following her dead mother's footsteps into danger. My heart stutters. This isn't the distant, untouchable Alpha from the streams and rumors. This is a predator deciding whether I'm prey or a threat. He's in front of me in a blink, one hand catching my wrist before I can even flinch. The heat of his grip sears into my skin, the strength in it effortless and terrifying. "If you're smart," he says, voice low, vibrating with something not entirely human, "you'll go home. You'll forget this. Forget me." My pulse stutters, frantic in my chest. "I—" His grip tightens, not painful, but enough to silence me. His gaze drops once to the silver at my throat, then drags back up. "You don't belong here, little human. Not with us. Not with this." His jaw ticks. "And if you're your mother's daughter, you already know that." The words stop my heart. He knows. He knows who I am. Who my mother was. "Next time," he continues, voice dropping to something darker, "if it's not me who finds you first..." The threat hangs unfinished, but clear. I nod. I don't even think about it. My body moves before my brain catches up. Then, as if he's testing me—or maybe warning me—he lets go. My wrist burns where his fingers were, my lungs finally filling with air again. Around us, chaos churns—shouts, the stink of blood, Maddox barking orders at anyone dumb enough to linger. But Kieran doesn't look away from me. Not once. "Run," he murmurs. And for the first time all night, I actually listen. *** Isla and I aren't speaking. Ever since The Den, she's been giving me the kind of silence that cuts deeper than words. She finally breaks it the second she throws her car into the park outside my parents' place. "Jesus Christ, Sienna," she snaps, hands gripping the wheel so hard the leather squeaks. "Do you even realize what we saw back there?" The image hits me again before I can stop it: the body sprawled across the floor, bones split, skin torn, caught between man and beast like someone yanked the wolf out mid-shift. Just like the photos in my mother's journals. "It wasn't random," I murmur. "Whatever did that—it knew exactly what it was doing." Isla whirls at me, eyes wide. "Are you seriously analyzing this? We saw a murder, Si! And that Alpha—" She breaks off, shaking her head. "He knew you. He knew your mother's name." My throat tightens. "I know." "Then you know you need to stay away. Whatever your mom was researching, whatever got her killed—" "Might be the same thing killing Kieran's pack," I finish quietly. Isla stares at me like I've lost my mind. Maybe I have. "Get inside," she finally says, voice tight. "Your perfect stepsister is visiting tomorrow. Try not to get murdered before then." I slip out of the car and head toward the house. The porch light flickers—it's been broken for weeks—and for a second, I swear I see movement in the shadows. I freeze. Nothing. Just paranoia and adrenaline. I unlock the door and step inside. The house is dark, quiet. My father's probably already asleep. Savannah won't arrive until morning, which gives me a few hours to— There's an envelope on the console table. My name scrawled across the front in sharp, jagged letters. My breath sticks in my throat as I tear it open. A single slip of paper falls into my hand. Three words. WE SEE YOU. Not "I." We. My hands shake as I flip the paper over. On the back, printed in small, clinical font: Dr. Lilian Hart knew too much. So do you. —The Architects The name punches through me like a blade. The Architects. The organization that my mother mentioned in her final journal entry. The ones she feared. The ones who might have killed her, and now they're watching me.