Selena watched that word hang between them-a single syllable that seemed to change the very atmosphere of the room. Mate. The effect on Damien was obvious and profound. The haunted, defeated look in his eyes was replaced by the raw, stunned disbelief. Rachel was to him as if she had just spoken a language he had only heard in dreams. This was the last thing he expected. He thought he was being judged as a monster, when she had skipped past it to the heart of their impossible connection in what he considered a tactical advantage: this had not occurred to her but it had worked. For the first time since her arrival, she felt she had a sliver of control. He swallowed hard, looking away from her as if the concept in itself were blinding light. "I don't know," he said, his voice rough with honesty. "Not completely. It is not a memory. It's… an instinct. Something the curse unlocked. It's a knowledge that's in my blood." He began to pace, not with the same caged-animal energy of last night but with the restless motion of man trying to piece together a fragmented map. "It's not… romantic," he clarified, shaking his head as though to ward off the very idea. "It's biological. Primal. It is a gravitational pull. The beast inside me... it sees you as an anchor. A balancing point. The only thing that matters more than the hunt. Every instinct was screaming to break it down; every instinct screamed to break it down to get to you, but the instinct to keep you safe was the only thing stronger when I was at your door last night."
Selena could listen with her rational, cynical head as a journalist, battling every word inside her. Mate. Anchor. Primal pull. This was the language of paranormal romance novels she secretly ate as a teenager, not the stuff of reality. It was absurd. It was illogical. And yet… she couldn't deny the jolt she'd felt the first time she'd laid eyes on him. She couldn't rationalize the intoxication, familiar scent of him that had thrown her so completely off balance. She couldn't explain why, after being terrorized by a monster, her first instinct wasn't to run to the police but to run straight back to him. As much as she wanted to reject it, his insane explanation was the only one that fit the bizarre and undeniable facts of her own experience. She felt a surge of indignation as if her own free will was being hijacked by some cosmic, supernatural decree. She was Selena Cross, independent and self-made. She was nobody's "mate." But as he spoke, his words triggered something else in his own mind. His brow furrowed, his eyes losing focus as he delved deeper into the chaotic library of instincts the curse had implanted. "There's more," he whispered, a new layer of dread entering his voice. "The dreams weren't just about you. They were warnings. Flashes of...lore. History."
He stopped pacing and looked at her, his expression now laced with a fresh horror. There are others. Like me. Clans, they're called. Ancient families, who carried this curse through the ages. They're under really strict laws. He was realizing the full extent of just how much he was caught up in it all as he explained it to her. "The wolf who attacked me, the bloodline from which my own descended, broke a sacred law by attacking a human with the purpose of passing on the curse. And me… last night..." The implication hung heavy in the air while he trailed off. "By coming to you, by... marking your territory with my presence on the night of my first change, I've broken their laws, too." Selena felt a cold dread seep into her bones. This was no longer about one man and his monstrous secret; it was bigger. "What laws?" she pressed, her voice urgent. "He spoke of a prophecy," Damien said, wide-eyed with the remembered terror of his dreams. "That if an Alpha of a cursed bloodline marks a human as his mate, all could come to an end. Either we would be saved, cured from our curse... or a plague would devour us all. And now they're hunting me. To stop this prophecy from coming to pass."
Her world dropped from under her feet. Within five minutes, she transformed from a reporter with a dangerous secret to the fated "mate" of a werewolf and finally the linchpin of a supernatural prophecy that could either save or damn an entire species of monsters she never knew existed. Her life wasn't just in danger anymore; it was the potential catalyst for a supernatural war. All of her plans-to get the story, to expose the truth, to control the narrative-dissolved. It was beyond big and dangerous, and she wasn't a reporter; she was the headline. She regarded Damien, truly regarded him, and saw not a billionaire not an alpha predator, and not even just a monster. No, she saw a man condemned, cursed king at the very center of a mythological storm whose ways he had no clue how to navigate. Fate, it seemed, made her an unwilling co-pilot. She took a deep breath, her mind shifting from shock to strategy. Fear was a luxury she couldn't afford. Running was pointless; if what he said was true, these "clans" would find them both. There was only one path forward. "Alright, Voss," she said, her voice devoid of fear, now steely professional calm that made him stare at her in renewed astonishment. "It looks like your problems go way beyond a simple PR crisis." She crossed her arms, the investigative journalist taking charge. "You're going to tell me everything you can remember about these clans, these laws, and this prophecy. We need to figure out who is hunting you. And we need to find them before they find us."