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Nova’s ex was called Johnny.

I close the gap between me and Paul in one stride and slam my hand around his throat. A vile taste floods my mouth, fury and hatred. “You’re from Ridgemore?” I spit, my face barely a breath away from his.

Paul’s eyes widen. Finally… there it is.

Fear.

He nods.

Something in my eyes has changed. He is truly afraid of me now.

“Johnny?” I can barely choke out the name, my voice low and dangerous. “He was your son?”

Paul’s face is reddening. He nods from beneath my fist.

This wretched man’s spawn tormented Nova. Branded her. Fucked with her. Made her a murderer.

“You ever meet his girlfriend?”

I loosen my grip enough so that Paul can speak. “The witch? Yeah I met her. Would have fucked her, given the chance. Glad I didn’t, now I know what she is.” He licks his upper lip. “Thank fuck Johnny never impregnated the thing.”

“Luther…” Nico mutters a warning.

My skin is on fire. My entire body feels like it’s going to explode.

I move to the back of Paul’s chair. My knuckles whiten around the edge of the back, the wood creaking under my grip.

“Mind you,” Paul muses as if we’re two guys chatting shit in a bar, “he wouldn’t have been the first to use a knitting needle to end a hybrid pregnancy.”

A tsunami of bile rises in my throat, and I slam my hands onto the sides of Paul’s skull. His hair sizzles, then his skin. I send waves of fire down his arms, over his chest, up his legs.

This time, I don’t stop.

I let the heat consume his pathetic, gnarly genitals.

He screams so loudly the curtains sway and the ceiling rattles. He screams until he passes out, and I stand back and watch him burn.

10

TANNER

“Oh,” Thornfield narrows his eyes at me. “I thought Nova was coming?” In the museum’s entrance hall, he stands, as usual, stock still. He’s like a fucking statue. Like his movements are all calculated, controlled, thought through. He barely ever folds his arms, or scratches his chin. He’s the picture of composure.

Except when he encounters werewolves, apparently. Because the way he is with Sam is not calm or composed.

“She’s busy.” I don’t like the way he looks at her. She told me what happened between her, Thornfield, and Kole. And, sure, it turned me on. I mean, I’m fine with her wanting the guy.

But I’m not okay with him wanting to fuck her. I don’t trust him not to go for a bite – to try and taste the blood he’s heard so much about. So, when she got up to leave, I suggested she stay with Mack and Snow.

“I’ll go,” I said gently, kissing her forehead. “You enjoy the sunset from up here. Just the three of you.”

It broke my heart to see the look in Mack’s eyes as he nodded his thanks at me. And then made me feel horribly guilty because my motivation was to keep her away from Thornfield, not to give him more time with her.

I bite my lower lip.

Something in Mack’s demeanor is bothering me. I know he’s in pain. But it’s more than that; it’s like he’s given up. And I don’t know how to handle that.

Sam, too, is in trouble. He’s absent more than not, and I’m struggling to know how to bring him back into the fold of the group when we have so many other things to deal with.