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I sat at his tiny table and watched him pull out ingredients. The chaos of him—the way he moved, the way he talked, the way he filled every room he entered—surrounded me like nothing I’d ever felt before.

He was mine. He knew what I was. And he’d said yes.

Chapter Nine

Deadeye

Something stirred me awake. I’d fallen asleep in Niles’ bed, fully dressed, my mate curled against my chest. Something in the other room scraped, like metal against wood. I slipped from around Niles and melted into the shadows.

The noise was coming from the front door. Someone was trying to break in.

I moved through the dark apartment without a sound. The bedroom door stood open a crack, and I slipped through it sideways, my bare feet silent on the floorboards. The living room was dim, lit only by the sliver of moonlight bleeding through the window.

The front door handle jiggled again. Metal scraping metal. Someone was working the lock.

My wolf surged forward, pressing against my skin. Protect. The instinct was immediate and absolute. Niles was asleep in the other room, and someone was trying to get into his apartment.

I positioned myself against the wall beside the door, out of the sightline. The handle stopped moving. A pause. Then the sound of something sliding between the door and the frame. A credit card. A thin piece of metal. Someone who knew what they were doing but wasn’t good enough to do it quietly.

The lock clicked.

The door swung slowly inward, and a figure stepped through. Tall. Thin. The stale smell of cigarettes and sour sweat hit me before I saw his face. The neighbor from 3D. The one who’d stared at Niles like he was something to be consumed.

His eyes were fixed on the dark hallway leading to the bedroom, completely unaware I was standing close enough to snap his motherfucking neck before he could register my presence.

I grabbed him by the back of the head and slammed him face-first into the wall. The impact made a sound like a wet thud. His body went rigid then started thrashing. I held him there, forearm pressed between his shoulder blades, my free hand twisting his arm up behind his back at an angle that was one wrong move away from dislocation.

“Wrong apartment,” I snarled.

He made a choking sound. His cheek was mashed against the drywall, spit running from the corner of his mouth. The moonlight caught the side of his face, showing the wild whites of his eyes.

“This is my apartment,” he wheezed. “I live here.”

“Try again.”

“I was confused. I got the wrong door.” His voice pitched higher. “Let me go. I’ll leave. It was a mistake.”

“You make a habit of breaking into your own place?” I didn’t loosen my grip. My body stayed pressed against his, keeping him pinned, and my wolf snarled at the back of my skull. This wasn’t a mistake. This wasn’t confusion.

He’d come here for Niles.

“You’ve been watching him,” I said.

“No. No, I haven’t. I don’t know what you’re—”

“Don’t lie to me.” I leaned closer, my lips near his ear. “Niles told me about yesterday. You, in the hallway, how you looked at him, making him squeeze by you. Does that make you feel tough, or give you a sick thrill?”

I wanted to rip out his spine for that alone. The son of a bitch had scared Niles, seen that I wasn’t there to protect him, and preyed on someone much smaller than him.

“He’s got a mouth on him. That’s all. He’s rude. I wanted to teach him a lesson.”

The words hit my brain like gasoline on a fire. Teach him a lesson? This piece of human garbage had broken into my mate’s apartment to teach him a lesson. My hand tightened on the back of his head, and I was tempted to crush his skull.

“What kind of lesson?” I asked.

“Nothing. Just talking. I was going to talk to him.”

“At two in the morning. With a credit card.”