One Night Stand With the Alpha Who Rejected Me-

"You smell that, little wolf?"

The whisper didn't come from the air, but from the back of Sharon’s mind, a dark vibration that made her fingers curl tightly around the steering wheel. She killed the engine, the silence of the coastal drive suddenly feeling heavy. The scent was faint—a ghost of cedar, rain-drenched earth, and something metallic that made her inner wolf pace with frantic, jagged energy.

She hadn't smelled that scent in four years.

"Not possible," Sharon whispered to the empty car. She forced her breathing to level out, her eyes scanning the gravel path leading to her cottage. The Oregon mist was rolling in, thick and gray, swallowing the pines. Everything looked normal. Her small porch light was on, the flowerbeds she’d spent all spring weeding were damp from the afternoon drizzle, and the curtains were drawn. It was the picture of a quiet, human life.

Then the front door flew open.

"Mama! You're home!" Alexander came charging off the porch, his small boots thumping against the wood before he hit the gravel at a full sprint.

Sharon was out of the car before he could reach her, bracing herself as he launched into her arms. Even at five years old, Alexander had the explosive strength of his lineage, his small body a compact bundle of energy. She buried her face in the crook of his neck, breathing in the scent of flour and laundry detergent.

"Oof, you're getting so big, Xander," she laughed, though her eyes never stopped moving, searching the tree line for shadows that didn't belong.

"Blie let me help with the pancakes!" he announced, his voice vibrating against her chest. "I flipped one and it didn't even fall on the floor!"

"That’s my boy," Sharon said, finally setting him down but keeping a firm hand on his shoulder.

Blie stepped out onto the porch, her infant daughter strapped to her chest in a soft wrap. She offered a tired but warm smile. "He’s a natural in the kitchen, Sharon. My little one, on the other hand, decided today was the day for a twelve-hour lung capacity test."

"I'm sorry, Blie. I owe you one," Sharon said, her voice sounding tight even to her own ears.

"Don't worry about it. You look exhausted. Rough shift?"

"Something like that," Sharon replied, her gaze flickering to the woods behind Blie's head. The shadows there seemed too deep, too intentional. "The wind is picking up. You should probably get the baby inside."

Blie frowned slightly, sensing the shift in Sharon’s mood, but she nodded. "Yeah. I'll see you tomorrow? Don't forget we're doing the park run."

"I won't. Get home safe."

Once Blie’s car disappeared down the road, Sharon ushered Alexander inside and locked the door. She slid the deadbolt home with a decisive click, but the hollow feeling in her stomach didn't vanish. The kitchen was a disaster zone of sticky syrup and flour, but she didn't have the heart to complain. Alexander babbled through dinner, recounting every second of his day, but Sharon could barely hear him over the roar of her own pulse.

A sharp cramp twisted in her gut—low, hot, and sudden. She gasped, dropping her fork.

"Mama? You okay?" Alexander’s big brown eyes were wide with worry.

"I'm fine, honey. Just a little stomach ache. I think I worked too hard today," she lied, forcing a smile that didn't reach her eyes.

"You should sleep. I can tuck myself in," he offered bravely.

"In a minute, baby. Let's get you cleaned up first."

The routine of bath time and stories usually acted as a shield, but tonight, every creak of the floorboards sounded like an intrusion. As she tucked the covers around Alexander’s chin, the memory she’d been fighting all day finally broke through her defenses.

“You want to come, don’t you, little wolf?”

The voice in the memory was a low growl, vibrating through the small of her back. She could almost feel Luthor’s hands on her hips, his fingers digging into her skin as he held her arched against the headboard. The room in her mind was dark, smelling of sex and dominance.

“Please,” she’d whimpered, her palms slipping against the wood. “Luthor—Alpha—please.”

“Good girl,” he’d murmured, his teeth grazing the sensitive cord of her neck. “Tell me who owns this. Say it.”

“Yours,” she’d sobbed, the pleasure so intense it felt like pain. “Always yours.”

“Damn right.”

The memory of him filling her, the sheer, overwhelming power of his knot and his will, made her knees buckle in the present. She gripped the edge of Alexander’s bed, her breath coming in ragged hitches.

"Mama?" Alexander’s voice was a tiny thread in the dark.

Sharon shook her head, dragging herself back to reality. "Go to sleep, Xander. I'm right in the other room."

She stumbled into the living room, her skin feeling too tight for her bones. She didn't turn on the lights. Instead, she sat on the sofa, watching the front door. The cramps were getting worse, a rhythmic tightening that felt less like an illness and more like a physical reaction to a presence she couldn't see.

"Mama?"

She jumped, her heart nearly leaping out of her chest. Alexander was standing in the hallway, his face pale in the moonlight.

"Xander, I told you to stay in bed."

"There’s a man," he whispered, his bottom lip trembling. "He was at my window. He was just... looking."

The world turned cold. Sharon stood up, her movements fluid and predatory as her wolf rose to the surface. She grabbed a heavy fire iron from the hearth, her senses expanding.

Crunch.

The sound was faint—a single footstep on the gravel outside. It was slow, deliberate, and utterly confident. It wasn't the sound of a prowler. It was the sound of a king returning to his territory.

The scent hit her again, no longer a ghost but a tidal wave. Cedar. Rain. Smoke.

Luthor.

"Stay behind me," Sharon commanded, her voice dropping into a low, warning growl that made Alexander scramble to hide behind her legs.

She moved to the door. Her hand shook as she reached for the handle, but she forced it still. She was no longer the terrified girl who had fled in the middle of the night. She was a mother, and she was a wolf of this pack, even if it was a pack of two.

She swung the door open.

The man standing on her porch was a mountain of shadow and muscle. He was dressed in a dark coat that caught the mist, his hair longer than she remembered, his jaw shadowed with stubble. But his eyes—those gold-flecked, predatory eyes—were exactly the same. They tracked her with a terrifying intensity, moving from her face, down to her throat, and then settling on the small boy peeking out from behind her.

Luthor’s mouth curved into a slow, devastating smile.

"Hello, little wolf," he said, his voice a deep rumble that seemed to vibrate through the very floorboards under her feet. "You’ve been very hard to find."

"Leave," Sharon rasped, her grip tightening on the iron. "You have no right to be here."

Luthor took a step forward, and even though he didn't touch her, the sheer weight of his Alpha presence made the air in the room feel thin. He ignored her weapon, his focus entirely on Alexander.

"Is that him?" Luthor asked, his voice softening into something even more dangerous. "Is that my son?"

"He's my son," Sharon hissed, stepping further in front of Alexander. "He has nothing to do with you or your pack. We left that life behind."

"You left," Luthor corrected, his eyes snapping back to hers with a sudden, sharp heat. "I never let you go. And a wolf doesn't forget his mate, Sharon. No matter how many miles she puts between them."

He reached out, his hand hovering just inches from her face. Sharon flinched, but she didn't back down. She could feel the heat radiating from him, the same heat that had once been her entire world.

"You smell like him," Luthor murmured, his nostrils flaring as he took in her scent. "But beneath that... you still smell like me. Like you’re still waiting for me to finish what we started."

Another cramp seized her, and this time, Sharon couldn't hide the small moan of pain. Luthor’s expression shifted instantly from smug to predatory. He was inside the house before she could swing the iron, his hand wrapping around her wrist with the force of a steel trap. He disarmed her effortlessly, the iron clattering to the rug.

"You're in heat," he growled, his eyes darkening until the gold was almost gone. "My presence triggered it. Your body knows I’m here, Sharon. It’s calling for me."

"No," she gasped, trying to pull away, but he pulled her flush against his chest.

Alexander let out a small, frightened whimper. Luthor’s head snapped toward the boy, his gaze softening for a fleeting second before returning to Sharon.

"Take the boy to his room," Luthor commanded, his voice vibrating with the Alpha tone that demanded absolute obedience. "Now. We have things to discuss that aren't for his ears."

Sharon fought it. She clawed at his arm, her teeth bared, but the biological pull was too strong. Her wolf was howling, not in fear, but in recognition. Her body was betraying her, the heat blooming in her core until she was shaking with it.

"Go, Alexander," Sharon managed to choke out. "Go to your room and lock the door. Don't come out until I say."

The boy didn't hesitate, terrified by the raw energy rolling off the man in their living room. He bolted down the hall, and the sound of his door slamming shut seemed to signal the end of Sharon’s resistance.

Luthor didn't waste a second. He backed her against the wall, his hands pinning hers above her head. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, inhaling deeply.

"Four years," he breathed against her skin. "Do you have any idea what I’ve done to find you? Do you know what I’m going to do to you now that I have?"

"I hate you," she whispered, even as she arched her neck to give him better access.

"I know," he murmured, his teeth grazing her marking spot. "But you’re still mine. And tonight, I’m going to remind every cell in your body who your Alpha is."

He hoisted her up, her legs instinctively wrapping around his waist. The fire she’d tried so hard to extinguish was roaring back to life, fueled by the man who had started it. As he carried her toward the bedroom, Sharon knew her quiet, human life was over. The Alpha had come to claim his own, and the little wolf had nowhere left to run.

"Any number of times you’d like," Sharon promised, her voice a soft anchor in the quiet room. She reached down, gently sliding the book from Alexander’s lap. "But we have to finish the story first, okay? No skipping to the end."

Alexander’s small fingers lingered on the colorful edge of the cover before he finally let go. "The dragon wins, right Mama?"

"The dragon always protects what’s his," she murmured.

As his lashes began to flutter, heavy with the weight of sleep, Sharon watched him with an intensity that bordered on worship. In the dim glow of the bedside lamp, the resemblances she tried to ignore felt sharper. At seven, he was already gaining that lanky height, his limbs stretching out as if eager to leave childhood behind. His hair had darkened from the pale flaxen of his toddler years to a rich, sandy brown, but it was his eyes that sometimes made her breath hitch—that specific, piercing blue.

She hated that she saw Luthor Michaels in the tilt of the boy's head. She hated that fragments of the Tenzclaw Alpha were stitched into the person she loved most. But she reminded herself, over and over, that Alexander was her heart, her anchor. If he carried Luthor’s shadow, she would be the light that drowned it out. Every drop of blood she had spilled to escape the pack was a down payment on a life where Alexander would never know the rot of their politics or the cruelty of his father’s "love."

"Sleep now, little dragon," she whispered, pressing a kiss to his warm forehead.

His breathing deepened into the steady, rhythmic pull of a child far away in dreams. Sharon eased out of the room, leaving the door cracked just enough for the hallway light to slice across his rug.

The cottage was silent. It was the kind of peace she had spent seven years building, brick by painful brick. Yet, the moment she stepped away from his door, the ache in her stomach returned. It wasn't the dull throb of hunger or the sharp cramp of stress; it was a slow, grinding pressure that vibrated against her ribs.

Something is wrong.

She stood in the hallway, her bare feet pressing against the cool wood. She tried to tell herself it was just the anniversary of her flight, or perhaps the heavy fog rolling off the coast. But the instinct was too loud to ignore. It was a pull—a magnetic, sickening tug toward the front of the house.

She moved silently through the living room. The shadows here felt different tonight—heavier, as if they were leaning in to listen. She reached for the front door, her fingers hovering over the deadbolt.

"Don't be a fool, Sharon," she breathed. "It's just the wind."

She opened the door anyway.

The night air was thick with the scent of the salt marsh and damp pine. A storm was brewing somewhere over the Pacific, and the wind carried a low, mournful hum through the trees. Sharon stepped out onto the porch, closing the door behind her to protect the warmth—and the boy—inside.

She reached for the magic in her blood, the power that had truly woken the night she left Luthor. It didn't feel like a foreign tool; it felt like her own breath, a shimmering extension of her soul. She let it spill outward, brushing against the grass, the trees, the pebbles in the drive.

The land felt restless.

"Is someone there?" she called out, her voice barely a whisper.

The porch light flickered. Snap. Snap. The sound was sharp, like a bone breaking. Sharon’s heart slammed against her ribs. The air suddenly felt charged, the atmosphere thickening until it was hard to draw a full breath. There was a metallic tang on her tongue, an electric charge that she hadn't felt in seven years.

It was him.

The realization didn't come as a thought, but as a total physical collapse of her security. Her wolf stirred, pacing in the dark cage of her mind, whimpering in a mix of terror and ancient, carved-in submission.

"No," she gasped, clutching the porch railing. "No, you can't be here."

She had buried herself so deep. She had used every ounce of her magic to shroud their trail, to turn their names into dust. An Alpha shouldn't have been able to find her. Not after this long. Not here.

The crickets abruptly went silent. The wind died, leaving the trees frozen like jagged teeth against the gray sky. Sharon’s hand white-knuckled around the doorknob. She thought about running back inside, grabbing Alexander, and driving until the road ran out. But her feet wouldn't move.

A shadow shifted at the edge of the yard, just beyond the reach of the porch light. It was tall, broad-shouldered, and stood with a stillness that was more terrifying than any movement.

"Luthor?" she rasped.

The shadow moved, stepping forward into the fringe of the light. She couldn't see his face clearly yet, but she saw the tilt of his head—that arrogant, possessive curiosity. The porch light flickered again, casting a strobe-like effect on the figure.

She saw the glint of his eyes. Cold. Gold. Constant.

He didn't need to speak. His presence was a physical weight, a command that pressed down on her shoulders, demanding she drop to her knees. The ache in her stomach twisted into a sharp, white-hot knot of recognition.

"You've grown quite the thorns, little wolf," a voice rumbled from the dark. It was deeper than her memories, rougher, like stones grinding together.

Sharon’s breath caught in her throat. "How did you find me?"

"I never stopped looking," Luthor said, taking another step. Now she could see him—the hard lines of his face, the scar across his brow that hadn't been there before, the expensive dark coat that looked out of place in her rugged coastal world. "You took something that belongs to me, Sharon. You didn't think I'd let that stand, did you?"

"He doesn't belong to you," she snapped, her fear momentarily eclipsed by a mother’s rage. "He is nothing like you."

Luthor’s mouth curved into a dark, mirthless smile. He looked toward the house, his gaze lingering on the window of Alexander’s room. "I could smell him from the road. My blood. My strength. You did a fine job of hiding, but a sire always knows his own."

"Get off my property, Luthor. I have a life here. I have a pack here."

"A pack of humans and a broken witch?" Luthor stepped onto the first stair of the porch. The wood groaned under his weight. "That’s not a pack. That’s a hiding spot. And the game is over."

"I'll kill you before I let you touch him," Sharon said, her fingers beginning to glow with a faint, shimmering violet light.

Luthor stopped, looking down at her hands with genuine amusement. "Magic. So that’s how you did it. You’ve been busy, Sharon. But you’re still a shifter at your core. And I am still your Alpha."

He released a surge of his own power—a raw, dominant energy that hit Sharon like a physical blow. She staggered, her back hitting the door. Her wolf wanted to howl, to bow, to offer its throat in exchange for peace.

"Don't," she pleaded, her voice breaking.

"Where is he?" Luthor demanded, his voice dropping into a low, terrifying register. "Bring him out. I want to see my son."

"Never."

Luthor moved with a speed that defied his size. Before she could cast a spell, he was on the porch, his hand slamming into the door beside her head. He didn't touch her, but the heat radiating from him was a brand. He leaned in, his scent—cedar and old blood—overwhelming her senses.

"You have two choices, Sharon," he whispered against her ear. "You can open this door and we can meet as a family. Or I can take this house apart piece by piece until I find him. And believe me, I will enjoy the second option much more."

"He's just a boy," she sobbed. "Please, Luthor. If you ever cared for me, just go. Let us have this."

Luthor’s hand moved from the door to her chin, forcing her to look up at him. His eyes were burning, a frantic, obsessed light dancing in the gold. "I cared for you so much I almost burned the world down when you left. You don't get to ask for mercy now. You're coming home. Both of you."

"He won't go with you."

"He's a child. He'll go where his Alpha tells him to go."

Luthor turned his gaze to the doorknob. Sharon tried to block him, but he simply picked her up by the waist and moved her aside as if she weighed nothing.

"Luthor, don't!"

He didn't listen. He turned the handle. The door, which she had forgotten to lock in her panic, swung open. The warm, yellow light of the hallway spilled out, illuminating Luthor’s predatory silhouette.

He stepped inside.

Sharon scrambled after him, her heart in her throat. "Alexander, stay in your room!" she screamed.

But it was too late. At the end of the hall, a small figure in dinosaur pajamas stood in the doorway, rubbing his eyes. Alexander blinked at the giant man standing in their living room.

The silence that followed was absolute. Luthor froze, his entire body going rigid as he stared at the boy. For a moment, the Alpha mask slipped, and Sharon saw a flash of something raw—something that looked almost like wonder—in his eyes.

Alexander looked from the stranger to his mother. "Mama? Who is that?"

Luthor took a step toward the boy, his voice uncharacteristically soft. "Hello, Alexander."

"Who are you?" the boy asked, his voice trembling slightly but his chin lifted in that same stubborn way Sharon did when she was backed into a corner.

Luthor knelt down, making himself smaller, though he still looked like he could swallow the room whole. "I'm the man who's been looking for you for a very long time."

Sharon rushed between them, her arms spread wide. "Don't you dare," she hissed at Luthor.

Luthor looked up at her, and the wonder was gone, replaced by a cold, iron-clad resolve. "He has my eyes, Sharon. And he has my scent. He’s coming back to the Tenzclaw. We leave at dawn."

Sharon looked at her son, then back at the monster from her past. The quiet life was dead. The dragon had found its hoard, and she realized with a sickening dread that the fight for Alexander’s soul had only just begun.

"Where the devil is my son?"

The snarl cut through the quiet hum of the refrigerator, a sound so violent it made Sharon’s hand slip on the doorknob. She had spent seven years running from that voice, seven years burying the memory of how it could command her very blood to stop. The magic she had sensed outside wasn't coming from the woods; it was radiating from the heart of her home.

Her hand shook so violently it took two tries to turn the knob. Every instinct screamed at her to flee, to grab Alexander and vanish into the mist, but Luthor Michaels was already inside. An Alpha’s presence was a physical weight, and through the wood of the door, Sharon felt the crushing gravity of his power. She was practically hyperventilating by the time the door creaked open, revealing the truth she had prayed was a hallucination.

Luthor Michaels sat at her small dining table, his large frame making the modest kitchen look like a dollhouse. He was her ex-Alpha, the father of her child, and the only man who had ever touched her. The moment their eyes met, every Omega instinct Sharon had suppressed for nearly a decade roared to life. Her body wanted to drop, to offer her throat, to beg for the favor of the man who had discarded her.

Screw that, she thought, her teeth grinding together. She hadn't spent seven years building a life out of scrap and magic just to roll over because a dominant wolf walked through her door.

"Sharon," Luthor rumbled, standing up. The movement was fluid, predatory, and entirely too close. "It’s been a long time."

Sharon took an instinctive step back, her knees threatening to give way. She forced her chin up, a futile attempt to look brave while her heart tried to hammer its way out of her ribs. "You shouldn't be here, Luthor. You have no right."

"I have every right," he countered, stepping toward her. "I’ll ask you one more time. Where is he?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," she stuttered. The lie was flimsy, a paper shield against a hurricane.

Up close, Luthor was still the most handsome man she had ever seen, a fact that felt like a betrayal to her own soul. Time had only sharpened him. His blond hair, usually a shade lighter than Alexander’s, was cut into a severe, military style that emphasized the harsh, beautiful lines of his face. His jaw was a ridge of granite, his lips full and sensual against his tanned skin. But it was his eyes that truly undid her—that bright, summer-sky blue that she saw every single morning when her son woke up.

Luthor watched the color rise in Sharon’s cheeks. She was flushed with a volatile mix of fear and fury, her dark chocolate hair stacked messily on her head with wisps curling around her neck. Her eyes—midnight black with flashes of moonlight silver—were wide and despairing. He had forgotten how beautiful she was. He had spent years convincing himself she was a plain, useless girl he’d made a mistake with, but the woman standing before him was a revelation. The shy awkwardness of her youth had been beaten away, leaving behind something tempered and sharp.

He was enraged, but beneath the fury, his wolf was howling in recognition, desperate to claim the Omega it had never truly forgotten. He’d been searching for seven years, nearly tearing the continent apart. When his scouts finally told him she was living a mere four hours away under a different name, he had nearly leveled the packhouse in his rage.

"Don't lie to me," Luthor hissed, his scent—that intoxicating cedar and woodsmoke—filling her lungs. "I smelled him the moment I crossed the porch. My blood. My son."

"He isn't yours," Sharon snapped, her voice gaining a jagged edge. "He’s mine. You made it very clear seven years ago that I wasn't worth your time. That makes him mine."

Luthor flinched, though he hid it behind a mask of cold arrogance. He remembered that night vividly, even if he tried to pretend otherwise. Back then, he was a newly minted Alpha, and Sharon Spark had been the pack’s ghost—a girl born of shifters who seemed to have no wolf and no magic. He had written her off as useless until her first heat hit. It was an Omega heat, rare and powerful, and it had undone him.

He had been gentle with her that night. He had mated her, bound her, and protected her like she was the highest-ranking member of the pack. But when the haze of the heat cleared, his rational, cold-blooded side had taken over. He needed a queen, a dominant mate to help him lead a warring pack, not a submissive, magic-less girl. He had convinced himself that mating her was a monumental error. He had been distant, then cold, and finally cruel, driving her away until she disappeared into the night.

"I was young, and I had a pack to secure," Luthor said, his voice dropping into a low, dangerous register. "But I don't leave my blood in the wilderness, Sharon. You stole an heir from the Tenzclaw. That’s a death sentence for anyone else."

"Is that what this is? An execution?" Sharon challenged, stepping deeper into the kitchen, placing herself between Luthor and the hallway leading to Alexander’s room.

"It's a reclamation," Luthor corrected. He looked at her, his gaze lingering on the pulse jumping in her neck. He wanted to be angry—he was angry—but the lust was a secondary fire, burning just as hot. He could smell her magic now, too. It was different, stronger than it should be. "You've changed. You're not the girl who used to hide in the corners of the dining hall."

"That girl died the day she realized her Alpha was a coward who was afraid of a little girl’s heart," she said.

Luthor’s eyes flashed gold. He moved so fast she didn't have time to blink, pinning her against the counter. His hands didn't touch her, but he boxed her in, his heat radiating through her clothes. "Careful, Sharon. I’ve spent seven years being angry. Don't push me to show you exactly how much of a 'coward' I am."

"Mama?"

The small, sleepy voice from the hallway shattered the tension like a stone through glass. Both Sharon and Luthor froze.

Alexander stood at the end of the hall, clutching a stuffed wolf—a cruel irony Sharon hadn't noticed until this exact moment. He rubbed his eyes, his messy sandy-blond hair catching the kitchen light. He looked from his mother to the giant man looming over her.

"Who's that?" Alexander asked, his voice small but curious.

Luthor stepped back from Sharon, his entire posture shifting. The predator didn't disappear, but it became still, hushed. He stared at the boy, his sky-blue eyes wide with a shock that looked dangerously like pain. He saw the chin, the shoulders, the height—it was like looking into a mirror that showed him a better version of himself.

"Alexander," Sharon breathed, moving quickly to her son’s side. She gathered him into her arms, her magic flaring instinctively, a soft violet shimmer dancing around her fingertips.

Luthor’s eyebrows shot up. "Magic? You’ve been hiding more than just a child."

"I've been learning to protect what’s mine," Sharon said, her voice steady now that she was holding her son. "Now get out of my house."

Luthor didn't move. He kept his eyes on Alexander, who was staring back at him with a strange, fearless intensity. "He doesn't know who I am, does he?"

"He knows he has a mother who loves him. That’s all he needs to know."

Luthor let out a dry, dark chuckle. He walked to the door, but he didn't leave. He paused with his hand on the frame, looking back at the two of them—the Omega he had thrown away and the son he hadn't known he needed.

"You’ve done well, Sharon. Better than I expected," Luthor said, his voice carrying the weight of an Alpha’s decree. "But this little cottage isn't a fortress. The Tenzclaw are coming. I’m not leaving this town without my son. And since you're so fond of him, I imagine you'll be coming too."

"I'll die first," Sharon vowed.

"We'll see," Luthor replied, his gaze dropping to her lips for one agonizing second. "Get some rest, Sharon. You're going to need your strength for what comes next."

He stepped out into the night, the heavy fog swallowing him whole. Sharon immediately collapsed against the wall, sliding down until she was sitting on the floor, pulling Alexander into her lap. She was shaking, her magic flickering out like a dying candle.

"Mama, why was that man crying?" Alexander asked softly.

Sharon froze. "He wasn't crying, baby. Men like that don't cry."

"He was," Alexander insisted, tucking his head under her chin. "I saw his eyes. They looked like the ocean when it's sad."

Sharon held him tighter, staring at the closed door. The Alpha had found them, and the seven years of peace had ended in a single breath. She knew Luthor Michaels. He didn't ask; he took. And she knew that the fire between them—the anger, the guilt, and the devastating attraction—was about to burn her entire world down.