The Blackout is loud enough that I stopped pretending conversation is supposed to happen at a reasonable volume an hour ago. Bass shakes through the booth and up through the floor, bodies packed shoulder-to-shoulder beneath shifting lights while bartenders work three orders ahead and security circles the edges of the room. Familiar pack scents thread through a crowd mostly made up of humans who have no idea they're drinking on werewolf territory. Normal Saturday night. Busy. Loud. Mine.
“You're full of shit,” Luka says beside me.
I tip my glass toward him.
“Strong argument.”
“It’s the truth.”
“That doesn't make it an argument.”
One of the two packmates across from us snorts into his drink while the other is already grinning because Luka has apparently decided this stupid conversation deserves another round.
“I’m just saying,” Luka continues, “if you hate dealing with drunk assholes this much, owning a nightclub may have been a tactical error.”
“I don't deal with drunk assholes.”
Luka stares at me. I stare back. I take another drink.
“I pay people to deal with most of the drunk assholes.”
“That guy last week pissed in the stairwell.”
“Security dealt with him.”
“You carried him outside.”
“He was resisting security.”
“You carried him like luggage.”
“He stopped resisting.”
The idiots across from us laugh. I ignore them and lean farther back into the booth, half listening as Luka starts telling a story I've already heard twice and am apparently about to hear a third time because none of these people have anything better to do. It's ordinary. Familiar. Exactly the kind of night I've had hundreds of times before.
Then something hits me like a fucking truck.
I stop breathing.
Luka keeps talking for maybe two seconds before he notices.
“—and then Mark swears he didn't—”
The scent disappears beneath the crowd.
My head snaps up.
What the fuck?
Music keeps pounding. Someone drops a glass near the far end of the bar and a group of idiots cheers like gravity just performed a trick. People laugh, dance, shout over each other. I hear all of it, but suddenly none of it matters because there was something underneath everything else for half a second. Something unfamiliar. Something my entire body recognized before my brain caught up.
There.
I catch it again through alcohol, perfume, sweat, pack scent, overheated bodies, spilled liquor, and nightclub air.
My fingers tighten around my glass.
Mate.
No hesitation. No maybe. No mistaking it for attraction or some scent I happen to like. Every instinct in me locks onto the answer with absolute certainty.
Mate.
My wolf surges so hard beneath my skin that I have to lock my jaw.
Mine.
Oh, fuck off.
“Damian?”
I'm already looking past Luka.
The club has suddenly become impossibly crowded. Hundreds of people, too many moving bodies, too many overlapping scents, too many fucking obstacles between me and whoever just walked into my territory and detonated something primal straight through my nervous system.
“Damian.”
Luka's tone changes. Less amused now.
I stand.
The two wolves across from us go quiet. I barely notice. The scent catches again, stronger this time, and every part of me turns toward it.
Find them.
I scan the bar. Not there. VIP stairs. No. Entrance. No. The scent shifts with the movement of the crowd, threading through bodies toward the center of the club.
“Holy shit,” Luka says behind me.
“Don't.”
“I didn't say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I really was.”
I move into the crowd. People shift out of my way without always realizing why. Humans recognize the owner. Wolves recognize something else and move faster. I keep following the scent, forcing myself not to shove through half the dance floor like I've lost my fucking mind.
Control it.
I'm the Alpha of Northbank. I've handled territorial challenges, injured wolves, emergencies, pack disputes, and supernatural idiots with more confidence than sense. I've spent eleven years being the person who keeps his head when everybody else's instincts start running the show.
Apparently one stranger in my nightclub is enough to make all that experience feel theoretical.
The scent gets stronger. Closer.
My eyes sharpen as I scan the dance floor.
Then I see you. Right in the middle of it.
I stop.
For one strange second, the rest of the room turns into movement around a fixed point. Lights sweep over you. Bodies move on every side. Music pounds hard enough to vibrate through my ribs. There's a drink in your hand, and I don't know a single fucking thing about you.
But I know you.
Not your name. Not who you are. Not whether you're human, wolf, or something else entirely. Not whether you know anything about mates. Not whether you can feel a damn thing corresponding to what just happened to me.
None of that matters to the instinct settling into my bones with terrifying satisfaction.
There you are. My mate.
The stranger I've never met and somehow recognize more completely than anyone else in this building.
My gaze stays fixed on you.
Mine.
I exhale slowly through my nose.
No. Not mine. Not like that. Not yet.
My wolf does not appear impressed by the distinction.
Luka catches up beside me and follows my stare. For once in his life, he actually goes quiet.
“Oh.”
I say nothing. He looks at me. Looks at you. Looks back at me.
“So much for a quiet night.”
I don't take my eyes off you.
“Shut the fuck up.”
Then I start toward the dance floor.
---
[ DAY 1 | FRIDAY | NIGHT | THE BLACKOUT (MAIN FLOOR) ]
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