Nicolas’s POV

A moan.

Low. Muffled. Coming from somewhere on the other side of that door.

I didn’t think.

My shoulder hit the door. Wood splintered. The lock gave.

I was already inside.

The smell hit me like a fist.

I stopped moving.

Every single coherent thought I’d had in the last five minutes evaporated. Just—gone. Replaced by something hot and immediate that my wolf recognized before my brain caught up.

Heat.

Female heat.

Thick in the air. Heavy. Sweet in a way that was almost nauseating in its intensity.

My entire body went rigid.

"Irina."

No answer.

I scanned the room. Bed—empty. The tangled mess of sheets still there from last night. The curtains still pulled. A glass of water on the nightstand, untouched.

"Irina."

A sound. Soft. From the far side of the bed.

I moved around it.

She was on the floor.

Curled up between the bed and the wall, her knees pulled to her chest, the blanket half-dragged off the mattress and wrapped around her like she’d tried to pull it over herself and run out of energy halfway through. Her hair was everywhere. Her face—

Christ.

Her face was flushed. Deep red from her cheeks down to her throat. Sweat at her temples. Her lips parted slightly.

She looked like she was burning alive.

"Irina." I crouched down. My hand found her shoulder before I thought better of it. "Hey."

Her eyes were half-open. Glazed. Looking at nothing.

She made a sound. Not words. Just a low, involuntary noise that dragged itself up from somewhere deep in her chest.

I withdrew my hand.

The smell in this room was—

I pressed my jaw together. Hard. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

"Okay." I kept my voice flat. Clinical. "You need to get up. We’re going to find the doctor. Can you hear me?"

Another moan.

Her head turned slightly. In my direction, but not looking at me. Looking through me. Her brow furrowed like she was working through something.

I’d seen heat before. It had happened to female pack members. It wasn’t common—usually there were signs, preparation time—but I’d seen it enough to recognize it.

I’d never been this close to it.

The room smelled like her. Like her, but amplified. Turned up to a volume that made it impossible to think about anything except—

I stood up. Fast.

Put my back to her for exactly three seconds and pressed the heel of my hand against the bridge of my nose and breathed through my mouth instead.

My wolf was not being helpful.

*Go to her,* he snarled. *She needs us. She NEEDS—*

"Shut up," I said under my breath.

The wolf did not shut up.

I turned back around.

She’d moved. Slightly. Shifted position so she was more on her side than curled up, one hand pressed flat against the carpet like she’d tried to push herself upright and given up on it.

"Irina." I dropped back down to a crouch. Kept the distance this time. "Look at me. I need you to look at me."

She turned her head.

Her eyes found my face.

For a second—just a second—I thought it had worked. That she was actually with me.

She was looking right at me. Those gray-blue eyes, usually so carefully blank, now completely unguarded. Glassy. Dark at the edges with something that wasn’t fear.

Something that was the opposite of fear.

"Nicolas." Her voice came out wrong. Low and rough and nothing like her normal voice.

"Yeah." I kept very still. "That’s right. I need you to—"

"You’re here."

"I’m here. And you need medical attention. Can you stand? If you can get your arm around my neck I can—"

She reached for me.

I caught her wrist before she touched me—reflex—and immediately wished I hadn’t because the heat of her skin was insane. Like catching a live wire. My wolf lunged so hard at the back of my skull I actually flinched.

Her pulse pounded under my thumb. Fast. Frantic.

"Okay." My voice came out rougher than I intended. "You need to—"

She moved.

I didn’t fully register it until it was already happening. She leveraged herself up off the floor using my arm, the blanket falling away, and then she was right there, inches from my face, and her hand was on the back of my neck and—

Her mouth found mine.

Soft. Burning.

Completely unlike the last time I’d kissed her. Nothing desperate in it. Nothing afraid.

Just her. Her lips against mine. Warm. Pliant. Like she’d been waiting.

The mate bond didn’t just hum.

It roared.

Every nerve ending I had lit up at once. My hand was still around her wrist and I could feel her pulse and feel the heat radiating off her and she made a small sound against my mouth that short-circuited something essential in my brain.

*Mine.*

The word filled every available space.

I pulled back.

One inch. Just one inch. Enough to breathe.

My chest was heaving. When had that started.

Her eyes were still half-closed. Her lips slightly parted. Still tilted toward me like she’d follow wherever I moved.

My body was—

I pressed my eyes shut.

The sound that came out of me wasn’t something I’d planned. Low. Guttural. Dragged up from somewhere that had nothing to do with reason or restraint or any of the thoughts I’d walked in here with.

A growl.

Pure, undiluted want.

I was hard.

Completely, undeniably hard.