The first attack hit before Ivy Gray could decide whether Commander Lucan Frost was protector or captor. Claws tore through the sealed door. Commander Lucan Frost shifted between her and the attacker, taking a silver blade across his ribs while he forced a path into the old service tunnels.
They escaped with the sealed record but not the evidence that proved who had signed it. Inside a guarded room, Commander Lucan Frost traced its payments and erased seals. Every path led back to someone Ivy Gray had defended for years.
Commander Lucan Frost placed a contract beside the evidence. For thirty days they would appear united, share information, and never move without security. In return, he would give her access to the one archive capable of proving Ivy's Omega scent is a spell hiding the strongest royal bloodline in a century. The final clause was strangely specific: neither of them could pretend the attraction between them was part of the agreement.
She laughed once, without humor. “You wrote a rule against falling for you?”
“I wrote a rule against lying about it.”
Their first move together became another ambush. A messenger slipped Ivy Gray a key engraved with the date of her greatest loss. It opened a private box containing photographs of Commander Lucan Frost meeting the person who had arranged the Luna crown rejected every noble candidate and flew into her supposedly powerless hands.
She pressed the photographs against his chest. “Tell me why I should not leave.”
He did not deny the meeting. He stepped close enough that anger became heat and covered her hand with his over the evidence. The bond between them flared, forcing his forehead against hers while both their wolves recognized the same hidden mark.
“I went there to stop what happened to you,” he said. “I failed. I will not fail twice.”
The lights died before she could decide whether to believe him. A black mirror filled with the face of the person Ivy Gray trusted most.
“You have until midnight,” the caller said. “Ivy's Omega scent is a spell hiding the strongest royal bloodline in a century. Ask Commander Lucan Frost what else he is hiding. Then decide which one of you I kill first.”