I wasn’t supposed to survive that night.I saw his face. I saw what he did. And I ran. God! I ran like my life depended on it, because it did. But you don’t outrun Caius Draven. Nobody does. His wolves caught me in under four minutes, dragged me to my knees in front of him, and I looked up into the coldest pair of eyes I have ever seen in my life and waited to die.He didn’t kill me.I almost wish he had.Instead, he kept me. Tucked me inside his fortress like a dirty secret, surrounded by wolves who could smell that I was different and hated me for it. I had one rule which was to stay invisible. I had one goal which was to survive long enough to find a way out. I had no idea that the longer I stayed inside those walls, the more something buried deep in my blood was waking up. Stretching. Remembering things I was never taught.Then I found out who sold me to them.The one person I trusted. The one person I thought was safe.And that was the moment I stopped being afraid and started being dangerous.My name is Astoria Sinclair. I spent twenty-two years pretending I was ordinary. No pack. No wolf. No past worth claiming. Just a quiet life and a very convincing lie.But the wolf world found me anyway. Dragged me underground. Showed me exactly what I came from and exactly what they’ll do to bury it again.They should have killed me when they had the chance.Because now I know what I am.And so does he.

THE WRONG SIDE OF HIS LAST NAMEShe had one rule going into junior year.Don’t feel anything for Patrick Winslow.Easy enough, considering his father stole her house, bankrupted her family, and put her dad in prison for three years over a lie so clean it fooled an entire courtroom. Considering she’d spent four years sharpening herself into something dangerous specifically for this moment. Considering the only reason she enrolled at Harlow Academy was to get close enough to finish what Gerald Winslow started. Except this time, she’d be the one holding the match.The plan was simple. Get close. Find the weakness. Burn it down.What wasn’t in the plan was the way Patrick looked at her on the very first day, like he already knew she was coming. Like he’d been waiting. Like he was carrying something that belonged to her and hadn’t figured out yet whether to hand it over or run.He’s not supposed to be complicated.He’s not supposed to make her feel seen.He’s definitely not supposed to be the only person alive who holds the key to everything she lost.But here they are.Two sides of the same wound, bleeding in the same direction.

I know exactly what kind of girl I am.I’m the one you don’t notice. The one sitting three rows back with her head down and her headphones in and absolutely no interest in being interesting to you. I’m the one who watches everything and writes it all down and never, not once in three years at Hartwell High, made the mistake of wanting something she couldn’t carry out alone.I had a plan. I had a future. I had one rule which was to make sure I need nothing and I followed it like religion.Then Clement Calloway happened.Not the way he happens to other girls. Not the slow-motion hallway moment, not the accidental eye contact across a crowded cafeteria. He happened to me the way a bad deal happens. Suddenly, in writing, with my signature at the bottom.Fake girlfriend. Reality show. Twelve weeks.I told myself I could do this with my eyes closed. He was just a boy with a good jaw and a ruined reputation and I was just a girl who needed a scholarship. Simple. Clean. Temporary.Except he chose me deliberately.He read everything I ever wrote. And then he picked me.I didn’t know what to do with that. I still don’t.This is not a love story about a girl who got swept off her feet.This is a story about a girl who kept both feet firmly on the ground and fell anyway.

The night Wesley Anderson died, two people were seen leaving his dormitory. One of them was me. The other was Collins Waverly. A campus legend, legacy student, and the one name everyone whispered whenever something went wrong at Crestfield. The golden boy with iron in his eyes and a smile that never quite reached them. I came to this university for one reason which was to find out who destroyed my brother Maurice. I built my entire plan around staying invisible, staying sharp, staying away from men like Collins. Then Wesley turned up dead and suddenly Collins Waverly was standing in my doorway at midnight, rain-soaked and dangerously calm, with a proposition that made my stomach drop. Fake a relationship. Give each other an alibi. Survive the investigation together. I should have slammed the door in his face. Instead I said yes, and that single word unravelled everything. Because here’s what nobody tells you about pretending to fall for someone, your body doesn’t know it’s acting. Every stolen glance across a crowded dining hall, every whispered conversation that lasted longer than it needed to, every night his hand found mine in the dark and held on a little too tight. None of it felt fake. And the closer we got, the more I realized Collins Waverly wasn’t just my alibi. He was my prime suspect. And God help me, I was falling for him anyway.