The Alpha’s Fated Touch

Penthouse

The elevator ride to the penthouse took forty seconds. I counted every single one of them.

Forty seconds of silence. Forty seconds of Matteo Romano’s thumb pressing into the pulse point of my wrist, anchoring me to the floor as gravity tried to pull my stomach out through my shoes.

He smelled like violence. Even beneath the expensive leather of the car and the air freshening of the elevator, the scent of raw, unadulterated slaughter clung to him. It was the smell of the two Rogues he had torn apart in the alleyway.

And I was holding his hand.

The doors slid open.

This time, the penthouse wasn’t empty.

“Alpha!”

A man was pacing the foyer. He was tall, wiry, with hair slicked back so tight it looked painful and a scar cutting through his left eyebrow. He wore a holster over his dress shirt.

Dante. The Romano Beta. The man who executed Matteo’s dirty work while Matteo kept his hands clean.

Dante stopped dead when he saw us. His eyes went to Matteo’s bare chest, the sweatpants, the drying blood on his mouth. Then they slid to me.

His expression curdled. It wasn’t just hate; it was revulsion.

“What is she doing here?” Dante snarled, his hand drifting toward the gun at his hip. “Security said you brought a stray in, but a Moretti? Are you out of your mind?”

Matteo didn’t stop walking. He dragged me out of the elevator with him, his grip on my hand unyielding.

“Stand down, Dante,” Matteo said. His voice was bored. Dismissive.

“Stand down?” Dante blocked our path. He was growling low in his throat. “She’s a spy, Matteo! Her father has been trying to sabotage the port deal for six months. You don’t bring the enemy into the den unless you’re planning to skin them.”

“I’m not a spy,” I said, my voice raspy. “I’m a sedative.”

Dante blinked, looking at me for the first time. “What?”

Matteo sighed. It was the sound of a man who found explaining himself to be a tedious waste of oxygen.

“My levels spiked,” Matteo said. “The shift was… volatile. She stabilized me.”

Dante’s eyes widened. He looked at our joined hands. He looked at Matteo’s skin, which was not blistering, not red, not peeling away. It was perfectly, impossibly healthy.

The Beta went pale. “She… touched you?”

“Extensively,” Matteo drawled. “Now, get out of my way. I need a shower, and she needs… everything.”

He tried to step around Dante. Dante moved to block him again, desperation leaking into his scent.

“Matteo, think about this. The Council will have a field day. A Romano Alpha with a Moretti reject? It looks weak. It looks desperate.”

Matteo stopped. The air in the room dropped ten degrees.

He released my hand.

For a second, I thought he was going to hit Dante.

Instead, Matteo grabbed Dante by the throat.

It was so fast I almost missed it. One second Dante was standing; the next, he was pinned against the marble pillar, his feet dangling six inches off the floor. Matteo didn’t even look like he was exerting himself.

“Weak?” Matteo asked softly.

Dante clawed at Matteo’s wrist, gasping.

“I just slaughtered a Rogue pack leader in under twelve seconds,” Matteo whispered, leaning in. “Do I look weak to you, Beta?”

Dante choked, shaking his head.

“And regarding her,” Matteo tilted his head toward me. “She is not a Moretti anymore. She is an asset. My asset. And if you look at her with anything other than absolute respect, I will rip your throat out with my teeth. Do we have an understanding?”

Dante nodded frantically, his face turning purple.

Matteo dropped him.

Dante collapsed on the floor, coughing and retching.

Matteo turned back to me. He held out his hand again. The monster was gone, replaced by the CEO.

“Come,” he said.

I looked at Dante, wheezing on the floor. I looked at Matteo’s outstretched hand.

I realized then that I hadn’t just entered a new house. I had entered a war zone. And the only safe place was in the eye of the storm.

I took Matteo’s hand.

The Master Suite was bigger than my entire apartment back at the Moretti estate.

It was a cavern of glass and steel, dominated by a bed that looked large enough to sleep a family of four. One wall was entirely glass, overlooking the rain-swept city.

Matteo pulled me into the bathroom. It was all black marble and gold fixtures.

“Shower,” he ordered, pointing to the stall that was essentially a room of its own with six different showerheads. “Wash the alley off you. You smell like fear and wet dog.”

“I wonder whose fault that is,” I muttered, clutching the rags of my dress.

I turned to close the heavy mahogany door.

Matteo put his foot in the jamb.

“Leave it open,” he said.

I froze. “Excuse me?”

“I need to hear you,” he said, leaning against the doorframe, crossing his arms. His silver eyes tracked a droplet of water running down my neck. “The silence in my head… it’s fragile. If you disappear behind a soundproof door, the static comes back.”

“I am not showering with an audience, Matteo.”

“I’m not watching. I’m listening.” He gestured vaguely at the room. “I’ll sit on the bed. But the door stays open.”

“Pervert.”

“Pragmatist.” He turned and walked to the bed, sitting on the edge, his back to me. “Go. Before I decide to hose you down myself.”