The Alpha of The Forgotten

A Familiar Scent

Jazmine stood perfectly still.

The wind moved through the trees, stirring the dark strands of her hair and carrying his scent toward her in steady waves—cedar, smoke, rain, and something deeper beneath it. Something maddeningly familiar.

Kai Blackbird.

For one sharp, disorienting second, the years between them collapsed.

The training fields.

Mountain air.

His laugh.

The way he used to look at her like the whole world had narrowed down to whatever she was about to say next.

Then reality slammed back into place.

He was no longer the boy who had once run beside her through the trees.

He was an Alpha now.

A powerful one.

And her body knew it before her pride could deny it.

Jazmine straightened, forcing every muscle into stillness. “You’ve got a lot of nerve showing up unannounced.”

Kai stepped fully out from the shadows of the treeline, his gaze never leaving hers. He wore black from throat to boot, simple and practical, but nothing about him blended in. Not with that height. Not with those shoulders. Not with the quiet force rolling off him like heat before a storm.

“You always hated surprises,” he said.

His voice was deeper than she remembered.

Rougher.

It slid over her skin in a way she didn’t appreciate.

“I hate trespassing more.”

The corner of his mouth lifted, almost a smile. “This is neutral ground.”

“It’s Forgotten Ones territory.”

“Close enough to neutral for me.”

Jazmine folded her arms across her chest. “Then your judgment’s gotten sloppy.”

His expression didn’t change, but his eyes sharpened. “No. Just selective.”

That should not have unsettled her as much as it did.

She lifted her chin. “Why are you here?”

Kai took another step forward, slow enough not to provoke, bold enough to make a point. “I came to see you.”

“After years?”

“Yes.”

Her laugh was short and humorless. “That’s convenient.”

“Nothing about this feels convenient.”

The honesty in his tone irritated her more than a lie would have.

Because she felt it too.

The pull between them was no longer subtle. It moved like a live current under her skin, tightening low in her stomach, climbing her spine, pressing at instincts she had spent her whole life mastering. Her wolf paced. Her magic stirred. Even the vampire side of her, cold and controlled and old in its own way, seemed to sharpen its attention around him.

Unacceptable.

Jazmine’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t get to disappear and then reappear like nothing happened.”

Kai stopped a few feet away. Close enough that she could see the faint scar near his jaw she didn’t remember. Close enough that the air between them felt charged.

“I know.”

“Do you?”

“Yes.”

No excuse. No defense.

That threw her off more than anger would have.

She had prepared, in all the imaginary versions of this moment she would never admit existed, for arrogance. For apologies. For distance. For regret.

Not this.

Not the calm certainty in his face.

Not the way he looked at her like he had already made some unshakable decision.

Jazmine let her arms fall to her sides. “Then explain.”

Kai was quiet for a beat, his expression unreadable. “My father died.”

The words landed harder than she expected.

Jazmine’s features tightened. She remembered his father well enough—strict, proud, impossible to impress. A hard man who believed weakness could be beaten out of a person if you pushed hard enough.

Still, death was death.

She said nothing.

Kai looked past her for a moment, toward the dark line of the mountains. “After that, everything changed. The pack was unstable. There were challenges. Divisions. People waiting to see if I’d break before I took the Alpha seat.”

“And you stayed.”

“I had to.”

Jazmine studied him. The boy she remembered had always carried too much on his shoulders, but this version of Kai wore it differently. Like he had been forged under pressure instead of crushed by it.

“You could’ve sent word,” she said at last.

“I thought about it.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No.”

“Why?”

His gaze came back to her, steady and direct. “Because I knew if I saw you before I was ready, I wouldn’t leave again.”

The air seemed to thin.

Jazmine’s pulse kicked once, hard and hot, and she hated herself for it.

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one I’ve got.”

She looked away first, jaw tight.

The bond—or whatever cruel thing this was—pushed at her again, urging, recognizing, reaching. She could feel the shape of him in ways that made no sense. The steadiness of his breathing. The restraint in his stance. The deliberate control he was using not to crowd her.

As if he knew exactly how close he could get before she lashed out.

That knowledge was dangerous.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she said.

“And yet.”

Her head snapped back toward him. “Don’t push me.”

A small silence stretched between them.

Then Kai said, quietly, “The Council called, didn’t they?”

Jazmine went still.

That alone was answer enough.

His expression darkened. “I figured.”

Her eyes flashed. “You figured?”

“Their timing is never accidental.”

“You seem very informed for someone minding his own pack.”

“I make it my business to know when people start cornering powerful women.”

The line hit harder than it should have.

Jazmine hated that too.

“I don’t need protecting.”

“I know.”

“Do you?” she shot back. “Because that sounded a lot like pity.”

Kai’s brows drew together. “I have never pitied you.”

“Then watch your tone.”

He stepped closer before he could seem to think better of it, and now there was barely any space left between them. No touching. Just heat. Pressure. Awareness so thick it stole oxygen.

“My tone,” he said, low and controlled, “is the only reason I’m still standing here without grabbing you by the shoulders and demanding you stop pretending this doesn’t exist.”

Everything in her body locked.

His words should have infuriated her.

Instead, they went through her like a spark through dry brush.

Jazmine’s voice dropped. “Be careful, Kai.”

His eyes flicked to her mouth and back up again. “I’m trying.”

The honesty in that nearly broke something.

Behind them, branches cracked.

Both of them turned at once.

Three wolves from the Forgotten Ones emerged from the eastern path, their expressions tense the second they saw who stood with her. Two shifted back to human form at the edge of the clearing while the third remained half-phased, hackles raised.

“Alpha,” one of them said to Jazmine, his gaze fixed on Kai. “We caught movement near the borders.”

“I can see that,” she said coolly.

The half-phased wolf growled.

Kai did not move.

That was either wisdom or arrogance. With him, she wasn’t sure which.

“This doesn’t concern you,” Jazmine told her wolves.

“With respect,” the second said, “that’s the Alpha of the Midnight Pack.”

Kai inclined his head slightly, not submissive, not challenging. Just enough to acknowledge rank.

Jazmine could feel her pack’s unease prickling across the clearing. They sensed what she sensed: power recognizing power. Not just rivalry.

Something worse.

Something binding.

“Go,” she told them.

They hesitated.

That alone nearly snapped her temper.

“I said go.”

This time they obeyed, though not without one last suspicious look at Kai before disappearing back into the trees.

The silence they left behind felt even heavier than before.

Jazmine turned back to him. “You’re causing problems already.”

Kai exhaled through his nose. “I’m not the problem.”

“No,” she said, voice sharpened to a blade. “You’re the complication.”

Something changed in his expression then. Not amusement. Not victory.

Recognition.

As if he understood exactly what that admission had cost her.

“Jaz—”

“Don’t,” she snapped.

He stopped.

Good.

She took one step back, forcing distance where there was too much of him, too much history, too much pull.

“You need to leave.”

Kai held her gaze. “I will.”

Relief came too fast—and was ruined just as quickly.

“But I’m coming back.”

Her eyes hardened. “That would be a mistake.”

“No,” he said, the certainty in his voice like iron. “Leaving you to fight this alone would be the mistake.”

Jazmine stared at him, rage and heat and memory tangling into something unsteady in her chest.

Then she said the only thing she could.

“I don’t need you.”

Kai’s face gave away nothing, but his voice softened in a way that was somehow more dangerous than if he had challenged her.

“Maybe not,” he said. “But you know me better than anyone.”

He took a step back.

Then another.

And the bond inside her stretched so sharply with the distance that she nearly reached for him on instinct.

She clenched her fists until her nails bit into her palms.

Kai paused at the treeline, his gaze fixed on her one last time.

“You can keep lying to the Council,” he said. “You can lie to your pack.”

His eyes locked onto hers.

“But don’t lie to yourself, Jazmine.”

Then he was gone.

The clearing fell silent.

Still.

Empty.

But his scent remained in the air, wrapped around her like a challenge.

Jazmine stood there long after he disappeared, every part of her burning with one ugly, undeniable truth:

The problem wasn’t that Kai Blackbird had come back.

It was that some part of her had never let him go.