Something flashed through Alpha Grayson's eyes.

He pursed his lips and looked away but the look I'd seen in his eyes was enough to make curiosity fill me. It was clear that he didn't like Lucas but the question was why?

"You know him," Dad observed softly.

He nodded. "Unfortunately. Let's just say that Lucas's mother had been a thorn in my side since they moved here."

"But his mother's dead right?" I asked.

"Yes, she committed suicide three years ago."

My mouth dropped open in shock. Suicide? Jason never mentioned anything about his mother killing herself. I frowned.

"Why did she kill herself?"

His face closed off which was another sign that he knew more about Lucas than everybody else.

"I'll stop by his house and check things out."

"I'll go with you," I called out before I could stop myself.

Both of them froze. Dad's eyes narrowed while Alpha Grayson raised a questioning eyebrow. His eyes darted over to my Dad and then back to me.

"No."

I hurried forward and stepped in his path to stop him. "Please. He is my friend and I'm worried about him."

Alpha Grayson studied me silently. His eyes slowly darted over my face. I licked my lips and shifted from foot to foot. The small action made his eyes drop to my lips. I watched in surprise as his pupils dilated.

Alpha Grayson's lips parted slightly to reveal the sharp tips of his canines.

"Eva," Dad warned softly.

"Do you know him well?" Alpha Grayson questioned with a slight growl in his voice.

"Yes," I lied. "We're best friends."

Dad cleared his throat and moved closer to my side but the Alpha didn't glance at him.

"My Beta and a few of my men will be here to lead your search in five minutes. They'll need something to use so they can track her scent and a photo to identify her."

"Eva will get the—"

"She's coming with me," he growled. "We're going to pay her best friend a visit." He said the words with a slight tilt of his lips and a dark glint in his eyes.

"Alpha I—"

"We'll meet up with you later," he interrupted Dad.

To my surprise Dad hesitated only a second before he backed off. My mouth dropped open when Dad actually bowed his head and tilted it to the side to expose his throat.

"I'll see you outside, Eva."

With a meaningful glance at Dad, he walked past us and out of the room.

"You submitted to him!" I gasped as soon as he was out of earshot.

Dad rolled his eyes. "Always know when to pick your battles, princess."

I blinked at him.

"Where did I go wrong raising you?" he muttered under his breath. "I'm not here to start trouble, Eva. We are on another pack's land."

"So? Are you scared you won't be able to take him? He is younger and a bit more muscular than you."

He ran a hand through his hair and then down his face. "It's not about that Eva. We...we need their help to find Ariana. It won't do us any good to start animosity between our packs."

I sobered at the mention of Ariana. I wasn't thinking about her but I should've been.

"Daddy, I'm—"

"Alpha Grayson's waiting for you."

My shoulders sagged and my head lowered. I guess he was still pissed at me. Granddad was clearly wrong about Dad forgiving me anytime soon.

"Do you have your phone?"

"Yeah," I muttered as I made my way to the exit.

"Eva?"

Hope soared through me. I turned around slightly. "Yes?"

"Call me if something happens."

I nodded. "Sure." I turned away but he stopped me again.

"Eva?"

"Yes, daddy?"

"I love you; you know that, don't you?"

I blinked away the tears. "I know," I whispered.

"We'll talk about this tonight, okay?"

With another nod at him, I walked out of the room and hurried towards the front door. Halfway there cold fingers grabbed my wrist and jerked me to the left. I stumbled but in the next second a gasp fell from my lips when my back was slammed against the wall.

My wide eyes darted up to the person who had grabbed me.

Alpha Grayson placed his palm flat on the wall next to my head and slowly leaned in.

"Very touching," he muttered. "So you're the black sheep of the family."

"Our family matters have nothing to do with you," I hissed.

His lips twitched. "So you think."

"We're wasting time."

"Are we?"

Alpha Grayson reached up and placed his other palm next to my head. I swallowed in fear when his eyes flashed red.

"Let's get one thing straight," he growled. "I do not tolerate any fucking lying."

"I—"

"What's Lucas to you?"

"Why do you care?"

"Answer the question, Eva."

My eyes dropped but snapped up again when he growled. "He's a friend."

His hand shot down to wrap around my neck. One finger rested against the base of my throat where my pulse had kicked up a few notches. My lips parted when he gave my neck a squeeze. I could feel the way my body reacted to his unexpected action.

His chest rumbled. "You like that."

Colour flooded my cheeks. Instead of focusing on my body and the strange reaction I was having to his hand wrapped around my throat, I forced myself to think of the reason why we needed to leave.

I swallowed. "I don't know him."

His hand tightened a fraction more. "Try again."

"H-he's Ari's friend."

"What's Lucas to you?"

I pressed my thighs together. "A friend."

"Is that all?"

"Yes!"

His nostrils flared. "Do you know why I'm gripping your neck like this?"

"N-no."

"It's because your heartbeat increases when you're lying. If you were telling the truth—"

"I am telling you the truth!" I growled. "My heart is beating a mile a minute because you have a hand wrapped around my throat and you're invading my fucking personal space."

His pupils slowly shrunk as his irises started changing colour. His icy blue eyes were slowly starting to bleed red. Panic hit me when his hand tightened and cut off my air supply.

"Don't ever fucking talk to me like that again."

I swallowed or at least tried to. The desire I'd felt earlier was replaced by fear. He wasn't fucking normal. No Lycan had red eyes.

Black dots danced in my line of vision as my lungs started screaming for air. Just as I thought that I was going to pass out, his hold loosened. With one last swipe of his thumb against my pulse, he suddenly jerked away.

"Fuck!"

Without a glance in my direction, he hurried away. My body jerked when the front door slammed shut. After a deep breath, I managed to compose myself somewhat. My legs were still shaking; my heart was still beating a mile a minute and the fear still lingered.

But despite the fear and uncertainty, deep down inside there was a spark of desire. I'd liked his hand wrapped around my throat and the dominance he asserted over me.

***

He sat stiffly next to me with his hands clenched around the steering wheel and his eyes focused on the road ahead. Neither one of us had said a word since we left Jason's house.

Alpha Grayson should be apologizing for acting like a dickhead. The fucking guy pinned me to a wall and choked me—not that I hated what he'd done—but still.

Or maybe he should explain why his eyes turned red.

"How long has your sister been friends with Lucas?"

My eyes snapped over to him. "You're not going to apologize, are you?"

"Why should I?"

"You—"

"Answer my question, Eva."

"I was but then you—"

"How long has your sister been friends with Lucas?"

"You have no manners!" I growled.

"So I've heard." He glanced at me. "Your manners aren't any better than mine."

Would I be punished if I slapped him? Squeezing my eyes closed, I silently counted to ten and blew out a breath. I didn't feel any calmer but at least I knew that my action would have repercussions.

I couldn't fucking hit the Alpha. At least not until we find Ariana.

"I don't know how long they've been friends for, okay? I met him when he accompanied Ariana to the dorm room."

"You haven't spent any time with him?

"Apart from him doing my tattoo, no."

Another glance at me, this time with twitching lips. "You have a tattoo?"

"Yeah."

"Does your father know?"

"Not yet."

Alpha Grayson chuckled. "I'd love to see his reaction."

I pursed my lips and focused on the passing scenery. We were driving through a neighbourhood I hadn't explored yet. It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him that Dad had a tattoo of his own but I stayed silent.

"Do you make it a habit of strangling young, unsuspecting women?" I asked, unable to stand the silence.

"No." He paused. "Did I hurt you?"

"It's a bit too late to ask me that, don't you think?" I smirked. "If I tell you that you did, what are you going to do about it?"

Alpha Grayson scoffed. "Nothing."

I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him. "Are you just going to ignore this attraction between us?"

"Yes," he growled, "and so should you."

"Do you have a mate? Or are you in a relationship with someone?"

"No."

"Then—"

"How old are you, Eva?" he cut me off.

I licked my lips. "I'm twenty-one."

"Barely out of your teens and with a string of young men running after you." He slowed the car and then turned to the left before he glanced at me. "Why do you want to start a relationship with a forty-six-year-old man?"

My mouth dropped open. He had to be making fun of me because there was no fucking way that he was forty-six.

I pursed my lips instead of answering him.

During the last few weeks I had made a lot of friends and that included both humans and Lycans. I had kissed and fooled around with some of them but none of them had made my panties wet with only a single touch. And the man who could achieve that just so happened to be a forty-six-year-old man.

"You're not made for my world, little black sheep," Alpha Grayson muttered.

"Why?" I frowned at him. "We're the same."

"That's where you're wrong," he pointed out. "We are not the same."

"W-what are you?" I was almost too scared to ask him but I needed to know.

He flashed me a grim smile. "It's better that you don't know."

Before our conversation could continue, he parked the car at the curb in front of a double story house that needed a fresh coat of paint and a lot of repairs.

"Stay in the car."

My lips parted but the look he gave me made me snap my mouth shut. He pressed a button on the dashboard near the steering wheel before he got out of the car.

I couldn't help it, my eyes dropped to stare at his ass as he walked up the porch steps.

"I'd like to see him naked," I muttered. "Definitely want to explore every inch of his perfectly shaped body."

Shaking my head, I cleared my mind of all sexual thoughts.

Alpha Grayson was knocking on the front door. He stepped back and walked to the window to the right to take a peek inside. Straightening, he walked back to the door and slammed his fists against it a few times.

But nobody answered the door.

After a few more knocks, he made his way down the steps and walked around the side of the house.

I counted the seconds into minutes. Once half an hour passed with no sign of him, I reached for the door handle. Nothing happened. I leaned across the seat to try the driver's door but the same happened. Even the back doors were locked.

Slumping in my seat again, I huffed and glared at the car parked a few feet in front of me.

He fucking locked me in!

I remembered the button he'd pressed before he got out. Slipping over into the driver's seat, I leaned forward to study all the buttons. Some of them had small pictures on them to indicate what they were used for and others were plain black.

Shit, which one had he pressed?

It was one of those fancy new cars so I had no clue which button did what and I couldn't exactly press all of them to figure out which one unlocked the doors. . .could I?

My lips slowly curled up into a smile. With my finger inches from a button, my phone started ringing which made me jerk in fright. I scrambled back to my seat and pulled my phone out of my pocket.

"Daddy?"

"Just calling to make sure that you're okay."

I smiled. "I'm fine. It looks like nobody's home."

Dad was silent for a moment but I could hear other people talking in the background.

"Have Alpha Grayson drop you back at Jason's house when you're done there," he ordered. "I'll be home as soon as I can."

My hold on the phone tightened. "You found something, didn't you?"

"I'll meet you at Jason's home as soon as I can," he repeated his earlier words before hanging up.

He found something—I could hear it in his voice—and whatever it was, it was something bad.

Ariana was still alive, I reminded myself.

The worry inside me continued to grow as I waited for the Alpha to return. Ariana was alive and according to her, safe, but what had she suffered before she got away? What was so bad that Dad didn't want me to see it?

I sat up a bit straighter when an old beat up truck pulled into the driveway of the house we were parked at. A bald man with a beer belly got out of the truck. He was dressed in a suit that had seen better days and carried an old brown leather suitcase.

He turned toward the car, making me tense. His eyes narrowed and his lips curled back into a sneer. The man only managed to take a step towards me when Alpha Grayson appeared and called out to him.

"Samuel."

The man in question turned to face the Alpha but he didn't look any happier.

They talked for a few minutes with the man making wild gestures with one hand. The conversation ended abruptly when Samuel stormed towards the house.

My eyes locked on Alpha Grayson as he made his way back toward the car and climbed in.

"Lucas hasn't been home since Thursday," he said.

"So he's missing too."

"You saw him on Saturday, didn't you?"

I nodded. "When I realized that Ari was missing."

He started the car and set it in gear but he looked at me before he pulled away from the curb. "Then he's not missing."

"He is!" I exclaimed. "I haven't seen him once since he said that he was going to go out and look for Ari."