Blade to Throat

Nadia POV

So this was the alpha.

I stood frozen at the threshold, my combat boots rooted to the thick plush carpet as I grappled with the infuriating reality of the man standing before me. Because apparently, on top of being an arrogant, inconsiderate bastard who stood people up, he also had to look like a god carved out of marble and shadow. His entire posture exuded a state of effortless, indolent ease. He stood beside the mahogany bar cart, one hand casually resting on the polished wood, the other holding a crystal tumbler of amber liquor. He looked devastatingly handsome. His dark, messy hair fell over his forehead in a way that looked deliberate, framing a sharp jawline and striking, angular cheekbones.

He was unaffected by the fact that a weeping girl had just bolted past me in sheer distress. He looked as if reducing women to hysterical, mascara-stained tears was just another mundane task on his daily schedule. The opulent VIP suite was silent save for the soft clink of the ice swirling against the glass in his hand.

His stormy, shadowed gaze finally flicked up. Those intense gray eyes landed on me. For a fleeting second, the air left my lungs. I was trapped in his heavy, magnetic stare. But the moment of connection lasted for exactly two seconds. Then, with a slow blink, his eyes slid away. He turned his attention back to his drink, dismissing me with a single shift of his head as if I were nothing more than an unwelcome speck of dust ruining the aesthetic of his private room.

The casual dismissal felt like a physical slap. My pride flared instantly. A hot, scalding wave of indignation rushed through my veins, flushing my cheeks and erasing any trace of awe I had felt a moment ago. I refused to shrink back. I refused to appear intimidated by the very man who had arrogantly wasted my time the day before. I set my shoulders, lifted my chin, and took a firm, heavy step across the threshold, marching directly into his personal space.

"If this is your idea of mending things, you might want to work on your people skills." I let my disdain pour out, my voice ringing loud and steady in the quiet room.

His dark brow lifted a fraction of an inch. He brought the rim of the crystal glass to his mouth. He took a slow, calculated sip of the amber liquid. The infuriating calm radiating off him grated on every single nerve in my body. He swallowed, set the glass down on the cart, and finally gave me his attention.

"You are quick to draw a conclusion." His voice was a low, smooth rumble, dangerously calm and laced with a razor-sharp edge of condescension.

I crossed my arms over my chest, planting my feet apart in a fighter’s stance. I was not going to let this overconfident alpha intimidate me into silence.

"I saw enough." I shot back.

The corner of his mouth twitched. It did not form a real smile, but rather a sharp, mocking curve that made my stomach tighten.

"Did you?" He asked.

"Yes. You call me here after not showing up yesterday, then I walk in on you making someone cry. Let me guess, now it is my turn?" I snapped, stepping closer, letting my anger dictate my words. "Reducing young women to hysterics is hardly a testament to impressive leadership. It just proves you lack basic human decency."

He paused. He stared at me for a long beat. Then, a soft, rich laugh slipped from his chest. He laughed like I had just said something genuinely amusing. The dismissive sound of his amusement fueled my temper faster than any shouted insult ever could.

"You are not just quick." He watched me over the rim of his glass, his eyes dark and analyzing. "You are also stupid."

My mouth fell open. My arms dropped to my sides. The sheer audacity of the insult hit me like a brick.

"Excuse me?" I demanded.

He tilted his head slightly to the side. He studied my face, mapping my features like I was some strange, defective puzzle he had not yet decided whether to solve or throw into the fire.

"You build entire stories in your head to feed whatever moral superiority you are clinging to. Narratives that are very detailed, very dramatic, and wrong." He spoke with that same velvety, unbothered tone.

The heat in my blood reached a boiling point. My hands curled into tight fists at my sides.

"Oh, I am wrong? Then please enlighten me. Was that not a girl running out of here crying two seconds ago?" I scoffed, taking another aggressive step toward him.

"It was." He answered without a shred of hesitation.

"And you were not the reason?" I pressed, demanding the truth.

"I was." He admitted flatly.

I stared at him. A profound sense of disgust settled over my skin, mixing with a deep, heavy disbelief. He stood there unabashedly confessing his cruelty, offering no excuse, no defense, and zero remorse.

"Wow." The single word tumbled from my lips in breathless disbelief.

He shrugged his broad shoulders. The tailored fabric of his dark shirt pulled tight across his chest muscles. He acted as if shattering someone’s emotional state was trivial nonsense.

"See, you are proving my point." He murmured.

Something inside my chest snapped. The cold, unbothered expression on his face was unbearable. The fact that he could be so beautiful and so rotten at his core made my stomach turn.

"Good. Then I am glad I called you out yesterday. You are exactly the kind of person I thought you were." I fired back, my voice shaking with raw fury.

His stormy eyes narrowed a fraction. The micro-expression was barely noticeable, but it was enough to tell me my words had finally pierced his arrogant armor.

"And what kind is that?" He challenged, his voice dropping an octave, carrying a dark, instinctual warning.

"The kind no one should be stuck with. Whoever the poor soul is that is destined to end up as your mate is guaranteed a lifetime of misery, chained to a callous brute who cares for nothing and no one." I let the words spill out in a rapid, venomous rush. "So congratulations, alpha. Because I am never meeting you again. We are finished."

The heavy, suffocating silence that followed my declaration stretched across the room. The air grew thick, pressing down on my lungs. The alpha did not move. He just stared at me, his eyes burning with a dark, primal intensity that sent a sudden spike of alarm straight down my spine.

I did not take back a single word. I also knew better than to stick around and wait for a predator to strike. Needing to put as much distance between us as possible, I spun sharply on my heel. I aimed my boots toward the heavy mahogany doors, ready to storm out and leave this disastrous meeting behind me forever.

I did not make it two steps.

A rush of wind hit my back. Before my brain could even register his unnatural speed, a massive hand clamped around my wrist like a band of forged iron.

The moment his bare skin made contact with mine, the world shattered. A sudden, vicious jolt of electric sparks detonated at the point of contact. The raw, terrifying energy of the mate bond surged up my arm, crackling along every nerve ending, flooding my veins with liquid fire. My breath hitched in my throat. A surprised gasp tore from my lips. My wolf clawed at the inside of my chest, howling at the undeniable, biological recognition of our alpha mate. The sparks bypassed all logical thought, shooting straight down to my core, making my pussy throb with a sudden, traitorous ache.

Before I could process the intoxicating heat of his touch, his massive strength took over. He whipped me around in a disorienting blur of motion. My feet lifted off the velvet carpet. He shoved me backward. My shoulder blades slammed flat against the solid plaster wall. The impact knocked the remaining breath from my lungs.

I tried to push off the wall, but he stepped directly into my personal space, eliminating any chance of escape. He towered over me, a massive, imposing silhouette blocking out the ambient light of the chandelier. He planted one thick, muscular arm on the wall right beside my head. He effectively caged me between the hard, unyielding plaster at my back and the solid, radiating heat of his broad chest in front of me.

My pulse hammered a frantic, chaotic rhythm against my ribs. I found myself hyper-aware of every single inch of him. The overwhelming heat bleeding off his skin warmed my face. His woodsy, intoxicating scent of crushed pine needles, dark musk, and raw alpha dominance swallowed all the oxygen in the room. It clouded my senses, making my head spin.

"You did not think this through before coming here, did you?" He murmured, his voice a low, vibrating purr that rumbled deep in his chest.

I swallowed hard. My throat felt like sandpaper. My brain momentarily forgot how to speak. I stared up into his face, trapped beneath his heavy, calculating gaze.

His dark eyes dropped deliberately from mine. His gaze traced a slow, burning path down the bridge of my nose, settling heavily onto my parted lips. A sudden, heavy pooling of heat settled between my thighs. My body betrayed my anger, reacting to his proximity with a desperate, animalistic craving that made absolutely no sense.

"Let me go." I croaked, my voice sounding weak and breathless, lacking all the fiery venom I had possessed seconds ago.

He did not step back. Instead, he leaned down. He came close enough that his warm, steady breath prickled across the sensitized skin of my cheek. A slow, mocking smirk touched the corner of his lips.

"Are words suddenly failing you?" He taunted in a dark whisper. "Or are your ladybits suddenly in a frenzy?"

The explicit, arrogant taunt acted like a bucket of ice water over my clouded mind. Humiliation and rage detonated inside my chest, obliterating the intoxicating haze of the mate sparks. My instincts as a fighter took full control. I was not going to let this bastard play games with my body.

Without giving him a fraction of a second to anticipate my reaction, my free hand shot beneath the hem of my leather jacket. My fingers closed tightly around the rough grip of the concealed knife resting at the small of my back.

With swift, lethal precision, I drew the weapon. The metallic shing sliced through the quiet room. I drove my arm forward, pressing the razor-sharp edge of the cold steel flush against the exposed, beating pulse point of his thick throat.

"Back the hell off right now." I hissed, grinding my teeth together, delivering a venomous, unwavering warning. The cold metal contrasted sharply with the burning heat of his skin. I pressed the blade just hard enough to dent the flesh, ready to draw blood if he moved against me.

I expected him to flinch. I expected him to release my wrist, to step back from the lethal blade resting against his jugular, to show even a flicker of natural, biological fear.

Instead, the reckless bastard flashed me a full, cocky smile.

His stormy eyes remained locked onto mine, hovering barely inches above my face, utterly devoid of fear. He looked at the knife against his throat as if it were a child's plastic toy.

"What are you doing?" I asked, my pulse spiking at his unnatural calm.

"Seeing if you will follow through." He replied smoothly, his lips hovering dangerously close to mine.

My grip tightened around the hilt of the knife. My knuckles turned white.

"You think I won't?" I threatened, pushing my chin up.

"I think," he drawled, his voice dropping even lower, vibrating with dark amusement, "you do not know how."

The sheer audacity of this man made my blood roar in my ears.

"I know exactly how!" I spat back.

"Do you?" He murmured.

Before my brain could fathom his next move, his large, calloused hand came up. He did not grab my wrist to disarm me. Instead, he closed his large hand directly over mine. His long, thick fingers wrapped around my smaller hand, covering the very fingers gripping the hilt of the weapon.

Another scorching cascade of electric mate sparks detonated at the point of contact, sending violent shivers straight down my spine. My breath caught again.

With terrifying calm, he twisted my wrist. He adjusted my fingers, correcting my angle and my grip on the weapon. He deliberately forced the cold steel deeper, tilting the razor edge into a far more dangerous, lethal position against his own throat.

"Your angle is wrong." He instructed in a dark, casual whisper, acting as if he were teaching me a simple lesson instead of helping me hold a blade to his lifeblood. He shifted my hand another fraction of an inch. "If you actually wanted to hurt me, you would press right here."

A genuine wave of panic seized my chest. His blatant disregard for his own life terrified me. The line between lethal aggression and dangerous, primal intimacy had blurred into nothing. The rough texture of his palm over the back of my hand sent confusing, heated signals straight to my brain.

"Stop!" I gasped, breathlessly stammering as I tried to pull the knife away from his skin. I did not want to kill him. I just wanted him away from me.

"Go ahead," he commanded softly.

His other hand broke away from the plaster wall. His thick arm snaked down, sliding firmly and possessively around my waist. Instead of stepping away from the lethal blade, he tightened his brutal hold on my hips. He yanked me forward, crushing my body flush against his.

The collision knocked the air from my lungs. My soft breasts flattened against the hard, unyielding wall of his chest. My stomach pressed into his rigid abdominals. His hips locked against mine, leaving not a single sliver of space between our bodies. The raw, unmistakable bulge of his arousal pressed heavy and hard directly against my clit through the denim of my jeans. My pussy clenched instantly, weeping hot slick in a frantic, instinctual response to the heavy friction of his cock.

He stared intensely down at my lips, his gray eyes darkening to the color of a raging storm.

"Use that knife," he urged, his hypnotic whisper washing over my face. "Use it right now, while your mind is still working."

My thoughts spun in utter confusion. The raw physical sensation of his hard body caging mine scrambled my defensive instincts. It did not feel like a challenge. It felt like a dark, inevitable warning.

"Because a second later," he added quietly, his gaze dropping to my mouth. "It won't."

My brain short-circuited at his cryptic, arrogant claim. I parted my lips, desperate to regain control of the situation.

"What does that even—"

The question never fully formed on my tongue. Before another syllable could leave my mouth, he eliminated the remaining fraction of distance, and his lips crashed brutally and possessively down onto mine.