Damien’s POV
When Caleb ntioned seeing Anna before, sothing sharp and urgent twisted in my chest. I leaned forward slightly, my alpha instincts suddenly on high alert.
"Where exactly did you see her?" I asked, my voice carefully controlled despite the storm brewing beneath the surface.
Caleb stared out the window for what felt like an eternity, his brow creased in concentration. The city lights streaked past us in blurs of gold and white, but he seed completely oblivious to the scenery, lost in so distant mory.
Caleb’s fingers drumd against his thigh in an absent rhythm, his eyes still fixed on so point beyond the glass. Then suddenly, his entire body went rigid.
"Oh my God," he breathed, his hand flying to his forehead as if the mory had physically struck him. "Oh my *God*, I can’t believe I didn’t make the connection sooner!"
"What?" I leaned forward, every muscle in my body coiled tight. "What do you rember?"
"It was five years ago!" Caleb spun to face , his eyes wide with the kind of shocked recognition that made my stomach drop to sowhere around my ankles. "Five years ago, at the Moonlight Grand Hotel!"
The Moonlight Grand. The sa hotel where I’d spent that unforgettable night with my mystery woman. The sa hotel where I’d left my pendant beside a sleeping figure I’d never been able to find again.
"Tell everything," I said, my voice coming out rougher than I’d intended. "Every single detail."
Caleb ran both hands through his hair, his expression cycling between amazent and disgust as the mories ca flooding back. "I was there on a job—so rich guy’s vintage Porsche had broken down in the hotel’s underground parking garage. Real piece of work, that car. Took most of the night to get her running again."
"Get to the point about Anna," I interrupted, though my heart was already hamring against my ribs.
"Right, right!" Caleb waved a hand impatiently. "So there I was, around six in the morning, packing up my tools and thinking about breakfast, when this... *creature* ca stumbling out of the hotel’s service entrance."
The way he said ’creature’ made my lips twitch despite everything. "Creature?"
Caleb shuddered dramatically. "Picture this: a woman wearing what used to be a hotel cleaning uniform—you know, those hideous polyester things—except it looked like she’d been through a blender. Hair sticking up in every direction, makeup sared all over her face... well, let’s just say she looked rough."
Caleb leaned back against the seat, his expression a mixture of horror and dark amusent. "The sll. Sweet Jesus, the sll. It was like soone had dumped an entire perfu factory into a garbage disposal and then lit it on fire."
Despite the growing knot of dread in my stomach, I found myself fighting back a laugh. "That bad?"
"Worse. I’m talking eye-watering, nose-burning, make-you-question-your-will-to-live levels of awful." Caleb gestured wildly with his hands. "And tonight, when she leaned into the car window and batted her eyelashes at , it was the exact sa scent. I swear I had flashbacks."
The humor drained from the mont as the implications hit full force. "What was she doing outside the hotel?"
He paused, seeming to gather his thoughts, then continued with the careful precision of soone recounting important evidence.
"She was clutching sothing in her hands—sothing that caught the early morning light and threw it back in these brilliant golden flashes. At first, I thought maybe it was brass or so cheap costu jewelry, but when she got closer..." Caleb shook his head slowly. "Damien, it was beautiful. Intricate craftsmanship, obviously expensive. Real gold, unless I miss my guess."
My mouth went completely dry. "A pendant?"
"A pendant," Caleb confird, his eyes never leaving my face. "Shaped like a wolf, with incredibly detailed engravings. The kind of work you see in high-end jewelry stores, not clutched in the hands of a desperate hotel cleaning lady at dawn."
The world tilted sideways. Everything I thought I knew about that night, about Anna, about the woman I’d been searching for—all of it crumbled like a house of cards in a hurricane.
"She was trying to sell it," I said, though it ca out more like a question, a desperate hope that sohow I was wrong about what this ant.
"*Trying* to sell it?" Caleb let out a bark of bitter laughter. "Damien, she was practically throwing herself at people’s feet, begging them to buy it. I watched her approach at least six different people before she got to , and the desperation on her face..." He trailed off, shaking his head. "It was ugly to watch."
The leather armrest creaked under my grip. "What exactly did she say to you?"
"Oh, it was a real performance." Caleb’s voice took on a mocking, high-pitched tone as he mimicked Anna’s words. "’Please, mister, I need the money for my sick grandmother’s dicine! This belonged to my dear departed aunt, but I have to sell it to pay for food!’ The whole sob story, delivered with all the sincerity of a carnival barker."
"And you didn’t buy it."
"Hell no, I didn’t buy it!" Caleb looked at like I’d suggested he juggle fire while riding a unicycle. "Damien, I may have been young and broke, but I wasn’t born yesterday. Everything about that situation scread ’stolen goods’ or ’scam’ or both."
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