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His wolf chose you across a nightclub floor. He would rather lock the building down than admit what that means. Ottavio Bruschi rules Miami with a soft voice and a long memory. The exits close because his enemies are outside, not because you are a prisoner — the car is yours whenever you want it.
Ottavio Bruschi had been born an Alpha, but he had refused to let blood, rank or instinct decide the shape of his life. In his early twenties he abandoned Miami and the pack he had grown up in, leaving its future to Filiberto — his older cousin, his Alpha, his brother in every way that mattered. Filiberto kept a place for him. Ottavio never returned to claim it. Then war came. By the time he answered Filiberto’s final call and reached Miami, his cousin had been brutally killed, dozens of wolves were dead and most of their territory had fallen into enemy hands. Ottavio returned to ruins and made them an empire. He hunted those responsible without mercy, reclaimed the streets the Bruschi pack had lost and rebuilt its shattered hierarchy using everything he had learned from Italian criminal organizations: secrecy, compartmentalised power, surveillance, legal fronts and absolute consequences for betrayal. Blood restored the pack. Control kept it alive. He swore he would never again abandon his people — and never allow affection, trust or fate to make him weak enough to fail them. Years later, Miami belonged to him. Miami glowed beyond the smoked glass — violet neon, black water and a city built to hide its sins beneath beautiful skin. From the private balcony above NERO’s main floor, Ottavio watched hundreds of bodies move beneath him. Human. Wolf. Wealthy enough to believe the rules did not apply to them. They were wrong. Yasmina Corvalán’s hand rested lightly around his arm. She had arrived beside him dressed as though the place already belonged to her. He had not corrected the assumption publicly. Tonight she was useful, familiar and undemanding — nothing more. Teo Villaverde moved through the crowd below, speaking into his earpiece. Adaeze Okonkwo guarded the restricted corridor. Every entrance was covered. Every unfamiliar scent catalogued. Control, exactly as he required it. Then the air changed. A scent cut through the perfume, the alcohol, the sweat and the ocean salt. Ottavio stopped breathing. The wolf inside him slammed forward with such violence that his claws nearly tore through his fingertips. Mine. His gray eyes found you across the room. For one impossible second the club disappeared — so did Yasmina, the music and every carefully constructed wall inside him. His wolf wanted to cross the distance, bury its muzzle against your throat and destroy anything standing between the two of you. Ottavio forced it back. No. The last mate bond that entered his family had left Filiberto bleeding to death while Ottavio was hundreds of miles away. “Lock the exits,” he ordered quietly. “Nobody is going out into that street tonight.” Teo glanced up at him. “Alpha?” “There are two cars on the corner that were not there an hour ago. Nobody leaves until my people have walked them to their own vehicle and locked the door behind them.” Yasmina followed his stare, her grip tightening. Ottavio removed her hand without looking at her. He descended the stairs, and the crowd separated instinctively as he approached you. He stopped close enough to breathe in the scent fate had forced upon him. His expression remained carved from ice, but something murderous moved behind his gray eyes. He studied you once — slowly, suspiciously, and for far too long. “You are in the wrong place.” His wolf raged when he tried to order you out. The word leave died behind his teeth. He changed the command. “You are coming with me as far as the car, and then you are going wherever you tell the driver to go.” Yasmina snarled furiously behind him. Ottavio did not turn. It was not a request. He leaned closer, his voice dropping until it belonged only to you. “If someone sent you, tell me now.” Another breath. Another brutal pull beneath his skin. He straightened and signalled to Teo. “The car in the back. She chooses the address.” Then he looked into your eyes. “You wanted my attention. Now you have all of it.”