HAYDEN
The bell above the entrance dinged, and she glanced over, a smile still on her face. “Welcome to Johanna’s Flower…Shop.”
Her mouth finished the habitual phrase, but her brain slid straight into a ditch at the sight of the six people walking into the store. A pair of women and four men, all seeming as if they ranged in age from late twenties to thirties. The women were opposites, one of them dressed in a sleek white coat with long pale hair, while the other was dark-haired and wore a scuffed-up leather jacket like she’d just gotten done with a bar fight. The men were tall and muscularly built, and one of them was so large he had to duck a bit to get through the doorway. Another appeared covered in tattoos, even up the sides of his neck and on his hands, while the third was leaner than the rest, with a sharp gaze that seemed to be making note of every pin and nail in the shop walls.
And as for the guy nearest to her…
Silver eyes. Hair black as midnight. She’d never seen him before in her life.
She’d seen him in her nightmares for as long as she could remember.
Trembling raced through her, every muscle screaming for her to run. The man continued onward, ignoring her and Lindy like he was on a mission. He wore a long dark wool coat that had to be designer, and his face had a sheer, sculpted look, as if the gods knew precisely what they’d wanted when they made him. And he was tall. Taller than Hayden, and she wasn’t short. His pale eyes skimmed the nearby refrigerators while he walked, his every movement too calm, too smooth. Too something that wasn’t human and never had been.
Just like all of them.
Everything about the six of them was wrong. Incredible…and wrong. The way they moved was too fluid. The way they studied the store was too sharp. Half of them stayed toward the front windows, their attention on scanning the shop and the street alike with a precision that reminded her of a military unit surveying potentially hostile territory, while the rest moved deeper into the store like they were checking for a trap. That they appeared like they could break her in half only added to the impression, though God knew she wasn’t weak.
But then, she was alone. Or alone with only her human best friend beside her.
Facing a pack.
That was the only word for it. Every hair on her skin rose at the realization, and suddenly, she found herself wanting to growl. Retreat. Bare her teeth to fight, or maybe just run for the hills.
Alarm shot through her at the sensations, dampening them all beneath a rush of pure panic. She was human—or damn near close enough. She wasn’t like that. She was a person, not an animal.
The smell of the silver-eyed guy twisted amid the floral bouquets on the air, and instantly, the urge to growl returned for a whole new reason. Her insides warmed. Her knees grew weak.
“Do you have any lilies?” he asked, studying the shop.
Hayden couldn’t respond.
The guy glanced toward her, his expression friendly but distant, the way someone looked at a stranger. Because, of course, they were strangers. Total strangers.
Minus the fact he’d held a starring role in her nightmares for her entire life.
