THIRD PERSON POV:
BEGINNING OF FLASHBACK
“I want you to fuck me!” June says to Hiram, and a smirk crosses his lips at once.
The daring nature of the lady before him makes him feel things he hasn’t felt before. He opens the door at once and pulls her out, lifting her up bridal style as he makes his way to his guest room.
He feels his room is too far, and the bulge in his pants can’t wait. He would have had her in his car, but he wants to enjoy the moment.
As soon as he reaches the door, he manages to pull it open, then walks in, kicking it closed with the back of his foot. He walks straight to the bed, tossing her onto it and fumbling with his pants. Juniper is drunk, but she is a bit aware of what is going on. It is about to be her first time, and this stranger is hella hot. Hiram pulls down his pants, hurriedly lifting the hem of her dress, attempting to press himself into her.
The moment his dick comes in contact with her entrance, she whimpers from the pain, wrapping her hand around him. As for him, he feels a sweet sensation envelop his body-something he has never felt before, and in that moment, a sweet smell engulfs the entire room. The word mates echoes in his ears, causing his wolf to take over.
He grabs Juniper, sinking his fangs into her neck without thinking. Pain radiates through her body, and she screams loudly, slapping hard against his chest. This is when he realizes what he has done. He pulls away at once, gets to his feet, while Juniper crawls back, her back hitting the headboard. She reaches for her neck, which aches from his mark.
Hiram doesn’t hesitate. He grabs his phone and places a call to Alex.
“Al… help, please. I just found my mate, and I accidentally bit her to mark her,” he stammers, and Alex chuckles.
“Well, that’s a relief. What do you mean accidentally? Mark the poor girl, and-”
“She is human, Alex,” he says, his gaze still on June, who pulls her hand away, staring at blood from the wound.
Alex, who knows how grave this situation is, swallows hard.
“If she’s there, put the phone on speaker,” she says, and Hiram does so.
“Who are you, and what are you doing to me?” June asks, but before she can say more, Alex chants a spell, and June blinks slightly, then remains still for a split second.
“There you have it,” Alex says.
As soon as this is done, Hiram walks out of the room, locking June in it and leaving her there. The thoughts of his mate being human swirl around in his head, and he wonders how much more bad luck the Moon Goddess will throw his way. A part of him believes it’s his mother’s prayers answered since he ran from marrying Vera. This is probably his punishment.
He walks to the mini-bar in his living room, grabbing a bottle. Without bothering with a glass, he corks the bottle and starts to down its entire contents. He curses himself for going to the bar tonight. Maybe if he was home, then this wouldn’t have happened.
“And I fucking marked her,” he says aloud, chugging down more of the alcohol. Frustration simmers beneath his skin, and he wonders if it is all a dream.
He realizes otherwise when he sees Juniper staggering toward him.
“W… where have you been?” she asks in a slur, collapsing close to him.
It happens that she found a bottle of wine in the room and drank it, intensifying her drunkenness.
“My neck… it hurts… but…” She glances to the side. “Y… you are handsome,” she mutters, getting to her feet to leave the house.
Hiram knows he should detest her, but she is his mate, and seeing her walk away drunk causes his protective instincts to kick in. He is in denial about how drunk he is until he gets to his feet and the entire place spins, but he pushes forward to get to June.
Once outside, he sees her heading toward the street and chases after her, but she thinks it is a joke. She throws her arms in the air, laughing and rushing past the gates.
As soon as she is on the street, she flags down the first taxi and gets in, ordering it to move. Hiram flags down a taxi to go after it, and the driver follows hers until she randomly orders her driver to stop. Hiram asks his driver to stop too, and June rushes out without paying hers. He pays for both rides and tries to catch her before he becomes completely intoxicated.
As his hands grab hers, she flips around, running her hands over his body.
“Why did you refuse to fuck me?” she slurs, poking his shoulder. He grabs her hand in anger, expecting to say something tangible, but a chuckle leaves his lips. The intoxication has just begun, and he has no clue he is about to make the mistake of his life.
He lets go of June, then cups her face and kisses her. June grabs his hands, pulling him directionless, and they laugh wildly in the cold night, whirling away.
After a while of staggering aimlessly, Juniper suddenly gasps, pointing ahead. “A church!”
Hiram squints, barely making out the steeple in the dim light. Without thinking, she grabs his hand and drags him forward, giggling uncontrollably.
They stumble through the doors, laughing like maniacs. A lone man stands inside, startled by their disheveled state.
“Marry us!” Juniper slurs, throwing her arms wide.
The man blinks, then shrugs. “Why not?”
Before Hiram can process the madness, they’re exchanging mumbled vows.
“By the power vested in me…” the man begins, but they cut him off with a sloppy kiss, leaving him to shake his head as they stagger back out into the night as he, too, was drunk.
END OF FLASHBACK
“Then we got the marriage certificate that night. We headed back to the hotel room, but before we could have sex, we both passed out from the heavy dose of alcohol,” Hiram continues, and June stares at him in disbelief. “The reason you cannot remember a thing from that night is because the spell was to erase everything that happened after I marked you, so you can remember the bar and meeting with me, but after that, nothing more.”
Her breathing comes out shaky, and she begins to wonder if what she is doing with him is worth it.
“What else are you keeping from me, Hiram? Who have you hurt or wiped from my memory that I do not know of?”
He shakes his head when she asks, but his answer doesn’t satisfy her.
“I swear, I only hurt those who hurt you,” he begins, then Jax crosses his mind. “Except Jax,” he says in a low tone, and June glares at him with her brows drawn down.
“On the day of Nala’s birthday, I saw your Instagram, and you two seemed intimate. I was a bit jealous, so I asked the management to evict him. I paid triple the rent to get the lady he was replaced with, and I paid him off never to speak with you again.”
“Winston is the wolf you keep seeing in your dream. The night you spent in my house was a full moon, and he chased you in wolf form because he couldn’t recognize you. I made Alex’s men torture Victor in a room in this house on the night you spent here, and I threatened Lola to leave my class or fail forever. Larry left town because I paid him to leave. I took down the site where you found information about werewolves, and the missing books in the library were my doing, too.”
“Christ, Hiram!” Juniper exclaims, taking a step back. She is angry, but she needs to know more. “What else is there? Did you kill someone? Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if…”
“No!” he cuts her off at once. “I could have, but I held back for you,” he says, and she chuckles.
“Now it all makes sense to me. A werewolf prince whose family runs the entire city. That is why you do things like there are no consequences and why you do not fear the influence Cillian’s parents have.”
He shakes his head.
“I was pissed about you and Cillian because he was the one who sent the stalker after you.”
“What?” she asks, her mouth ajar.