Fifty Shades of Grey Can't Hold A Candle to This Book

Fighting Darius

No Hello or Goodbye

PENNY

Darius Ivanovic Rykov won’t stop staring at me and I can’t seem to look away either as Genesis keeps making introductions.

She tells me that Darius is a commander of the Royal Intelligence Force.

He’s here with his two other officers to investigate Genesis’s kidnapping. It’s a huge deal, especially since it’s connected to a ruthless and well-known rebel group.

Just then, I noticed my other friends are here too. Constantine, Lazarus, and Caspian. All of them are Lycans and they are all drop-dead gorgeous.

“Beany Penny! Don’t I get a hug too?” Caspian has a big, mischievous grin on his face as he pulls me in for a hug.

Huh? Beany Penny?

Caspian is actually Prince Caspian. The crown prince, also Constantine’s cousin. Prince Caspian is still unmated. He’s also swoon-worthily good-looking, of course.

If he wasn’t such an idiot, I might have fallen for him. Well, actually, I did have a crush on him…until he opened his mouth.

I glance quickly back at the smoking-hot, icy-blue-eyed Lycan over Caspian’s shoulder. He has a big scowl on his handsome face as he stares at Caspian and me.

I can’t concentrate on anything else around me. People are talking, yet I’m only aware of his every movement and of his eyes on me.

I feel the buzzing energy every time those icy-blue eyes land on me, which is a lot. My ears zone in on his deep, sexy voice as he talks…and that Russian accent. I melt.

My heart flutters in my chest like a trapped little bird, and my stomach clenches almost painfully every time our eyes meet.

All through the night, my eyes keep drifting to him. Like a magnet, I’m hopelessly drawn to him. Like he’s pulling the string to my kite.

He can’t seem to keep his eyes off me too because every time I look at him, he’s already looking at me. Our eyes would meet and lock from across the room. He would be the first to break the spell.

He would drag his eyes away before they would inevitably and reluctantly drift back to me again. It’s as if he can’t help himself.

“Persephone Aspen Ruiz, did you hear a word I was saying?” asks Genesis after I fail to answer her question for the third time tonight.

Of course not, girl.

“Of course I have, Genesis,” I answer as I feel my cheeks heating up. Gee, thanks a lot! Now I’m blushing. I don’t do blushing!

My eyes involuntarily flicker in Darius’s direction. I notice that there’s a slight smirk on his lips. A little amusement and a hint of satisfaction in his eyes.

Oh, how embarrassing! He must know how much his presence is affecting me.

“He’s hot, eh?” whispers Reese into my ear.

“Who?” I pretend ignorance.

“Who else?” She grins mischievously. “I think he looks like Draco Malfoy…only buffer, hotter, bigger, sexier.”

“Shut up.” I shush her as I notice his eyes slide to me again.

I watch him covertly from afar.

He looks like he’s in his early twenties…twenty-two at the most. He looks so tough, yet sophisticated. Rugged, yet so beautiful. So worldly and cultured.

I’d guess he is all that since really he’s older than twenty-two. Genesis’s mate, Constantine, looks like he’s only eighteen, but he’s actually over three hundred years old.

So I imagine he must be a bit older than that.

Compared to humans, us werewolves age slower, but lycans age a lot slower than werewolves. That means they live a lot longer.

Thankfully, a lycan’s mate, be they a human or a werewolf, will change into a lycan once they’re bonded.

If you’re wondering about how a werewolf could possibly mate with a lycan, then maybe I should begin by telling you a bit of what I know about lycans.

You see, lycans don’t have mates chosen for them by the moon goddess like us regular werewolves. They get to choose their own mates: either another lycan, a regular werewolf, or even a human.

Even though they’re not blessed with mates, each lycan has “the one” for them. The one that they’re attracted to like no other.

This one being is called erasthai.

This attraction is governed by their basic survival instinct. It is believed that the erasthai is best suited to the lycan in every way.

The stronger the attraction, the stronger their bond will be when they become mates. Lycans are not known to give up on their erasthais, even if their erasthais are already mated or married to another.

How crazy is that?

That being said, there are lycans who are marked and mated with other lycans who are not their erasthais. The bond isn’t as strong, though.

The bond between lycans who mate with their erasthais can be stronger than that of werewolf mates.

Seeing my best friend Genesis and her lycan mate, Constantine, I can believe that. She’s definitely Constantine’s erasthai. The level of love and understanding between them is incomparable.

Their chosen mate, no matter if she or he is a werewolf or a human, will turn into a lycan after they form a bond.

The mate’s physical appearance as a human will also change to mold perfectly to its other half, the lycan.

In their human form, lycans are better looking and more attractive than us regular werewolves, who are considered to be better looking than most humans…like way more.

So, lycans are amazingly smoking hot.

My friend Genesis, who’s very beautiful to begin with, is now drop-dead gorgeous, just like all the other lycans.

Genesis corners me into telling her about what’s going on with me the very next day. My bestie thinks I am Darius Rykov’s erasthai because that’s how she felt the first time she met Constantine.

I am so confused because I was waiting for my mate. I wasn’t expecting to be an erasthai to any lycans.

Not at all. What will happen if or when I meet my mate? I don’t know, but all I do know is that the connection is so strong that I can’t stop thinking about him.

Unfortunately, he’s gone right after the investigation without even saying goodbye or acknowledging me at all.