Chapter 2 What Is Wrong With Me?

Aria's POV

The strange man struggled to keep his eyes open, looking at me as he nodded.

The climb up the narrow staircase to my apartment felt endless.

The flickering overhead lights cast dancing shadows on the peeling wallpaper, and the musty smell of old building mixed unpleasantly with the metallic scent of blood dripping from his wounds.

"Just hold on," I whispered, glancing nervously over my shoulder toward the building entrance. "We're almost there."

His breath was warm against my ear as he replied, "I'm trying not to be dead weight."

The strange thing was, his scent had changed since we'd left the alley. The cold fir and leather was still there, but it had somehow become... warmer. Less intimidating.

"You're stronger than you look," he murmured, and I could hear the strain in his voice. "Thank you for this."

I fumbled with my keys at the apartment door, my hands shaking slightly. "Don't thank me yet. Let's get you inside before—"

The sound of a car door slamming in the street below made us both freeze.

His grip on my shoulder tightened, and his pheromones spiked with alertness despite his weakened state.

"Hurry," he breathed.

Finally, the lock clicked open. I pushed the door wide and helped him stumble into my small living room, quickly shutting and deadbolting the door behind us.

He sank onto my worn couch with a grunt of pain, and I winced as I watched a dark stain begin to spread across the faded fabric.

"I'll replace it," he said, catching my expression.

I shot him a look. "Right now you can barely sit upright. Let me worry about the furniture."

My medical bag had served well for basic first aid, but these weren't wounds you'd get from a simple street fight—they were werewolf wounds, deep and ragged. For that, a regular first-aid kit was useless. I bolted into the bedroom and dragged the specialized toolkit out from under the bed—a bitter reminder of lessons learned from my past entanglements with powerful families.

When I returned to the living room, the wounded Alpha was studying my small space, taking in the sparse furniture, the stack of psychology journals on the coffee table.

"You live alone," he observed.

"Is that a problem?" I knelt beside the couch, opening the kit and pulling out antiseptic and gauze specifically designed for werewolf injuries.

"No, it's just..." He paused as I began cleaning the blood around his wounds. "You could have walked away. Most people would have."

I focused on gently wiping away the dried blood, trying not to think about how intimate this felt. His skin was warm under my touch, and I could feel his muscles tense when I hit a particularly tender spot.

"Most people aren't Omegas," I said finally. "We're wired differently."

"Not all Omegas would have helped a strange Alpha."

I paused in my cleaning, meeting his gaze. "You're not just any Alpha, are you?"

His eyes flickered with something—surprise? Caution? "What makes you say that?"

"Your scent, for one thing. It's not like other Alphas I've encountered." I resumed cleaning his wounds, watching as the antiseptic caused him to hiss softly. "And the way you carry yourself, even injured. You're used to being in charge."

He was quiet for a long moment, and I could feel his internal debate through the subtle changes in his pheromones.

I glanced at him and asked, "What's your name?"

"Lorenzo Sterling," he said, hesitating for a few seconds, his voice carrying a weight of significance.

My hands stilled on his arm. Sterling. Everyone knew that name. The Sterling Pack was one of the most powerful in the region, with business interests spanning multiple industries. The name brought back a flood of complicated memories I'd rather keep buried.

With a tremble in my voice, I asked, "Do you know Marcus Sterling?"

His eyes narrowed slightly, and I caught a flicker of something unreadable across his features. "Why are you asking about him?"

The way he deflected my question made my heart skip. There was recognition there, despite his attempt to hide it.

"I'm not close to him or anything," I said quickly, focusing on bandaging his wounds. "Just curious, that's all."

His jaw tightened, and when he spoke again, his voice carried a bitter edge. "My family is the reason I'm bleeding on your couch. Let's leave it at that for now."

I nodded, not pressing further. Whatever connection he had to Marcus—or the pain it caused him—wasn't my business. My own history with that family was something I'd fought hard to forget.

"Why are they after you?" I asked instead, changing the subject. "Why do they want to kill you?"

Lorenzo's jaw tightened. "Pack politics. The Sterling name comes with a lot of baggage."

"That explains why someone wants you dead," I said, reaching for a moonpetal-infused bandage—one of the special healing wraps that worked particularly well on werewolf injuries. "But it doesn't change the fact that you're hurt."

He nodded grimly. "When you're at the top, everyone below wants to pull you down—and they don't care who gets hurt in the process."

Finishing the cleaning, I carefully applied the herb-infused bandages to his deepest cuts. My fingers worked with practiced efficiency, though I couldn't ignore the way his skin seemed to respond to my touch, or how his breathing grew steadier as my healing pheromones enveloped him.

After that, I grabbed a cloth and began wiping down the couch, trying to clean up the bloodstains before they set in. The combination of blood loss and my calming scent had taken its toll—Lorenzo's eyes grew heavy, and within minutes, he had passed out completely.

Once I finished cleaning, I crouched down beside him, studying his features in the dim light. He was... striking. Beautiful, even, in a dangerous sort of way.

My eyes lingered on his long lashes, then drifted to his lips. I got so lost in staring that I didn't notice time slipping by—until he mumbled something under his breath, shifting slightly on the couch.

I straightened abruptly, my pulse spiking—not from embarrassment, but from annoyance at myself for losing focus. How long had I been sitting there like some moonstruck fool? This was exactly the kind of distraction that could get me killed. I quickly backed away and slipped into my room, needing distance to regain my composure and clear my head.

My back hit the door, my own pulse a frantic drum against the wood. A stranger. A dangerous one. And I'd been staring at him like... what? Some moonstruck fool? The thought was humiliating, a betrayal of every instinct that had kept me alive this long. I was a trauma therapist, for Moon God's sake. I'd seen what happened when people let their guard down around dangerous individuals.

But even as I tried to rationalize my behavior, I couldn't shake the feeling that Lorenzo Sterling was going to change everything.