Alessandra Bianchi thought her life would be ordinary again after long ER nights?until a brutal, silent stranger rolls into her ER, claims she's his mate, and disappears. Evan O'Brien returns to consciousness miles from home with his body smeared in another's blood and a fragmented memory of torture. He tracks the only perfect match he can scent to a small-town nurse, and the moment their eyes meet, the world they both knew fractures.

Caught between community rules that bind loyalties and predators who want Hawthorne?the ancient shifter hiding a secret that could change everything?Alessandra must decide whether to trust a gorgeous stranger who insists he didn't choose this life, or run from the impossible bond that is calling them both. As hybrids and Council secrets close in, the pair must stitch together the truth of who took Evan?and why?before an old experiment burns the world down.