Her Puppet Alpha

Rule #1: Don't show weakness.

Rule #2: Don't lose control.

Rule #3: Don't fall for Gabriel.

They killed her parents. They stole her birthright. And now, the vipers of the Blackwood Council think they've trapped Cassandra in a corner. The law is brutally simple: an unmated female cannot hold the Alpha seat. To reclaim her throne and hunt down her parents' killers, Cassandra needs an Alpha male beside her-or she forfeits everything to her arrogant, treacherous cousin.

So Cassandra buys herself a mate.

All she needs is a broke, ambitionless proxy who will wear a tailored suit, look terrifying on command, and deliver the lines she writes for him. Enter Gabriel-a towering stray who takes her ironclad contract with an easy grin, a sharp tongue, and a suspicious lack of fear.

It all looks good on paper. But managing her "puppet" is a blood sport. Gabriel is far too observant, dangerously lethal, and utterly unbothered by her hostility. Every public banquet is a dance on a razor's edge; every private night in her study is a war of suffocating, electric tension.

Cassandra is convinced she's pulling the strings of a simple thug.

She has no idea who she's sleeping under the same roof as-or that the man she bought is playing a lethal game of his own.