The preparation was not a makeover. It was a weaponization.
Damien's "emergency team" wasn't a couple of makeup artists with curling irons. It was a squad of six beta wolves who moved with military precision. They didn't speak. They didn't ask questions. They simply unpacked trunk after trunk of haute couture, turning the penthouse living room into a war room of silk and chiffon.
But the atmosphere was wrong.
Usually, a styling session for a gala was filled with champagne and gossip. Tonight, the air smelled of ozone and terror.
The stylists could smell the silver.
It sat on the coffee table in its velvet box—the Sinclair Collar. Even with the lid closed, its toxic aura leaked out, making the wolves in the room sweat and flinch. They worked around it, giving the table a wide berth, their eyes darting toward it like it was a live grenade.
Aria sat in the center of the chaos, motionless.
She wasn't looking at the mirror. She was looking at Damien, who was standing on the balcony, on the phone, barking orders at his security detail. He was shirtless, changing into his tuxedo trousers, and the sight of his scarred back—scars he had gotten protecting her years ago—hardened something inside her.
"Madame?"
The head stylist, a woman named Coco, held up a dress. It was red. Bright, screaming crimson.
"No," Aria said. Her voice was calm, but it carried a resonance that made Coco stumble back.
"But... red is the color of power, Madame. It draws the eye."
"Red is the color of bleeding," Aria corrected. She stood up, the silk robe slipping from her shoulders. "I am not bleeding tonight. I am biting."
She walked past the rack of colorful gowns—the floral prints, the soft pastels, the "Vera" disguises. She went to the back, where a garment bag made of heavy, black canvas hung alone.
Damien had said to bring the Vault Collection.
Aria unzipped the bag.
The dress inside wasn't fabric. It was liquid engineering.
It was a floor-length column of gunmetal mesh—thousands of tiny, interlocking platinum scales that shimmered like the skin of a deep-sea predator. It was backless, plunging dangerously low, with long sleeves that ended in finger-loops. It looked heavy. It looked impenetrable.
"That one," Aria said.
Coco swallowed hard. "Madame, that dress... it weighs thirty pounds. It was commissioned for the Victorian Matriarchs. It has a corset structure made of titanium."
"Put it on me," Aria ordered.
The process took three people. As they cinched the internal corset, Aria felt her ribs compress, her spine straighten. The dress didn't just cover her; it held her up. It forced her posture into a line of absolute arrogance. When the platinum scales settled against her skin, they were cold, but her body heat quickly warmed them.
She looked like a statue cast in war-metal.
Finally, the room went silent. The hair and makeup were done—her dark hair slicked back into a severe, high architectural bun, her lips painted a deep, oxblood shade that looked like dried wine. Her eyes, framed by sharp liner, were the only thing that looked human.
Damien walked in from the balcony. He was fully dressed now, in a tuxedo cut so sharp it could draw blood.
He stopped.
His grey eyes traveled up the column of platinum scales, lingering on the curve of her hip, the exposed expanse of her back, and finally, her face. He didn't smile. He didn't offer a compliment. He just exhaled, a sound that was half pain, half worship.
"Everyone out," Damien commanded.
The stylists didn't need to be told twice. They grabbed their kits and fled the room, desperate to escape the pressure building in the air.
When the door clicked shut, Damien walked to the coffee table.
He picked up the black velvet box.
"Are you sure?" he asked. His voice was rough. "Once I put this on you, there is no hiding. You will be a beacon to every hunter in the city."
Aria turned to the mirror. She looked at her own reflection. She saw the fear in her eyes, yes. But she saw something else, too. She saw the girl who had survived five years of poverty in Paris. She saw the mother who had raised two children while hiding from the world.
"Put it on," she whispered.
Damien stepped behind her.
He opened the box. The silver choker gleamed under the chandelier light, the raw diamonds embedded in the metal looking like jagged teeth.
He lifted it. His hands were steady, but Aria could feel the heat radiating from him. He had to be careful not to touch the inner lining of the collar, where the silver was purest.
He brought it to her throat.
Click.
The heavy clasp snapped shut at the nape of her neck.
Aria braced herself.
She waited for the burn. She waited for the skin to blister, for her throat to close up.
Instead, a rush of cold, electric energy slammed into her brain.
The connection.
The silver wasn't choking her. It was amplifying her. It felt like plugging a live wire into a generator. The White Wolf in her mind threw its head back and howled, the sound echoing in her skull. Her vision sharpened until she could see the dust motes floating in the air. She could hear Damien's heartbeat—thump-thump, thump-thump—rhythmically accelerating.
Aria gasped, her hands flying to the metal.
"Does it hurt?" Damien asked urgently, his hands hovering over her shoulders, afraid to touch the collar.
Aria looked at him in the mirror.
Her eyes were no longer hazel. They were bright, incandescent white. Not just the irises—the entire eye was glowing with a soft, lunar luminescence.
"No," she said. Her voice sounded different. It had a metallic reverb, a dual-tone harmonic that wasn't human. "It feels... correct."
Damien stared at her. He reached out and touched her cheek, his thumb brushing against her jawline, inches from the lethal metal.
"You are beautiful," he whispered. "And you are terrifying."
"Good," Aria said. The glow in her eyes faded back to hazel, but the power remained, humming under her skin. "Because I don't want to be loved tonight, Damien. I want to be feared."
The Transit: 8:45 PM
The limousine was an armored beast, bulletproof glass tinted so dark the city outside was just a blur of neon streaks.
They sat in silence.
Damien held her hand. His grip was tight, bone-crushing. He wasn't looking at her; he was watching the GPS tracker on the console, monitoring the perimeter drones that were escorting them.
"Leo is online," Damien said, breaking the silence. "He has tapped into the Gala's security feed. He says Volkov is already there."
"Is he alone?"
"No. He has the entire Russian delegation with him. And the Council members are circling him like vultures." Damien glanced at her. "Elena is there, too. She's giving interviews."
Aria checked her phone. The live feed of the red carpet was playing.
There she was. Elena Vance.
She was wearing a white dress—an obvious, pathetic attempt to look innocent. She was clinging to the arm of a Council Elder, weeping dry tears for the cameras.
"We are just so worried about Damien," Elena was saying, her voice trembling perfectly. "He's been brainwashed. This woman... she's dangerous. I believe she has him drugged."
Aria turned off the phone.
"She's trying to set the narrative," Aria said. "She wants the Council to intervene before we even get inside."
"Then we don't give them time," Damien said.
The car slowed.
They had arrived.
The venue was the St. Jude's Cathedral—a massive, gothic structure in Midtown that had been deconsecrated and turned into an event hall for the supernatural elite. Stone gargoyles leered down from the spires. The red carpet was rolled out over the cobblestones, flanked by hundreds of paparazzi and curious onlookers.
But these weren't just human paparazzi. Half of them were pack spies, documenting the hierarchy.
The car stopped.
"Ready?" Damien asked.
Aria touched the cold silver at her throat. "Open the door."
The driver stepped out and pulled the handle.
Flashbulbs exploded like a supernova.
Pop-pop-pop-pop-pop.
The light was blinding. The noise was a physical wall—shouting, screaming, the roar of the crowd.
Damien stepped out first.
He buttoned his jacket. He stood to his full height, his Alpha aura rolling off him in waves of dark, aggressive smoke. He snarled silently at a photographer who got too close, and the man dropped his camera in terror.
Then, he turned and offered his hand to the dark interior of the car.
Aria took it.
She stepped out.
The gunmetal dress caught the flashbulbs and shattered the light, turning her into a pillar of glittering, liquid steel. She didn't stumble. She didn't look down. She rose from the car like a goddess emerging from a pool of mercury.
The crowd went silent.
It wasn't a respectful silence. It was the silence of shock.
They saw the dress. They saw the face—the face of the woman who was supposed to be dead.
And then, they saw the collar.
A collective gasp ripped through the werewolf contingent of the press. A cameraman from the Daily Moon actually retched, his wolf reacting instinctively to the proximity of that much pure silver.
"Is that...?" someone whispered.
"Silver," another voice hissed. "It's pure silver."
Aria didn't look at them. She locked her arm through Damien's.
"Walk," she murmured.
They moved down the red carpet. It felt like walking through a minefield. The air was thick with confusion and hostility.
Elena Vance was standing at the top of the stairs, still holding her microphone. When she saw Damien, her face lit up with a triumphant, predatory smile. She opened her mouth to launch her accusation.
Then she saw Aria.
Elena's smile died. Her eyes went to the collar. Her skin went pale, then grey. She took a step back, her heel catching on her dress.
Aria didn't stop. She didn't even slow down.
As they passed Elena, Aria turned her head slightly. Just an inch.
She looked Elena dead in the eye.
Aria didn't say a word. She just let a fraction of the White Wolf's pressure leak out.
Elena choked. She dropped the microphone. She clawed at her own throat, gasping for air as the sheer weight of Aria's dominance crushed her windpipe from five feet away.
Aria turned back to the front.
"Nice touch," Damien murmured, his voice laced with dark amusement.
"I didn't touch her," Aria said innocently. "She tripped."
They reached the massive oak doors of the Cathedral. The doormen, two hulking Gamma wolves, were trembling. They could smell the silver. It was making their noses bleed.
They scrambled to open the doors.
Inside, the music was loud. A string quartet was playing something classical and pretentious. The room was filled with five hundred of the most powerful supernatural beings in North America. Alphas, heiresses, Council members, warlords.
They were laughing, drinking, plotting.
Then the doors opened.
Aria and Damien stepped onto the balcony overlooking the ballroom.
The scent hit the room first.
Not the scent of perfume. Not the scent of wolf.
The sharp, metallic, sterilization scent of Silver.
The music faltered. The chatter died. Heads turned. Glasses shattered as hands went numb.
Five hundred pairs of eyes looked up.
In the center of the room, standing under the crystal chandelier, was Konstantin Volkov. He was holding a glass of red wine, surrounded by his sycophants.
He looked up.
His black eyes met Aria's.
For a second, just a split second, the void in his eyes flickered.
It wasn't fear. Not yet.
It was recognition.
Aria placed her hand on the banister. The silver ring on her finger clicked against the wood.
She smiled.
"Shall we go down, husband?" she said, her voice carrying through the silent hall. "I believe the landlord is waiting."
Damien grinned. It was a feral, bloodthirsty thing.
"Let's go say hello."