The beast’s fettered breath caressed Kaliope’s skin. There were workplace hazards, and then there was being mauled by a werewolf. A relevant tidbit they’d skipped when she signed her contract. All she wanted was a damned job. A normal job.

Then you shouldn’t have signed the contract, Kaliope. They showed you what was behind the Veil.

And she’d experienced the dangers of her new position on her first case when a faulty charm almost fried her brain. Her boss offered her a way out of her contract after they closed the case—no conditions applied. He even suggested she take time off to decompress from the shocking events. She refused. Both the time off and the severing of her contract.

The lure of working for one of the most prestigious companies in the country—no, in the world—had been too glorious an opportunity to pass up, and the secrets she discovered...

Curiosity killed the fucking cat, didn’t it?

And now curiosity, in the form of a werewolf, all gnashing teeth and claws, was about to kill her.

Fuck.

Warm, thick saliva dripped on Kaliope’s neck, and she almost gagged at the putrid stench. All her attempts at fighting off the beast failed. Her human strength against a werewolf? There was no contest. All her training amounted to nothing, pinned to the grime-stained concrete in a dank alley. She squeezed her eyes shut. Hoped for a swift end. Then the weight of the beast jerked away. Knocked off her body by an unseen source.

Another werewolf?

She didn’t move, didn’t open her eyes. The blood-curdling chorus of snarls and pained howls drifted away from where the werewolf dragged her off the street. Kaliope knew him. At least in passing. And she never suspected in the slightest he was part of the Occult. A wolf demon. But they were everywhere, hiding in plain sight.

Seconds stretched in silence. Kaliope waited. The night sky stretched starless overhead when she opened her eyes. Slight tremors wracked her body as her adrenaline rush faded. The wounds on her arms, from where the werewolf’s claws pierced her, burned.

“They better pay me overtime for this shit.”