The ruins of Manchester had become a
battleground for survival, not sport. The old
rules were gone—no courts, no referees, only the
fittest. The Red Wolves, a ragtag team of
athletes turned warriors, fought to keep their
territory intact. They trained in the skeletal
remains of an abandoned stadium, its stands
collapsed into rubble, its pitch cracked and
littered with debris. Among them was Kieran Voss,
a former rugby player turned leader, whose sharp
jaw and scarred knuckles spoke of battles won
and lost.
Eleanor Hart, a lawyer from the old world, had
never held a weapon. She’d arrived in the
wasteland seeking a client—a man accused of
stealing medicine from a warlord’s hoard. But
the law was dead here, buried under ash and
hunger. She found herself in the stadium,
watching Kieran lead his team through drills
that felt more like ritual than preparation. His
movements were precise, almost animalistic. When
he caught sight of her, he paused midlunge, eyes
narrowing.
She hadn’t come for him. She came for the
evidence. But when she followed him after the
training, she saw the truth: the Red Wolves
weren’t just fighting for land—they were
protecting something else. A vault beneath the
stadium, hidden by the rubble, held supplies
meant for the refugees. Kieran had stolen it
from the warlord, not for power, but for people.
The warlord didn’t take kindly to theft. That
night, the stadium burned. Eleanor watched from
the shadows as Kieran dragged survivors out of
the flames, his body halfmelted from a blast of
fire magic. He didn’t scream. He didn’t falter.
He just kept moving.
Her client had lied. He hadn’t stolen the
medicine—he’d been hired to guard it. The
warlord wanted her silenced. She had a choice:
report him and let the wolves be hunted, or stay
quiet and become one of them.
The first time she touched him, it was in the
dark. The stadium had fallen, and they were
hiding in the tunnels beneath it. Kieran’s skin
was warm, his breath ragged. She hadn’t meant to
kiss him, but the moment his lips met hers, the
world stopped. His hands gripped her waist,
pulling her closer. The air smelled of smoke and
sweat.
He was a werewolf, but not the kind that howled
at the moon. His transformation was controlled,
a secret he kept even from his own team. He’d
been cursed during the war, a punishment for
defying the warlord’s orders. Now, every full
moon, he became a beast.
She knew what that meant. It meant danger. It
meant blood. But it also meant something else—
something she hadn’t felt since before the world
ended.
The warlord found them. He brought his soldiers,
armed with guns and magic. The tunnels became a
battlefield. Eleanor fought with a knife she’d
stolen from a corpse, while Kieran fought with
claws and teeth. When the dust settled, he lay
beside her, his body broken but alive.
The warlord was dead. His men scattered. The
vault remained untouched.
Eleanor stood over him, the knife still in her
hand. She could leave. She could walk away and
forget everything. But she didn’t. Instead, she
pressed her lips to his again, this time with
purpose.
The world had changed. The rules had changed.
And so had she.
She wasn’t a lawyer anymore. She was something
else now. A fighter. A lover. A survivor.
And Kieran Voss? He was hers.
