The Traitor Alpha's Daughter

The Moonlit Pond

Alina’s POV

“You’re surprisingly good at taking their punches,” I tell him as we slip out the back door of the club and head into the woods. “That had to hurt, right?”

He doesn’t seem particularly fazed or concerned with whatever degree of pain he’s in. “Where are we going, Alina?”

I glance behind me, guiding him deeper into the woods until we’re fully out of eyeshot of the club. Only then am I able to relax. “Away from there,” I say, coming to a stop. “Beyond that, I don’t know.”

His expression softens slightly. “Are you okay? Is he going to…?”

Is he going to what? Kill me? Hit me again? Doubtful to the former; likely to the latter.

I shrug, turning away from the direction we came from and walking even deeper in the opposite direction. “I’ll make up something.”

“I don’t get it. Why do you stay with him?”

I don’t look back at him or answer him; I just keep leading him deeper and deeper in. We need to get as far from those fuckers as we can; only then will I be comfortable telling him what little I can. I decide to ask him a different question in the meantime. “Do you like her?”

I’m referring to Kat, if you were wondering. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t jealous when I saw them together. Again.

“I don’t even know her. She showed up at my house and told me we were going out. I didn’t exactly have any better offers.”

Better offers? Is it possible he’s referring to me? I can’t help but flush a bit at the sheer possibility. “I tried to warn you,” I remind him. “She’s trouble, Wren.”

“Apparently so. What the hell is a Beta, anyway?”

Shit. I was hoping he didn’t catch that stupid slip-up of Kat’s. “Just pretend you didn’t hear that.”

“And their ‘little pet?’ That’s you?”

I grimace at that. “I guess you could say that. It’s how they think of me, anyway.”

He looks confused. “I’ve seen you dodge a punch, break up two fights, and throw a hit of your own. What about you is… domestic?”

I can’t help but laugh at that, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t appreciate his observations about me. It's certainly more than anyone else ever grants me. “Men believe what they want. And it’s easier for me to be domestic than… the opposite.”

He doesn’t look any less confused. He seems to be thinking so hard and so fast, it makes me a little nervous. “A Beta is a second-in-command,” he says suddenly. “Where an Alpha is first. So, if that guy was Beta, that means Noah is the ringleader.”

I keep my back to him, striding deeper still into the forest. He's smart—probably too smart for his own good. “Does that surprise you?”

“No,” he admits. “Was she right about the other part, though? That you were flirting with me that day?”

I come to a stop at that. We’ve reached the small, moonlit pond I was looking for, but I have no idea what to say to him.

“I don’t know,” I finally admit, kicking off my shoes and wading knee-deep into the water. When I turn back to face him, his eyes are wide and mesmerized—as if he’s looking at an angel. I’ve had a lot of guys look at me a lot of different ways, but never like that. It makes me feel things I’ve never felt before—for better and for worse. “Maybe.”

He kicks off his own shoes and strides over to join me, his eyes never leaving mine. “Alina,” he says softly when he reaches me. “Why do you stay with him?”

This question again. It’s a really tough one to answer without saying, well, too much.

I heave a long, heavy sigh before turning to look up at the moon. Even if I wanted to tell him—okay, I do want to tell him—the wolf’s blood in me won’t let me. “There’s so much you don’t know, Wren. So much I can’t tell you. If I could, maybe you’d understand.”

A surprising amount of hostility clouds his eyes at that. “Why?” he demands. “Why can’t you? Because you’re afraid of him?”

“No.” I might have to let everyone else believe I’m afraid of Noah, but I refuse to let Wren. “These aren’t my secrets to share. And doing so would put more than just Noah at risk.”

He hates this, I can tell. He hates not knowing. He hates my keeping anything from him.

But he seems to understand that I don’t have a choice in the matter.

“Why did you come here?” I ask him suddenly. “Of all the places in the world, why Winder? Was it really because of the museum?”

A new pain clouds over those handsome, green eyes of his at that. A new fear. He seems to wrestle with answering the question at all, but ultimately does. “About a year ago, my father was killed in a mugging. We don’t know exactly what happened—just that he tried to fight off the guys who robbed him, and he lost.”

So his father died, too? Was murdered, too? What are the chances of that?

A tiny part of me almost wonders whether fate brought him here to Winder—and to me. Maybe the Moon Gods, or even the spirit of my late father, sensed that I needed... well... more.

But I shake that thought away as soon as it strikes me. I don't have the luxury of thinking that way. My life is what it is, and there's nothing I can do to change it.

I still feel for him, though. “I’m so sorry, Wren."

He clearly doesn’t want my pity; he avoids my sorrowful gaze entirely. “It’s okay. I… lashed out, I guess, for a while there. Went looking for trouble, hoping I might find the guys who killed him and make them pay. Got into some fights at school, too. So my mom started looking for work outside of New York to get me out of trouble, and that’s how we ended up here.”

Wow. “She sounds like a wonderful mother.”

“She is,” he admits. “She deserves better than me for a son.”

Better than him? What’s so bad about a teenage boy trying to find his way in the world? Wren already seems so much more decent than just about any of the other guys I know; his mother should be proud.

But I don’t say that, because, frankly, I’m the last person who should be assessing anyone’s relationship with their mother. Instead, I turn my attention back to the pond.

It’s not the first time I’ve stumbled upon this pond. I’ve come here a handful of other times—usually when Noah finds some other girl to grind on for the night and expects me to just stand there and watch. Every other time I've come here, I've stripped down to my underwear, slipped into the water, and enjoyed being free for the brief moments I was able to.

It would be different to do that now, of course. It would be in front of someone—someone who isn't Noah. If he ever found out, he'd probably have my head for it.

But if this is the place where I embrace my freedom, would that not be all the more reason to do it?

Let him hurt me. Let him kill me if it means I get this one, precious moment of actual… truth.

So I grab my dress by its hem, lift it over my head, toss it onto the shore, and tread deeper into the water.

Wren doesn’t say a word, but follows directly in my footsteps. I turn back toward him in time to see him stepping out of his jeans and pulling off his shirt before wading further into the water behind me. I don’t avert my gaze any more than he averted his. He’s every bit as ripped as Noah, but without the supernatural handicap that Noah was given; Wren actually works at looking that good.

We stare at each other for a long time, both submerged down to our waists, both stripped down to our undergarments, both enveloped in the soft light of the moon. Finally, I speak. It’s a hard truth to share, but for the first time since it happened, I find myself actually wanting to.

“My dad was killed, too.”

His lips part in quiet, yet clear, surprise; whatever pain he was just feeling for himself, he seems to feel tenfold for me. “I’m… sorry,” he stammers. “By who?”

I shouldn’t tell him. I shouldn’t tell him any of this. I can’t tell him most of this.

But what little I can, I do.

“The Morrisons.”