Alpha, Do I Know You?

Chapter 4: Confusion

Somebody is watching me, I thought as I was walking back to my cottage. The chirping birds were gone and only the silence of the breeze ruffling the leaves sounded in the forest. I slowed down, careful to make my steps light as a feather, and started whistling a repetitive tune so that I wouldn’t alert whoever is watching me.

I breathed in slow, trying to look for any scent that is different from the smell of the animals that live in the forest. Why is there nothing? I drew in a deep breath again, and only smelling the fresh breeze and plants.

Nobody in this pack can cover their scent like I do, I would know from years of keeping an eye on them like a vulture waiting for the right time to strike. So who could be watching me right now? But as minutes passed of being tense and readying myself in case of an attack, I wondered if it was only my imagination.

With nothing in the air but the scent of spring and the wild, I quickened my steps hoping that once I get in the safety of my cottage, this feeling of somebody watching me would go away. But as I got in and closed the door behind me softly, the feeling didn’t dissipate. Instead, now I am completely sure somebody is watching me.

A low growl rumbled in my chest at the annoyance of being stalked like I was a common prey built up. Whoever this person is, I didn’t care. I already decided that I will be leaving after tonight and if somebody attacks me right now, I sure as hell won’t hold back. Let them find out who I really am, then I can leave this hellhole all the faster.

As I opened the door and went outside, my skin prickled as I felt the first stirrings of the shift coming on. But I held on, willing with my all to not shift yet because I didn’t want to pull the trigger and jump the gun without knowing who the enemy is.

“Somebody is here,” said a familiar voice from beside me. My head snapped to look at the person who just spoke as I jumped away, ready to fight whoever it is when I realized it was only Tate.

I breathed a sigh of relief and turned back to look at the forest, continuing to watch for whoever it is hiding in the thick of it. Wait,what? My eyes widened as I turned back to look at Tate who was beside me.His whole body tense and alert for whoever was watching us.

“What are you doing here?” came out of my mouth before I could stop it. Last I saw him, he was leaving the meeting with his arms around Trisha.

He didn’t look at me as he raised his eyebrow and continued watching for whoever it was. This guy…A vein appeared on my forehead in anger and I felt the ripple of my skin changing. Thankfully, I didn’t change into a wolf in the few seconds due to pure strength of will alone even though I anted to attack this conceited, confusing guy.

A few tense minutes passed until the feeling of watchful eyes disappeared. Just measuring the enemy, is it? Or were whoever it is disappointed that somebody was here beside me? Knowing that it wasn’t just a figment of my imagination, I realized then that it wasn’t part of the Alcatrozz pack because Tate would have known for sure who it was. Additionally, they would have appeared in peace once they knew that Tate was here. They wouldn’t have wanted to anger somebody more dominant than they are, lest they be punished. And frankly, Tate is growing more and more powerful each passing day that he can usurp his father’s position any time he wanted to.

Which means that Tate is the most powerful wolf in the Alcatrozz pack and whoever was hiding in the forest couldn’t possibly be a wolf we know. Then could it have been a rogue?Had they enjoyed killing the Reons that they left to go attack the nearest pack—Alcatrozz?

Lost in thought, I didn’t notice Tate moving until he was right in front of me. “It’s like you don’t exist,” he murmured, reaching out for a tendril of black hair that had come lose from my usual bun.

I cringed back a step,about to snap back a retort, until what he said dawned on me. I don’t exist. That means… My eyes widened as I felt that I haven’t released my grip on the scents that I suppressed, especially the one I needed the most to blend in—my human scent.

“What do you mean?” I asked him as I slowly, like it was creeping on the wind and his nose was slow to catch my scent, opened my hold on my human scent and let it envelope my body bit by bit. It would take a few seconds before he realizes he was wrong, I thought, watching him carefully. He tilted his head a little to the side as he made a considerable sniff, his brows knitting together in obvious confusion.

The side of my lips lilted in obvious joy but I suppressed it down. I wouldn’t want him getting the wrong idea that I was enjoying his presence or that I knew what he meant when he said I didn’t exist. It would only make him become more suspicious of me and I don’t want that to happen seeing that he is noticeably more aware of my presence now than before he realized we were mates. And you know, after he rejected me earlier.

“What are you doing here?” I asked again to catch his attention. Better that he doesn’t think too deep about why he couldn’t smell anything on me.

He looked up at me, the creases on his brows increasing before it smoothened out into his usual cool exterior. “Be careful out here,” he turned to look back at the dense forest before settling his intense emerald gaze on me, “You don’t know who could be watching.”

“Including you?”

“Especially me,” he left me with those parting words, adding on to the vortex of mixed emotions I already feel about him.

Still feeling the pain of rejection, the anger for the massacred Reons wolves that this incompetent pack wouldn’t even lift a finger for to help them, and the blinding annoyance that someone was hunting me, I couldn’t stop from blurting out, “What does that even mean you i***t?” With his hearing, I knew he heard it and I didn’t care.

Going back and forth with ignoring and talking to me like a toy he can just play around with is irritating. At this moment on, even though I knew it is not easy, I just wanted him to make up his mind. If he’s going to let his nonsensical views on humans hinder us being mates, then he should stick to that choice. See through to the end of his decisions because even if I didn’t have to find the Rosewood pack, my pack, I wouldn’t accept him knowing that he just bounced back to the most convenient option at the time.

Maybe it really is better this way.

But as I went inside the cottage, I ignored the slow dawning realization that even just a little, he was worried about me to have come this way just to tell me to be careful.

God, having mates is hard. The mental strain one person has to deal with for a short bout of interaction with their partner is completely exhausting that I feel like I can sleep for days. Though I know I don’t have enough time because the Guijero pack is arriving soon for the party and I have to be there to play the miserable punching bag of a maid to this pack.

I didn’t realize someone had been in my cottage until I saw what lay in my bed and caught a whiff of Quentin’s potato chips smell. A simple navy blue lace dress with beautiful minute flowers interwoven together. Elizabeth’s scent lingered on the dress. Huh.That’s weird. Then I saw the sticky note placed conveniently in the bust section of the dress. I picked it up and read:

Wear this. Don’t talk unless spoken to and most especially, don’t do something embarrassing tonight.

Wow. Just off saving her own hide, is she? Well it’s not like I voluntarily talk to them either way, and the dress looks good at least.

I looked around the room,glad that if Quentin had looked through my stuff, he wouldn’t have seen anything. Well, besides the thousands of dollars of money I was able to save over the years. I kept it hidden under a removable floorboard near the door.These guys may be the worst kind of people I ever have to deal with, on account of the physical and mental abuse I’ve suffered throughout the years, but at least they’re paying me for it. The money may not make up for their character,but it’s something I’ll be able to use once I leave.

They probably thought that I would have just wasted it on pointless trinkets over the years, they wouldn’t really know because nobody ever visits me in this small house. But atleast, in this way I could be myself in this small space.

Sighing, I jumped on my bed, wrinkling the dress in the process. Let it be rumpled a little bit, it’snot like it matters anyway. Facing the wooden ceiling with its lone light bulb hanging low, I realized that I wouldn’t miss this place in the least. It’d be like a thorn have been plucked from my side after years of enduring it. A thorn to be replaced by the buzz of excitement and opportunities, interlaced with more than a healthy dose of uncertainty and fear of what is to come.

Closing my eyes, I sincerely hoped that the remaining eight Reons pack members are all right and I will be able to help them in one way or another. And hopefully, they know something about the Rosewood pack better than the Alcatrozz that knows nothing.

Half an hour later, I was looking in the small mirror, trying and failing to coerce my hair into a proper bun. So I gave up and just let it be a bun that’s a little wonky looking, you never know which direction it will go as you walk.

The navy blue dress that Elizabeth ordered me to wear was a bit wrinkled, but that didn’t hinder the minute patches of silver flowers interlocked together that decorated the top part and cascaded erratically to the bottom from seemingly blossoming from its dark blue canvas. The dress reached to my knees and bared my shoulders to the cold night ahead. It was a dress I never would have bought and one I could never have imagined that Elizabeth would make me wear for her important party.

Looking at it now, with all the glamour that the dress seems to boast, I could put on a mask of illusion and believe that I was living a normal life filled with loving parents, few close friends, and I was part of the Rosewood pack.

But I shrugged off the beautiful dream of a life I would never experience as soon as I thought of it.Because no amount of daydreaming and pretending that I was far from adopted and not living a lie of being human, would change it all. Serve me up some reality anytime, then I’ll know what I’m in it for.

Looking at the mirror, my eyes the color of the freezing arctic ocean set against a creamy pallor,reflecting the intensity of my dislike for foolish lies, I knew that my reality is definitely not a fairytale, Cinderella-esque dream.

In the distance, I heard the faint lyrical sounds of a classical music being played and the quiet chatter of arriving guests. I didn’t realize the time was already this late as I rushed to leave the cottage, quickly putting on the only shoes I own which is a pair of black converse. Elizabeth will notice and she’ll be angry tomorrow,but I won’t even be here so who cares?

When I got outside, I started running in inhuman speed and only slowed down a few miles near the party. Thankfully, I didn’t have to act as a serving waitress in this shindig,otherwise I would have gotten a few matching bruises for my dress from Elizabeth because I was late.

When I arrived, the party was in full swing. There were a lot of wolves I didn’t know that arrived, more than the total number of wolves in this pack. Huh. With such a big pack, it makes sense why Elizabeth would go gaga just to throw a party celebrating Poly and Brian mating together. Since allying with a bigger pack that is more likely to be powerful enough to have not dwindled down in numbers over the years,would make other supes think twice before attacking this pack. No wonder Hans didn’t think twice abandoning Reons for this party.

Still, what a f*****g ass. The alpha of the Reons pack called you in their moment of danger,expecting backup to save them but none came and now there’s barely any of them now. I could only imagine the betrayal they felt when they realized no one was coming.

It has been a horrific and frightening past few years to be a werewolf ever since the Lyell pack was massacred 3 years ago. Nobody knew who killed them, especially the why since according to Alya Montero, the news reporter who followed the story for five months, the Lyell pack remained mostly off the grid because they preferred the secluded life. With only five members to their pack made entirely of their family, they weren’t getting into feuds with anybody, which is why their deaths are suspicious.

Following their death, another pack was killed in the same fashion with no suspects until now. Then the consecutive killings of four more packs in the following years by a band of rogue werewolves, whose numbers we do not know. Just that there are a lot of them and that they’re attacking small packs for reasons unknown.

This is too depressing to even think about on an empty stomach so I sighed and headed to the tables filled with food.

Through the crowded yard,I saw him. Tate. Standing alone, drinking a glass of wine from what I could see, looking like he’s deep in thought. He had on a white shirt with two deliberate unbuttoned buttons to show the expanse of his toffee colored skin.His hair was styled to the side, the mess of curls refusing to cooperate.

He looked damned good and it only further annoyed me that it wasn’t for me. Any of it wasn’t for me because at any moment now, he’d wrap his arms around Trisha and be with her all night. Like they were mates the way Poly and Brian were.

So with courage that wavered ever so slightly every time I saw him, I looked away from him and continued heading to the food. I piled chicken alfredo onto my plate and settled in the furthest chair from all the commotion. I started eating,watching the dozens of wolves happily chatter around me, my eyes never straying away to look for him again.

“Quite a turn out, isn’t it?” said a calm voice from behind me.

I thought I’d be away from everyone but apparently not. I turned around and saw a middle aged man with deep auburn hair and dark brown eyes looking at me, a small smile on his face. Odd, he was wearing faded dark jeans and a long sleeved shirt with a picture of Jekyll and Hyde. Somebody from Guijero?

“What do you mean?”

“That they’d be together,”he gestured to Poly and Brian.

“They’re mates, aren’t they supposed to be together?” I asked, confusion coloring every word I said. Isn’t it normal for them to be together since they know they’re both wolves? With a situation like that, isn’t it a little more ideal compared to what I’ve been dished with? I winced as another sharp pain of hurt and anger sliced across my chest like it was real.

The man watched my face closely before he continued, “That’s not always the case. Every mated pair has different circumstances they go through. It’s up to them if they will pursue fate and be together or go the other way.” He walked towards the table I was in and took the chair in front of me. “In their case, they were both with other people for years when they met each other.”

“What happened to the people they’re with?”

He smiled sadly and said,“They left them.”

Oh.

Looking at the two as they smiled and warmly talked with the wolves gathered around them who wished them to have a prosperous mating, I wouldn’t have realized that they must have been hurt too when they got together. I understand the pain of being rejected which is why I can empathize with the people they left, but these two must have felt awful too.

I didn’t particularly like nor hate Brian as I was growing up because he wasn’t really around the pack house, as he was constantly travelling with his human girlfriend. He never brought the girl to meet the Alpha or the Louve but they’ve been together for years at that point. I can’t even begin to imagine the magnitude of pain they both felt when they separated.

The man in front of me smiled with warmth in his eyes. “We should be happy for them. Have you greeted them yet?”

“No, I don’t think they’d want me there,” and because he was smiling, my lips unconsciously curved into a small smile.

“Don’t be silly, child.Come, let’s greet them together.” He stood, holding his arm out for me to take.I looked at his arm and back at this man with kind eyes and warm smile,wondering if I should. Despite him being kinder to me than most, I still didn’t know this wolf.

Discreetly, I felt his power, something I should have done first off if I wasn’t so confounded that somebody was talking to me. He smelled of aged old bark that have absorbed all the warmth of the sun throughout the years; he was all sunshine with not a hint of the copious scent of disgust towards me.

Gingerly, I took his arm and we headed directly to the happy couple. Wolves I knew and didn’t parted to make way for us, their eyes wide as they stared at us until we stopped in front of the mated pair.

The man held out his hand to Poly who shook it twice, her eyes bearing the confusion she was feeling. And mine. Why are they confounded?

"Congratulations on finding each other," I said, looking at Poly with a small smile on my face.

"Are yo—" an ear piercing shriek cut across Poly's thought.

"EVANGELINE!"

All I could hear was the quick clickety clack of heels until Elizabeth appeared in my line of vision, her chocolate skin darkening further in anger. "What the hell are you doing!" The air around her vibrated with anger and her skin seemed to move: she was dangerously close to shifting.

Her nails grew to sharp claws as she tried to grab my arm. I moved slow, avoiding her touch but letting her nails nick my arm. Growling, she moved too quick for the human eyes to see to attack me but somebody stood in front of me.

And then I felt it. The overpowering need to submit, forcing every wolf around me to be pushed down to their knees as the man with the kind eyes and warm smile yelled, "No."