Claiming My Wolf

2 - Lunchtime and Secrets

~~Ava's PoV~~

It's lunchtime before I see Sadie again. She looks a little sad, but not as bad as when she first got here. Hopefully school is helping to take her mind off her parents and leaving behind all her friends. I can't imagine what she's going through but I'm trying to help by just being as normal as I can and not treating her like there's anything wrong with her.

That's easier said than done when jerks like Micah nearly blow it right off the bat.

We had a big school assembly last week to make sure everyone knew about Sadie and how to act around her until my aunt and uncle break the news to her about what we all are and what she is too, even though she doesn't know it.

We're all werewolves, of course.

I can't imagine not knowing. I grew up here in the Westbridge Pack where everyone is a werewolf. It's completely normal. From the time we're pups, we're taught about ranks and mates and everything to do with pack life.

But Sadie's mom, my aunt Cathy, she found a human mate and there were a lot of the pack that didn't accept that at the time. Rather than deal with the constant harassment, they decided to move away to a human city, and Sadie was raised as a human. The few times she came to visit, we stayed in our house so she didn't see anyone else from the pack. But she hardly ever came to visit, most of the time we went to visit them.

But now her parents are dead and she has no other family, and she's going to turn 18 soon anyway, so it's better that she's here in the pack for when she meets her wolf and shifts for the first time and everything else, but wow, it's going to be a lot for her to deal with. I don't think she even knows that werewolves are real, never mind that she is one!

And even though attitudes have improved since my aunt found her human mate, there are still some idiots like Micah Geary who think that being half human is something to be ashamed of. If he wasn't the son of our pack's Beta, I'd have punched him in the junk for speaking to Sadie like that this morning.

“Sadie!” I call out to get her attention and she looks over at me and smiles in relief. “Grab your lunch, we've got a table over here.”

I point to the table where me and my friends always eat lunch. Aaron and Laurel are already there along with a few others. Sadie nods and heads for the lunch line while I go take a seat next to Aaron.

“You need to talk to Micah,” I tell him. “And tell him to back off.”

Aaron grimaces. “He won't listen to me.”

That's true. Micah thinks he's better than everyone else, except the one person in school who outranks him.

“Then talk to Logan.”

We both turn at the same time to look at the table in the corner where we know the Alpha's son will be. Sure enough, he's sitting there all alone, the same as every day, his headphones on, staring at his phone. The same way he's been for the last year.

“I'm not going to bother Logan with this,” Aaron growls. “I'll talk to Micah if I have to. Just don't expect it to do any good.”

Sadie walks up then with her lunch tray, so we immediately change the subject. I ask her about her classes and introduce her to our other friends. First is Ethan, our Gamma's son, though of course I don't introduce him to Sadie that way. There's Blair and Tonya, they're both cheerleaders and are dating Micah and Ethan, in that order. Then there's Jordan, Kevin and Adam, they're all on the football team too, along with Aaron.

I secretly hope that Jordan's my mate, though I haven't told anyone that yet. We'll know very soon. He already turned 18 a couple of months ago and hasn't found his mate yet, which probably means it's someone younger. Someone like me, maybe. My birthday is this coming weekend, so we'll find out then. I cross my fingers under the table as the thought crosses my mind.

My bigger worry though is that Aaron and Laurel won't be mates. She's already 18 too, so they'll know at our birthday party. If they're not, I don't know what they're going to do. They've been together for years already and they're so ridiculously in love, it makes me a little sick, although it's probably just jealousy.

All through lunch I wait for Micah to show up, but he doesn't. That's probably a good thing. We just have to get through a few more days anyway. Mom and Dad have promised that they'll have 'the talk' with Sadie before our birthday party, since we're going to shift there and it would probably majorly freak her out if she didn't know it was coming!

“Who's that over there?” Sadie asks me as we stand up to clear our trays at the end of lunch. I follow her gaze and see that it's Logan she's looking at. I can see why he caught her eye. At a school of hot guys, he's probably the hottest. Or at least he used to be, back when he remembered how to smile.

“His name's Logan,” I tell her. “He's lost somebody too, but he's not dealing with it very well. It's better just to stay away from him unless he talks to you first.”

She nods, but I'm not totally sure she heard me. She's still staring over at him and I get a bit of a bad feeling about it. Everyone knows not to bother the Alpha's son. But Sadie doesn't even know what an Alpha is, so how can I explain it to her?

The sooner she finds out the truth about all of us, the better.