Alpha’s Unwanted Mate

Book 2 Chapter 4

Axel pov

I woke up with a sigh, sitting up and yawning. Groggily I turned off my alarm clock, throwing it against the wall. I rubbed my face, sliding my fingers through my messy golden blond hair.

The clang of the alarm clock against the stone wall echoed in the room for a moment, making me glad Alice and Ulric were out for a few days doing something my father forced them to do. I couldn’t exactly remember what it was, but regardless it was good they were gone or Alice would be giving me an earful for breaking another damn alarm clock.

I was living in the basement at Alice and Ulric’s lake house. I moved in when I was around thirteen, when my father got drunk and almost killed me because of how much I look like my mother. Ever since that night I’ve been living here. I remember that night like it was yesterday. I ventured out of my room for a snack. I knew at a young age to avoid my father as much as possible, especially when he was drunk. Wolves had a very high tolerance to alcohol, but my father was always drinking and so much he was drunk very often.

That night I walked past his room to get a snack out of the kitchen and he saw me. The next thing I knew I was curled up in my twin brother Julien’s arms as he ran with me. I could still hear the slurs and I saw my father throwing stuff at Julien’s back as he ran down the stairs, demanding he brings me back so he can kill me. I went in and out, but I remember being placed in a car and driven to Alice and Ulric. Eliza met us there to heal me, and I’ve been living here ever since. Sure I’m Alpha Blood, but Julien is the one taking over the pack when he’s of age so I haven’t had to be at any meetings or anything. I’ve successfully gone the past years barely seeing my father, and always at a distance.

I walked up the creaky steps silently, a skill I master at a young age having to walk on eggshells around my father. Ulric hated when I did it, he said I reminded him of a cat. The house was empty, something I was very used to. Alice and Ulric slept upstairs in the master bedroom, and their son Grayson slept in the other room. He was best friends with the little Alpha girl of the Blood Moon pack, so he tended to stay over there when Alice and Ulric were gone.

I quickly got ready for school as the images of my dream surfaced to my mind. For the past week I’ve been dreaming of a person all alone in a dark hoodie, white hair peeking out. I never saw their face, but they were always alone, sitting under the tree at school. I knew I was going crazy, I even searched for this person at school for the first few days of this week but I never found them, and when I asked people they looked at me dumbfounded. So I’ve come to the conclusion that this person didn’t exist, or they were invisible at school and no one knew them and we had completely different schedules. I was mostly leaning towards I was going crazy, it wouldn’t surprise me after all the beatings my father did before I moved in with Alice and Ulric.

My phone vibrated and I grabbed it out of my pocket with one hand, opening the fridge and grabbing a soda with the other. I opened the soda and took a sip as I read my text, nearly spitting my drink out. ‘Hey good looking. Are you coming to my birthday party today?’

I frowned, rereading the text. I didn’t even know who it was from, but that didn’t surprise me. Julien was always giving my number out to girls. He always had some girlfriend, and he felt the need to try to hook me up with one as well. I refused, I didn’t need a girlfriend or a mate. I didn’t want to turn into my father.

Of course, no one said anything to me directly, but I heard the whispers of how my mother was treated. Always ignored and pushed aside, undermined. Then when she died my father retreated into his room, only coming out when he had to, practically letting Alice and Ulric lead the pack. It was only the last five years he started venturing out of his room and trying to be a proper Alpha, telling everyone it was because the ‘creature’ wasn’t living in his packhouse anymore to drag him down.

I cringed, closing the phone without replying to the random girl. I hated being called a creature, but it was unfortunately my father’s favorite word. I grabbed my backpack and left the house, running my fingers through my messy hair. My bangs were as long as the bottom of my eyes, but I usually brushed them to the middle or the sides, letting my light blue eyes peek out. The rest of my hair fell under my ears in messy waves.

I locked the house and got into my car, driving to school alone. I usually took Grayson with me to drop him off at his school when he was here, but I barely saw that little kid much, especially since he was only in eighth grade.

I arrived at school, parking in the spot I was always in. There weren’t spots assigned for us, but it was like no one dared to park here. I heard the rumors. Julien and I were apparently two of the four “hottest guys” of the school. I didn’t really understand what they saw in me honestly. Sure I guess I looked alright, normal muscular body from years of training, but all of us wolves had that. I didn’t feel like I was any different than any others. Plus I couldn’t stand girls, and I tended to stay away from them. It’s not that I was gay, I just refused to end up like my father.

Julien’s car was already here, so he had to be inside. The other two spots were empty, the spots that Alpha Colt and Beta Emmett of the Blood Moon pack parked in.

I barely talked to them, especially Emmett. He was quiet and always buried in a book, and Colt was a troublemaker bad boy to the point that I barely tolerated him. At least I didn’t have to try to get along with them like Julien did, I wasn’t going to be leading the pack one day.

Girls swarmed around me and I flinched, holding my hands to my side as I did my best to move through them. They knew by now not to touch me but they still hovered, annoyingly close and chattering in their sugary voice, their caked-on makeup smell overpowering with their masked on perfume. I always had to hold my breath in school hallways, it was just so disgusting.

As I have been for the past week, I unconsciously swept my eyes over the parking lot, looking for the figure in the black hoodie. Of course, they weren’t there, and I closed my eyes as I scanned my ID at the gate, going inside. I had to come to the conclusion that there was something wrong with me. Why was I constantly dreaming about someone that doesn’t exist? Is this a ghost trying to tell me something?

I walked down the hall like a zombie, ignoring the squeals of the girls as they cluttered together like annoying chicks gossiping about me behind their hands and giggling when my eyes just happened to see them. I sighed, spotting Julien by his locker, surrounded by his followers.

I couldn’t help but shiver in disgust as I watched two little she-wolves brushing up against him giggling. What was the point of that? Marking their territory? He’s a f*****g Alpha, he’s not going to pick either of them to be Luna. Julien waved at me, his light brown hair was about the same length as mine, just less messy and more combed look. Barely any of it fell in his dark blue eyes, unlike mine. I waved back weakly at him, not wanting the attention all the girls were directing towards me.

I took a deep breath as I glared at the girls, making them squeal mixed squeals of excitement I was glaring at them and fear that I was annoyed. I wanted nothing to do with that disgusting circle of girls and I turned on my heel, ignoring my brother as he called out to me.

There was some sort of disturbance at the front doors but I walked past it without caring as I slipped into my classroom around a group of kids talking and sat down. It didn’t take very long for the bell to ring, signaling the start of class. I went from classroom to classroom, always sitting in the back near the window. I never was called on, but neither was Colt or Julien in any of their classes as well. We were all Alpha blood, and most of the teachers were werewolves, they didn’t want to provoke us. I only had one teacher that was a human, but there was a handful in the school.

It used to have more humans before the attack on the school, but since then Beta Alice decided to help Warriors who didn’t want to train or learn construction go through schooling to be teachers. I was in math class when I saw them. We had two lunches, the first lunch for half the school and the second lunch for the other half. Us royals ate in the conference room still, while the others ate in the cafeteria or outside. I heard it was more separated by types back when the adults were in school, but Beta Alice has been working wonders on the principal to get what she wants.

It probably only happened because of the wind. My classroom was on the second floor, and the tree was slightly farther from the building but the branches kissed the side of the bricks, gently swaying back and forth against the side like a paintbrush. The wind picked up at just the right time, and I saw the person under this tree, the tree that they always were under in my dream. I could barely see them, just an oversized black hoodie with the hood pulled up. They were laying on their stomach doing something, it was too far away to see.

The wind settled and the branches covered them again, but now that I knew they were there I could see the black of the hoodie from in between the branches. I didn’t even think about it. I wasn’t willing to risk missing them, I needed to know who they were, why they were always in my dream, and if they were actually real.

Quickly I shoved everything back into my backpack, standing up, making my chair fall backward on the ground with a clang. “Mr. Knight?” The teacher asked hesitantly. Because humans went to school with us, they weren’t allowed to call us by our titles, but most of the time the wolves didn’t call me Alpha anyway. I wasn’t the right Alpha, so I didn’t really care about my title. It was just my blood, not that important. It’s not like I was planning on leading anything.

None the less I could feel the fear the teacher felt, needing to be strict for the human children not to notice the truth, but afraid of the repercussions of trying to be strict to an Alpha. I nodded at him, glancing out the window again. “I got to go, sorry teach,” I said to him. His eyes widened in shock as I jolted to the window, jumping up on the sill and balancing like a cat on the thin wooden frame.

Ignoring the gasps of the students and the teacher, I jumped out the window, shooting straight down.

I don’t care what happens. I need to know who this person is.