Filed to story: Mated to the Alpha and His Beta Novel Free >>???
“I didn’t mean to scare you.” My mom laughed a tiny bit, shrugging her shoulders. “I thought you’d be able to sense that I was there…I mean…”
“Because I’m a Celestial,” I finished for her. At her open, curious expression, I decided to keep going. “Yes. I’m sure I could keep my senses on alert all the time so that nobody could ever sneak up on me. I could call on so many different kinds of skills to protect me from any threat. But that’s tiresome, Mom. And I don’t want to live like that.”
Her lips pressed together, and her gaze flared as her wolf rose a bit. Then it shadowed. She nodded.
“I want you to feel safe, Stella.”
I crossed the room to take her hands. “I do. I promise you. I do.”
Her fingers squeezed mine gently before she let go. She went to the window I’d been staring out of. “It’s so beautiful here. You’ve got the best view in the whole house. I just want you to know you can come to me about anything, little star You bypassed all the awkward years, right from child to adult.bwant you to know that I understand if there are some rough patches between us.”
“Did you have them with your own mom?” I felt a little weird calling my mother’s mother “grandma.” That had always been Gabriela for me. I’d barely met my other grandma.
My mom turned and nodded. “Sure. We had our arguments. She wanted what was best for me, but I wasn’t always ready to listen to her, and I didn’t always agree. I love my mother, but we…well, we are different.”
I sensed a tension in her. A sadness.
Something to do with me and the twins. I didn’t want to dig into that without her permission, so I withdrew the tendrils of my senses. This wasn’t as hard as keeping up a constant vigilance would’ve been, but it was somehow more insidious. It would be too easy to open myself up to the high emotions of the people I loved so I could help them. But, I hadn’t done it with my aunt, and I wasn’t going to do it with my mom.
“Has she seen or talked to you since we’ve been back?” my mom asked. Her voice was so purposefully steady that I knew she was only able to keep holding it that way with a lot of effort. “No,” I said softly.
Her flinch was small, but I saw it. Her head hung and her shoulders drooped. She nodded, like the answer didn’t surprise her. She drew in a long, deep breath and stood up straight. My mom’s brave smile didn’t fool me. I suspected it didn’t fool her, either.
“I didn’t think so,” she said. “I’ll leave you alone now.”
For a moment, she looked like she was going to hug me, but then she backed off. She left my room, giving me the space I’d thought I wanted.
It wasn’t actually as great as I’d thought it would be.
Stella–
The day had taken a long time to pass. I’d spent it exploring the mansion. Then, I’d taken the twins into town for ice cream. They’d have to start school soon, and I had to admit that I didn’t envy them having to do that…even if I did wish, just a little, that I’d had the chance.
Thinking about my mom’s sadness that there seemed to be a distance between her and her mom, and also her sister, I vowed that I wasn’t going to let my relationship with my siblings get any further apart. Back at home, I popped in on my Dad, Abba, and Papa, but they were totally occupied with pack business. Unlike my mom, they didn’t seem interested in hovering over me, but I figured that could change fast enough if they thought they had any reason to worry. I definitely didn’t want that. Abba snagged my sleeve as I was leaving their office.
“How’s it going?” he asked, pitching his voice low and glancing back at Dad and Papa, who were bent over the desk, looking at some kind of files. “With the…you know.”
“Oh, I, um…I’m sure it’ll be great, Abba. I’m going to try it out later this afternoon when I go shopping. I need some new outfits.”
He laughed, shaking his head, then drew me closer to kiss my temple. “Good for you. Have fun, honey. Let me know how it goes.” “I will,” I promised.
It wasn’t a lie. Not really. I could go shopping wearing Elleah’s face, if I wanted to.
***
“You need to go shopping,” Selena told me with a roll of her eyes. “I’m not going out with you looking like that.”
She waved at my long, navy skirt and matching flowery blouse. She pointed specifically at my navy ballet flats. I looked down at them.
“They’re comfortable. And I just got them!”
“You look like you teach preschool,” Selena said. “Not the look we’re going for. Change your face and let’s go.”
Shopping with my aunt was way more fun than it had been with my mom and the grouchy twins. Or maybe it was shopping as Elleah and not as Stella. Elleah’s golden hair and gray-blue eyes were a perfect match for an ice-blue silk camisole that Selena insisted I pair with black leather pants and a matching black leather jacket. She added heavy soled black boots that laced up tight to the ankle. Then, she stepped back with an approving nod.
“Still comfy, but not so dainty,” she said. “You look like a real badass.”
I blushed at my reflection. “I feel silly. All that black leather. It’s not me.”
“Of course, it’s not you,” she said with a laugh. “But it is Elleah Whitehaven.”
We paid for the clothes and I left wearing them. Outside of the store, Selena looked serious. “You sure this is cool? The…you know.”
She waved her hand up and down along my body and twiddled her fingers in my face.
I watched a couple of people pass us on the sidewalk. They gave me a curious glance but that was because I was a stranger, not because I was Stella Constantine. They kept going. I waited until they’d passed.
“Abba said it was the best option. I trust him.”
“Okay, well, you can trust me. You look great. The guys will go crazy for you.”
“I’m not sure I want anyone going crazy for me, said in alarm. I made sure nobody was overhearing us when I leaned closer to her. “I thought the whole point of us going out to someplace different was that we weren’t going to have anyone going crazy!”
Selena rolled her eyes again. “I just don’t want anyone trying to hump me to death while I’m trying to dance and have a good time. I want to have fun, not fight off men who can’t control themselves. The only time want a guy to be out of control is when I decide I’m into him. And listen, I’m not ready to be mated yet, so that’s not going to happen for a long time.”
“Why don’t you want to be mated yet?” I asked curiously as we walked along the sidewalk.
“You think want to end up like my sister? She’s barely twenty and has three kids. Not to mention three mates.” Selena shuddered. “One dude seems like a pain in the ass to deal with, much less three. S
“My mom loves my fathers!”
Selena let out a snorting guffaw. “I’m sure she does, but the whole idea of that is, like, no thanks.”
My expression must’ve shown my feelings, because Selena sobered up.
“Oh,” she said. “You want…?”
I shook myself and lifted my chin. I put an extra surge of confidence into my stride. Stella? Elleah? Whatever face I was wearing, I was still the same inside, right? “Let’s just go dancing,” I said.
Stella–
I stared up at the tall, black brick building in front of us. It had taken us over an hour to get here with Selena driving so fast I would’ve feared for my life if I hadn’t known I could cast a protection bubble around us in the event of any emergency. Even so, my heart was racing and my palms were sweating from the wild ride.
And anticipation.
“This is a human club,” I said under my breath.
Selena giggled. “Yep.”
“I’ve never been to a human city,” I murmured, holding back to let some clubgoers go in ahead of us. “I’ve barely even been around any humans.”
Selena tugged me off to the side. “I thought you were in that, whatever you call it. That enclave place. Weren’t there any humans there?”
I shook my head. “There might’ve been, but remember, I was small for a lot of that. And once I grew up, we had to get out of there. Fast.”
A shadow passed over my aunt’s face. For the first time, she looked sympathetic. “That must’ve been really hard. And scary.”
“It’s what I was meant to do,” I told her sincerely.
“Even so,” she said.
After a second, I nodded. Then, I laughed with embarrassment. “I faced an army of raging High Council wolves who were determined to kill me and my entire family, but somehow, I feel more scared about going into that club.”
“You look fantastic,” Selena assured me. She dug in the small crossbody purse to hand me a compact mirror and tube of crimson lipstick. “Freshen up.”
When my hand looked like it was shaking, she helped me. She stepped back to assess, then gave me an approving nod. I couldn’t stop myself from grinning at the tiny face I could see in the small mirror. “Ready?”
“Yes,” I said. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
“Just follow my lead,” she said, then stopped short with a furrowed brow. “Shit. I’m going to need you to do a little handwaving to get us through the door.”
“Huh?”
“Humans can’t get into a club like this until they’re over twenty-one, not eighteen like shifters can. And, you need a form of ID,” Selena explained. “You don’t have a driver’s license, do you?” “No…”
“Me neither,” she said with a laugh she hid behind her hand.
“But you drove us here!”
“Yeah,” she said, totally without shame.
“How do you have a car without a driver’s license?”
Selena laughed again. “It’s not my car. Let’s just say I…borrowed it.”
“You stole it?”
“Borrowed,” she insisted in a low voice. “C’mon. Can you get us inside or not?”
I looked back up at the many storied, black-brick building. I could hear faint music thumping from inside it. It got louder when the doors opened, letting people in or out. A tall, man stood guard at the door, checking small plastic cards watched him turn away a pair of young guys with hopeful looks on ON ERA
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
Dayson was the alpha of the largest pack in North America. Powerful figures from other packs sought to offer gorgeous girls as potential mates for Dayson. He steadfastly rejected these advances, he was not a pawn to be manipulated. But eventually there came a mysterious girl he could hardly say No. Who was she?