1 Encounter

"Dad, I don't like him," I said walking away from him.

"You haven't even tried to talk to him, Rose," he followed me out of his office and I shook my head.

"Why are you trying so hard to set me up with these power-hungry guys?" I crossed my arms, "what's the rush? Shouldn't you be begging me not to date? I'm barely even considered legal," I was beyond annoyed by the conversation.

I looked out the window with a scowl on my face watching pack warriors walk by frequently.

He sighed, "I am but it's not that simple," he said, "I'm getting old and I just want you to have someone in case something happens to me,"

I turned to face him. "I'll be fine," I said, "I can take care of myself and if I have to I can also take charge as Luna anytime,"

He frowned at my response, "women can't lead on their own you know that but that's not the point Rose," I rolled my eyes and continued to walk away from him before he started another sexist speech.

My dad was super strict and some may even go as far as to call him cruel but when it came to me, I was just his little girl.

Anyone else who would have walked away from him would have been dead.

"The point is that you're sexist," I murmured under my breath but of course, his stupid sensitive ears caught what I had said.

He used his speed to stand in my way causing me to almost bump into him.

I groaned, ready for my scolding.

"Rose, you can't even shift yet," he said, "how do you expect me to find peace of mind if you don't have anyone to look out for you?" he shook his head, "I won't live forever and we don't even know if you have a mate,"

I flinched when he raised his voice at me and his eyes darkened to a stormy blue instead of his regular green color which meant that his wolf was surfacing.

He noticed right away and his face fell when he realized he had frightened me.

Suddenly, I was engulfed in a hug.

I didn't realize tears had started leaking from my eyes until I moved my head and felt that I had cried enough to dampen his shirt.

"I'm sorry Roseabell-" he was cut off.

"John?"

We turned to face mom who had spoken to our left.

"What happened?"

She narrowed her eyes at me and I just rolled mine before pulling away from dad's hug and quickly wiping my tears.

"Did you just roll your eyes at me?" she said.

I turned my back to her so it was easier to ignore her and I heard dad groan.

"You're just gonna let her disrespect me like that?" she asked with outrage in her voice, "I'm supposed to be her mother," she screamed.

"Tara, please-" dad said in a pleading tone.

"Don't you 'Tara please' me," she snapped, "you're too soft on her she's gonna turn into more of a spoiled bitch than she already is,"

I turned around just in time to catch her sending me a nasty look of disgust.

Ever since I could remember mom seemed to have this intense hatred for me and I wasn't sure where it came from.

I assumed it was because, like dad, she had wanted a son, and to put the icing on the cake, I was rapidly approaching my eighteenth birthday but I still hadn't shifted.

It was normal for people to start shifting by the age of thirteen yet here I was reaching adulthood and not even a peep from my wolf or any enhanced senses of any kind.

I was different and wolves typically didn't take kindly to me being more human than animalistic.

It was unheard of for a wolf to not have shifted at the latest by fourteen.

What was even more strange was the fact that both my parents are werewolves so how I didn't get the wolf gene was beyond me.

Dad growled loudly, "watch it, Tara, that's my pup you're talking about," he said.

Mom scoffed, "I'd hardly call it a pup," she didn't use a pronoun when she referred to me and she even sounded disgusted at the fact that she had to refer to me at all.

She was really something else and like most days, I wondered if she had been dropped as a child and lost a screw because the woman didn't have a motherly bone in her body.

I wasn't too bothered by it though.

It hurt of course but I felt that dad loved me enough for both of them even if he was busy running the Pack most of the time.

Mom's words must have seriously offended dad's wolf because his eyes turned pitch black and he moved in a blur too fast for my eyes to catch up with.

His hand wrapped around mom's throat.

She scratched repeatedly at his hand to the point where she drew blood but he didn't seem phased at all.

She desperately tried to free herself but nothing was working.

When her face started to turn purple my body jumped into action.

"Dad, stop!" I screamed, "you're killing her,"

I tried to pull his arm back but I had no wolf strength and my pull was probably equivalent to the force of an angry toddler.

There was no way I could force my dad to let go, especially not when his wolf was angry and more in control than him.

"Submit," his voice was scratchy and animalistic.

The Alpha in him was itching for disobedience and my stubborn mom didn't react even when her life was on the line.

"Mom, submit,"

She shook her head and I began to panic when she glared at me as best she could.

I soon realized that dad's wolf had been holding back the entire time up until she glared at me.

He suddenly slammed mom with way too much force into the nearest wall making me jump away from him in fear.

If mom wasn't a wolf she would have died on impact or in other words if he had thrown me like that I would have died on impact.

He growled at her and I knew that if he put any more pressure on her neck she'd be dead.

Tears began to build up in my eyes again.

Why was he acting like this?

Wolves, especially alphas, were extremely protective of their mates and family in general.

Yes, mom had insulted me and him by saying I wasn't even worthy to be called his pup but mom was his mate and right now he was acting like she wasn't.

It was almost as if I was the only thing that mattered.

"D-Daddy-" I said.

His grip on her throat loosened at the sound of my voice cracking and when he looked over at me his eyes softened.

Mom took the distraction as her chance to escape.

She fell to the ground in a coughing fit as her lungs tried to greedily regain the oxygen they'd lost.

She still hadn't submitted to my dad's wolf and as soon as the same thought crossed my dad's head, he snapped his attention back towards mom again.

"Let this be the last time I hear you disrespect my daughter like that," I didn't miss his emphasis on 'my' as if I was his daughter only and not mom's.

It confused me to see him react the way he did but then again this was the first time mom had insulted me so harshly in front of him.

For some reason, before today mom had always held her tongue when it came to calling me names and basically verbally abusing me if dad was around.

"Next time you disrespect me," he said, " I'll end you," with that he walked away from both of us clearly trying his hardest not to shift and rip mom's throat out in front of me.

I was shocked, to say the least.

I thought mates would never hurt each other, much less try to kill them.

I walked over to mom.

"Are you okay?" I asked and held out my hand to help her up.

She glared at me with a kind of hatred in her eyes that could make anyone shutter.

"M-Mom," she slapped my hand away so hard that the sound echoed throughout our hallway.

I held my hand to my chest and hissed when the sting started to throb.

"This is all your fault," she said, "you're a fucking disgrace that shouldn't have been born," I blinked at her a few times before she became blurry and I realized that my unshed tears had begun to cloud my vision.

"Pathetic," she said before lifting herself off the ground and walking away from me.

Dad's handprint around her neck had already started to heal but my hand was only starting to throb.

The pain in my hand was nothing compared to how shitty she always made me feel.

I watched her until her figure disappeared into the endless maze that was our home.

Watching her walk away, I could feel myself begin to ball my eyes out again for the second time today which made me feel pretty pathetic like she had said

Everyone around me was strong, fast, and could shift.

My dad would never admit it but I knew he had always silently wanted a son.

The doctors had no clue why I couldn't shift and lately, I've been trying to accept the fact that maybe I was just a weak pathetic human.

I had to somehow learn to accept that I couldn't become Luna if I couldn't shift.

No one would take me seriously and my dad's idea of marrying me off to some random warrior wolf or Alpha from another pack was the most hurtful thing out of this whole situation.

The warriors my dad kept picking out for me only wanted to social climb and the Alphas were uninterested because they were waiting for their mates.

My family was a big deal in the werewolf world and everywhere I went I would be recognized which was why Dad never actually let me go anywhere.

My family are descendants of one of the three original packs who ruled when the first wolves were created by the Moon Goddess.

Those packs were considered royalty and to this day people still think that we're something special but I couldn't see why.

How could I see my family's strength if I couldn't even shift?

Regardless of how I felt about it, my father's pack was huge and he was basically one of three Kings to other smaller packs.

You can only imagine how much trouble all of that caused me.

Because of my inability to shift, anyone outside our family would immediately look down on me as a family disgrace and yes, that did hurt.

It hurt because it was probably the reason why I wasn't allowed to go to public events or barely leave our house.

What was worse was how my father hid me from the world and pretended like he wasn't ashamed of me to my face when I knew the truth deep down.

I haven't even met any of the other 'royal' families despite it being customary for us to be aware of all the members of each family.

If anything it would almost be shocking to introduce me to society after I'm already so old and to add to it, not even a full wolf.

"Wow, you look like shit,"

Jason walked into my room without bothering to knock or anything of that particular nature.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, "it's Wednesday, you have border patrol," my voice came out muffled because I had my face on one of my pillows.

"The alpha boss man said to watch over you for the rest of the week while he's away," he said and I rolled my eyes at what he called my dad before it dawned on me that dad would be gone.

I would be left here alone with my crazy ass mother all week.

I let out a loud groan.

"What my sexy ass is not good enough for you?" he said pouting.

I threw a pillow at his head which he could have easily dodged if he wanted but he let it hit his face so he could pretend to be hurt by it.

I shook my head, "idiot," I said

He was the world's biggest flirt and had even tried to take me to bed a few times before he realized who I was.

It wasn't surprising that he would never stop trying to remind people of his good looks.

He really was good looking at 6'2', a blonde tousled mess on his head, and deep blue almost hypnotizing eyes.

He was also reaching model status in the body department but I never saw him as anything more than a friend.

I couldn't tell you why but he just wasn't my cup of tea.

"Do you know where he went?" I asked.

He shrugged before making himself comfortable on my bed then grabbed my t.v remote.

~A few Hours Later~

I fumbled out of the forest line and huffed after regaining my balance.

That was definitely a close one.

I knew I left my scent everywhere I passed by so it would only be a matter of time before they found me.

Tracking my scent with their powerful noses through the dense forest was child's play for them.

Fucking dogs.

I knew this was supposed to be a wolf-populated town so I had to be careful not to trigger the pack on this territory and at the same time try to go unnoticed.

Despite not being able to shift, I still held an aura of power and I had distinguishable features wolves typically didn't have.

I had green eyes and long curly black hair that contrasted them.

They were markers of who I really was which is annoying, add the fact that my scent was likely mingled in with my dad's and I might as well have a giant red target on my forehead exposing who I was.

I pulled my hoodie over my head and walked further into town.

I zig-zagged as much as I could and made sure to bump into a few people with the hope of getting my scent on them and throwing off the trackers after me.

I kept turning to look behind me, worried that they had already caught up with me.

When I turned back around I crashed into someone.

My hood fell back and I gasped in surprise, almost falling backward as my long hair fell around me.

He had caught my waist and straightened me up before I hit the ground.

I stared at him waiting for him to out me but when he didn't I stared into his gray eyes a bit weirded out.

"You're not reacting?" I said I was confused.

He raised an eyebrow but otherwise looked seemingly indifferent, "am I supposed to," he said it more like a statement than a question.

His lack of a reaction made me realize he actually had no clue who I was?

I frowned at him analyzing him for a long time before my lips spread thin into a goofy grin.

I gave him the biggest smile, one that I haven't given to anyone in a long time.

"Rosabella," I said, stretching my arm out in front of us.

He stared at my outstretched hand for what felt like forever before his large hand wrapped itself around my smaller one.

"Aries," he seemed to be making his grip as light as possible.

Almost as if he feared that anything tighter than that would break my hand.

I was almost offended but his name made me curious.

I tilted my head confused, "like the god of war?" I asked.

His grip suddenly tightens, making me flinch.

He let go as soon as he noticed my discomfort and looked away as if trying to avoid eye contact, "sure," he said.

I was about to ask another question when I heard someone ask a group of ladies not too far away from us, "have any of you seen this girl?" the woman looked at the picture and then looked up in confusion just before her eyes met mine and recognition hit her face like a slap to the cheek.

I immediately knew that I had been found.

"Shit," I said just as Aries walked up to what I was assuming was his motorcycle.

He put his helmet on and the guys speaking to the lady a few feet away turned around to look at where the lady pointed me out.

I yelped and jumped on the back of Aries' motorcycle, hugging him from behind for dear life.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Drive!"

I don't know if it was the panic in my voice or the fact that I was shaking uncontrollably but thankfully he didn't question me further.

He stepped on it and we were speeding through the town just before the men could react.