3

"Don't bring that knife near me," Isabelle warned the woman pointing a finger at her.

"Oh please. It was just a joke. I'm not going to kill you." The woman replied dropping the knife into the counter.

"At least not now." She said when Isabelle sat down at the breakfast bar.

"What is wrong with you? Who are you anyway?" She asked standing up with her hands on her hips.

"Chris's Wife." She replied simply and got back to cutting the onions.

"Oh." She replied simply. Still not trusting the lady, she didn't sit down again.

"Dolores, where are you?!" A male voice shouted suddenly.

"In the kitchen and keep your voice down, the whole pack can hear you." She replies and then looked at Isabelle whose brows were furrowed.

"I mean the whole estate." She corrected smiling.

"Hey," Chris said walking towards the woman called Dolores. Isabelle turned her head to the other side not wanting to witness their kiss.

"So brother, how was your day? You know I told your..." she nudged her chin towards Isabelle with a knowing look, "I was your wife!" She said excitedly.

Chris only hummed in response and walked away. Isabelle rolled her eyes. Who asked him to stay in the first place?

"Hey." She called Isabelle who turned her head back to her.

*Hmm?" She replied.

"Something's wrong between you and my brother?" She asked.

"The snobbish jerk is your brother?! Woah! I wasn't expecting that. Well, I guess weirdness runs in the family." She replied instead.

"What are you cooking?" She asked Dolores when she saw a frown settle on her face.

"Lasagna. I'm Dolores by the way." She replied smiling as if she loved saying her name.

"Nice to meet you. I'd say my name but you addressed me by it earlier." Isabelle replied picking a strand of meat that wasn't yet in the frying pan to make the meat sauce.

"Don't eat the meat! Here, eat onions," Dolores said dropping the knife and then taking an onion and pushing it to Isabelle's face.

"Stop that. I don't want it!" Isabelle said laughing.

 Dolores joined her in laughing. She then took a slice of meat in the other hand.

"You want this?" Dolores asked stretching the meat to her. Isabelle nodded immediately.

"Then come and have it," Dolores said.

Isabelle immediately charged forward and ran to eat the onion instead. Dolores had switched hands when she couldn't stop.

"Yuck! Yucky! Oh my God!" Isabelle yelled running to the sink and immediately spitting out the onion and washing her mouth with water.

Then after getting rid of the weird taste, she turned around to glare at Dolores who was laughing her ass off.

"This isn't funny." She said.

"It is! You need to see how your face looked. It was so funny!" Dolores said still laughing.

"You think? Then come eat one yourself." Isabelle said taking a bigger slice of onion and walking towards Dolores. 

Dolores swirled out of the way careful enough to not use her inhumane speed. She walked over to the onions and picked another one.

"Onion Fight!" Dolores yelled throwing the onion at once. 

Soon, onion was all over the floor while the two ladies were in the midst of the whole mess.

"I guess no onion is going in the Lasagna then," Isabelle said laughing.

"Oh no. I didn't think of that. Oh wait, I did." Dolores replied laughing and then pointed at the plastic bag still sitting on the cabinet innocently.

"I better get cooking. You wanna help?" Dolores asked standing up. She then turned to Isabelle helping her stand up.

"Yeah, sure. I'll be happy to." Isabelle replied smiling.

"You chop the onions, I'll chop the meat," Dolores said moving to the counter.

"Who will take care of this then?" Isabelle asked pointing at the mess they made.

"Meh. Someone will do it." She said shrugging.

"Can I chop the meat instead? I don't have a thing for Onions. It was my younger sister that did." Isabelle asked.

"Just don't eat it." She said.

"Yes ma'am," Isabelle said saluting her and both got to work.

Chris was in his room when the sound of someone laughing reached his ears. He frowned and then listened in to sound.

"This isn't funny." He heard his mate say. Dolores could make her laugh? All he had heard was her whimpering, crying, and screaming. That was all.

And the laugh... it seemed... genuine. Like she was indeed happy. If he was going to hear her laughs every day Dolores was here, he should invite her to live at his house then.

A smile settled on his face when he heard her laugh again. His smile then dropped and he furrowed his brows, what was happening?

He shook his head and walked to the bathroom. He then dipped himself in the cold bath.

Whatever was happening, he would figure it out later. For now, he would listen to his mate's melodious laugh. And so he closes his eyes, leans back and his ears open wide.

After bathing, he makes his way downstairs and sees his mate focused on cutting the meat into the right sizes. 

Her golden yellow hair was packed in a high ponytail and her neck was bare which was very tempting for Chris.

His mate was growling and howling in his head. He gulped hard and managed to walk toward them, cooly. His eyes flickered unknowingly to his mate and then to his sister keeping his eyes on her. 

His eyes fought against him to turn his head but his body denied it. His eyes finally won the fight as he stared at her longer than he intended to. 

Isabelle looked up feeling someone's eyes on her. She met with Chris's eyes who immediately moved his eyes away. She scoffed and rolled her eyes.

Who asked him to look at her in the first place? Dummy.

"That's not how you're supposed to cut it!" Isabelle yelled to Dolores who was busy staring at the brief eye contact the other two people in the room just made.

"Then how?!" She asked in return.

"Like this," Isabelle said cutting her own meat into a dice shape.

"It's hard!" 

"If you didn't know how to cut this stuff, why would you even propose doing Lasagna?!" She asked.

"Well... Chris wanted it." She said pointing at her brother throwing him under the bus.

Isabelle dropped the knife and said, "I'm not cooking for this buffoon." 

Then she walked out of the kitchen and into her room. She slammed the door shut and huffed sitting on the bed.

"Woah... She hates you." Dolores said lowly.

"Yeah... Been a jerk to her since she came." He replied sighing.

"Oh." She said simply.

"Let me pity you and go talk to her. We've kind of bonded. Don't let your wolf take control by the way." Dolores said patting his shoulder as she walked past him.

At times like this, she was the eldest. 

Dolores stopped in front of  Isabelle's room following her scent. She then knocked.

"Hey...It's me. Open up?" She said and waited a few seconds. When she heard no approaching footstep she sighed and turned around to go. She had taken two steps on the verge of taking the third when she heard the door open.

She turned her head to see a pink-faced Isabelle glaring at her. She grinned and walked back to her. 

"Hey there." She said walking in.

Isabelle walked to her bed and sat down. Dolores sat beside her looking at her.

"Well, your room looks okay." She started looking around.

"What use is a fine room when you have no freedom in it?" Isabelle asked in return.

"Right. Trust me, Chris has a reason for all this. I promise." Dolores said.

"Has a reason for locking me in here? You know I woke up yesterday and my door was locked. Locked. Like I'm some fucking prisoner!" Isabelle yelled throwing her hand up.

"So tell me, what stupid reason is that? What kind of insane reason would that be?" 

"He locked you in?" Dolores asked.

"Yep. That your rude brother did. Look, I get it, he saved me... I'm grateful for that which I made clear to him but what else does he want from me?!" Isabelle said.

"That fucking..." Dolores started but she paused and closed her mouth. Then she pulled Isabelle in a tight hug.

"I'm sorry for all that you're going through. I really am. And I'll talk to my brother, alright?" 

"Like hell will he listen?" Isabelle snorted.

"I'll talk to him. Trust me on this one." She said.

Isabelle didn't reply and just hugged her back. She felt warm, really warm. So she hugged her very well to soak in her warmth.

Unknown to her, Dolores was scolding her brother in mind link as she was hugging her.

'You stupid dickhead. How could you do that to her? If you weren't my Alpha, I'll really beat you to death. Don't you ever talk to me ever again!' She yelled and cut off the mind link without giving him a chance to reply.

"All right. Do you want to walk around?" Dolores asked breaking the hug.

"I can?" 

"Hmm. I'll take responsibility," Dolores said grinning.

"Yes please." She replied. 

"But first you need to change out of those clothes. Did you hand wash them?" Dolores asked pointing at her clothes.

"Didn't have another except the one Antonio gave to me. It's drying right now in the bathroom." Isabelle replied shrugging.

"You hand-washed my clothes?! You should have told me if you needed clothes. What has Chris been doing?!" Dolores asked standing up.

"Uhhh... Let me see, apart from making sure I'm locked in and making my life miserable, I don't think he's doing anything else." Isabelle said.

"I'll go shopping for you tomorrow. For today, let's go to my place and get you some cute clothing. Come on." Dolores said pulling Isabelle up.

"Alright then." She replied.

Isabelle smirked when Dolores had her back turned on her. This way, she would inquire about everything and anything about all the places she can use as her escape route.

They both walked downstairs to see their Lasagna ready. Isabelle sighed and moved towards it. She wore hand gloves and placed them in the freezer.

"We can leave now." She said excitedly dumping the hand gloves.

Dolores smiled and they made their way out. They walked along a path with Isabelle asking questions here and there.

"How old are you anyway? You look younger than me but you're older than me in speech. Even older than that douchebag in there." Isabelle said nudging her chin in the way they had come.

Dolores looked away from the branch she was playing with and looked at Isabelle.

"You're really bold by the way. No one, absolutely no one dares to call my brother a douchebag. But it is to be expected, you seem wild." Dolores replied instead pointing at her with the branch she was holding.

"They're really missing out. It feels great." Isabelle snorted and laughed.

Dolores shook her head at her friend's naivety. Who would dare to call their Alpha names? 

"I'm 25." She said.

"Oh. You're older than me. I'm 23." Isabelle replied.

Dolores smiled at her and patted her head. 

"So, any past boyfriend?" Dolores asked.

"Just one... Ended badly though. My CEO at work wants to date me. If I ever get out of here, I'll give him a trial." She replied nodding her head oblivious if Dolores who was snapping her head around to see if her brother didn't hear his mate spout out that nonsense.

She heard the tree ruffle lowly as she looked up to see Chris wolf sitting there silently. She gulped and immediately nudged her friend.

"Yeah, I don't think I want to hear about that. It's fine." She said chuckling awkwardly.

"So innocent, my dear." She sighed and patted her head. Isabelle pouted and moved her head away. 

"I'm not a child. Don't ruffle my hair." Isabelle said.

"You're the only child of your parents?" Dolores asked absentmindedly looking up at her brother who was staring down at her with his red eyes.

"No. I have a younger sister." Isabelle replied looking away.

"Yeah? Where is she?" Dolores asked.

When she saw she got no response, she turned her head to see Isabelle cleaning her eyes with the sleeve of the shirt she gave her to wear.

"I'm so sorry. Come here." Dolores said pulling her into a hug.

Chris skillfully got down from the branch he was sitting on. He couldn't watch his mate cry. After landing on his four hinds with a soft thud, he trod lightly and walked a few centimeters away from them.

He paused and looked back at his mate who was still sobbing in his sister's arms while his sister kept her glare on him.

Ashamed, he turned his head and ran away at a fast speed. Dolores sighed inwardly and patted the crying Isabelle in her arms.

That night, Isabelle couldn't sleep very well. She kept waking up with nightmares of her parent's death and even dreamt of the woman in the heels opening the closet door as if she knew she was there.

She couldn't move her eyes away from her mother but she saw a clearer view. Her mother was smiling at her as if telling her she was proud of her for hiding in there.

Isabelle couldn't say a word when she heard the woman's voice icily say "Well, you're dumb pretending to be smart. But honey, you have to join your parents." 

And then bang! She looked down to see blood pooling all around her but she couldn't move. She felt her consciousness slipping away from her slowly.

She woke with a scream with her body covered in sweat like every other night.

It was like she was reliving the moment every night. Reminded that her parents were murdered.

She couldn't waste her life here. Never. And so she determined to run away the following night. It was already dawn and more so, she'd have the whole day to herself to plan her escape. 

She got up and wore one of the clothes Dolores gave her yesterday.

Isabelle's morning went like usual. She made breakfast for herself and ate it. She then returned to her room to plan her escape.

The only time she got out was when Dolores came with the clothes that she promised to get for her. She collected it and smiled then gave Dolores a final hug.

"Thank you very much. For everything." She added quietly.

"Hey, it's nothing. It's what friends do, right?" Dolores asked chuckling.

Isabelle nodded and pulled away.

"I really want to keep you company but I'm needed at the pa... party. I promise a full day tomorrow. Just you and me." Dolores said smiling. She heaved a sigh of relief. She almost said pack. 

Isabelle breathed a sigh of relief in her. She nodded frantically not even paying attention to the stutter.

"Bye," Dolores said pecking her cheeks.

"Hmm. Bye-bye." Isabelle said waving.

Dolores walked out. Isabelle took the bags to her room and dumped them on the bed. She didn't bother opening it. What's the use? She was leaving tonight.

Night came faster than she imagined. She made her dinner and ate it returning to her room. She made sure to lock her door, set the alarm by her bedside to midnight, and wore one of the clothes Dolores bought.

She glanced over to her clock. 30 minutes to go. If only the clock sensed when she had her nightmares and woke her up. She sighed and looked up at the ceiling.

She lay there wide awake revising her moves to escape. When her alarm sounded 12 pm, she flung the duvet away and jumped out of bed.

She was dressed in a shirt and trousers that would not hinder her running. She was, after all, going to run. 

She looked to the window and grabbed her duvet tearing it into thin sheets that would aid her in sliding down the window.

Finally, she was ready. She threw the clothe down making sure the end she tied to the bed leg was firm and tight and slid down it gently to make no sound.

She was safely on the ground as she turned around and walked over the low fence around Chris's house.

Once she was on the other side safely, she ran without looking back with the moonlight lighting her way. It was like the heavens were also on her side.

Then she found herself on the path Dolores took her to pass the other day. She smiled at her achievement and continued running. 

She was suddenly stopped by a man standing in front of her. She looked up to see Antonio.

A/N: 

       Just to clear it up, the part of her parent's murderer opening the closet door to kill her was all in her imagination. The woman never found her till she left.