Chapter 0002

My heart pounded as I held his steely gaze. I’d never seen him before in person. Still, he embodied every physical descriptor I had heard customers give him at the diner: extremely fit, tall, dark, and handsome--with ice-blue eyes.

The type of eyes a girl could get lost in.

Those eyes narrowed.

“Yes, you. You seem to have incorrectly identified yourself, Miss…?”

I swallowed hard. I needed this façade to work for a little longer, or Elise’s parents would catch her before she and her boyfriend left town. I titled my head to the side in pretend confusion.

“There must be a misunderstanding. I’m Elise Matthews; I handed my invitation to the guard on the way in.” I crossed my arms.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a phone. He pulled something up on the screen and showed it to me. It was a picture of Elise, who, might I add—looked absolutely nothing like me.

Crap.

“Everyone who RSVP’d was required to send their picture in with their application. Are you really saying this is you?” He raised a dark eyebrow.

I swallowed and took a deep breath, realizing that there was no point in trying to lie to the Alpha now. Especially not with those blue eyes trained on me. “My name is Agnes Blake. My best friend Elise…her family was going to force her to be here when she already has a mate. She asked me to cover for her.”

The Alpha snorted. “So she left you with the possibility of an impersonation charge if you were caught? Some best friend she is.”

I felt my stomach twist a little. “She’s helped me a lot in the past. She needed my—”

“Do you want to be here?”

I paused at his sudden interruption. Of course I didn’t want to be here, but my mind floated to that life-changing money again. Plus, he didn’t exactly look angry. Maybe I could stay, just until the trials ended, then Elise would pay me and it would all be okay.

“Yes, I do,” I lied.

The Alpha looked at me for a moment, scanning me as if sizing me up. His blue eyes wandered my dress, my hair, an eyebrow quirking at my lack of makeup. He sighed. “Well, your friend’s secret is safe with me. But as for you…”

He placed a hand on his hip and tapped his finger for a moment, considering. My heart pounded, but I managed to keep my expression calm and steady.

Finally, he strode over to the room’s door and beckoned someone over. It was a woman in a maid’s uniform. “Please show Miss Agnes Blake to the Mate Trial dormitories.”

The maid nodded and beckoned me to follow her. I gave the Alpha one last look. Did this mean I was allowed to stay…? But he’d turned to look out the window, his strong jaw set. I shivered.

His look was not a good sign for me. Would he request me be fully ousted out of the pack?

Despite my fears, I followed the maid to the dorms. “Each girl has her own room,” She told me curtly, “And own bathroom as well. Alpha Elijah wanted everyone to feel comfortable here.”

She stood in front of one of the rooms with the number ‘14’ carved into a brass plate. “This is your room,” she said, handing me a key with the same number on it. “Please take some time to get settled.”

I managed a smile. “Thank you.”

Once she was gone, I decided to take a quick look at the room and bathroom, which were a million times nicer than my cramped little apartment. The room was small but well-appointed, with a chandelier hanging from the ceiling, a large four-poster bed piled high with decadent pillows, and a closet filled with clothes that were my size—and Elise’s.

The bathroom had a clawfoot tub, a walk-in shower, and a toilet with a bidet. I hadn’t lived in such luxury in a while, not since I’d lived at home.

Home…

Thoughts of that place drove me to think of how I had the potential to run into Ava at any moment here, and I couldn’t help but wrap my arms around myself to ward off a sudden chill.

If I stayed here, that sisterly reunion was bound to happen sooner or later. I hoped Elise was happy with her mate, and I’d certainly be giving her an earful once this was all over.

Goddess, I needed some fresh air.

I made my way out of the mate’s trial dormitory and found two large patio doors that opened out to a garden. The air smelled of lavender and roses, instantly calming my frazzled nerves.

The garden was expansive, and I decided to take my time walking through it, just admiring the large flower bushes and other various exotic plants. It was when I was looking up, slowly admiring the flowering vines on a tall tree that my foot nudged something foreign. I looked down.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” I gasped. The toe of my shoe had nudged into the leg of a little girl, sitting under the tree with a pen and paper in her lap.

The girl smiled, and I noticed the freckles dusting her small, rounded cheeks. She couldn’t have been older than six or seven. “That’s okay! I was just trying to draw that bush over there.” She pointed at a yellow rosebush with her pencil. “Can you help me?”

Nodding, I sat down beside her in the grass and looked at her drawing. It was… beautiful. “What’s wrong with it? It looks perfect,” I said.

She bit her lip and grasped the paper, turning it this way and that. “I dunno…”

“May I?” I asked, gesturing for the paper, and she handed it to me. I looked for a moment and pointed at the stems.

“Add thorns,” I told her, handing it back.

“Ooh! That’s it!” she said, grabbing her pencil and quickly scribbling some tiny points along the bush’s branches. She looked adorable, the way she was sticking her tongue out as she worked.

“Do you live here?” I asked.

She nodded. “My mommy is…uh, she’s a maid here. I’m Thea,” she said brightly. “I come out here every day.”

“That’s so cool. It is beautiful here. Does the Alpha come out here a lot too?”

Thea nodded again. “He likes the gardens, too. But what I don’t understand is why so many women want to marry him?” She wrinkled her nose as if in disgust and I laughed.

“Well,” I leaned down conspiratorially, “I’ll let you in on a little secret of mine. I don’t really want to marry the Alpha. I’m just here to help a friend.”

Thea burst out laughing. “He’s gonna be so mad if he finds out! He thinks he’s sooo cool because all these girls like him. Wait till he finds out the prettiest one doesn’t like him at all!”

My face flushed deeper than the roses. As I opened my mouth to respond, my stepsister flung herself around the corner, nearly barreling into me.

“There you are. I thought I saw you earlier. What the hell are you doing here?” Ava demanded. Her blonde hair was still perfectly in place, even with her swift movements, but her blue eyes were red and angry.

I stood up and dusted off my dress. “Participating in the Mate Trial, same as you,” I stated calmly.

She scoffed, “As if an Alpha would want you. You’re just a waitress. Don’t act surprised that I know.” When she saw the look on my face, she added smugly, “Mom and Dad hired a private investigator to keep tabs on you, like, a year ago.”

Of course they did. I ignored her jab and turned to leave, but she blocked my path.

“Tell me what the Alpha wanted with you today.”

“Doesn’t that show that he was interested in me today and not you?” I quipped back.

“Oh, please,” Ava growled. “He probably just wanted a new scullery maid or something and you fit the bill. I mean, seven years ago, you got pregnant with some nobody wolf’s bastard. You left your only family, lost your wolf, racked up a mountain of debt, and the kid didn’t even live! Agnes, your life is a complete joke. You should never have come here.”

The reminder of my baby made me see red. No one got to talk about my experience like that. No one. “She didn’t die,” I hissed. “She was stolen.”

Ava just scoffed. “Even now, seven years later, you’re just as crazy and delusional as you were before.”

My eyes widened. Ava was pouring salt in a wound and she knew it. No one believed me when I said that my baby wasn’t dead—they all said I was nuts, that I’d lost my marbles after my baby died.

But the thing was, I never got to see my little girl’s body. I mean, she’d already been missing for two years by the time she was marked as dead by the authorities. She could still be out there for all I knew. For all anyone knew.

Satisfied by my silence, Ava sneered and turned to leave.

“Hey!” Thea suddenly jumped to her feet, her drawing forgotten. “I’m gonna tell my daddy you were mean to my new friend!”

Ava whirled around, her eyes flashing. “Oh yeah? And who’s your daddy, you little runt? Some servant or another? Get lost!”

Thea shook her head, brown curls swaying. “My daddy is a big and scary wolf! I’m gonna tell on you!”

With that, Thea went to run past us. Ava moved to shove Thea as she passed, but I caught her arm in my hand and placed myself between them before she could reach her. She struggled in my grip. Even ‘wolfless’, as she so pleasantly reminded me, I was still stronger than her.

“Ugh.. freak!” Ava hissed, wincing under my grip. “You’re such a—”

“You shouldn’t hit children, Ava.” I tightened my fingers around her wrist. “Or do you still think you’re a child yourself?”

“What is this?” A voice suddenly boomed from behind us. I whipped my head up to see Elijah standing there, looking at us like we were some kind of spectacle.

And right now, I supposed we were.

I let go of Ava and she rushed toward him, giddy, fixing her hair behind her ears. “Alpha—”

He didn’t spare her a glance. “Leave,” he ordered her.

My sister looked at him agape, then put her head down and hurried past him, out of the gardens.

Thea ran straight to Elijah and gave him a tight hug. “Daddy!” She exclaimed, but his eyes still didn’t leave mine.

My heart hammered in my chest as the truth sank in. She wasn’t the maid’s daughter, she was his.

The Alpha’s daughter.