TWO

LAUREL’s POV

Helios, in his sleep, is sprawled on the bed, and on his lap is Jamie. She is naked and straddled on his thighs, sensually stroking his chest. And there are bruise marks all over her body.

I quickly cover my mouth to stifle a gasp and watch in horror as my world comes crashing down with cruelty I had never known before. My heart shatters into a million pieces like glass thrown against the wall. But worst of all, I feel the sting of humiliation as I watch the only man I have ever loved in the arms of my sister.

It is no secret that Helios has always been a womanizer, but among all the women that he has bedded, this is the final blow.

Why does it have to be her? Why does she have to do this on the most important day of my life? And why does it have to be him? Did he call for me to come simply for me to see this? Does he not know how I feel or does he simply not care?

Then, as if sensing my presence, Jamie turns her head towards me. Both our ocean-blue eyes meet and her lips curl up into a sinister smile.

Slowly, she unmounts Helios and saunters towards me in all her naked glory. The moonbeam shines on her golden locks as she sashays over, proudly showing off all the bruises and marks on her curves.

I would have to be a fool not to know how Jamie got them.

She stops but a mere inches away from my face and the smile plastered on her face tells me that she is pleased with herself. Very pleased.

My sight blurs a little and I have to close my eyes. My breathing goes shallow and my chest tightens so hard that I have to open my mouth. I don’t want to be here anymore; I want to leave this room but I cannot.

“Why are you just standing there? You should be congratulating me. I told you to wait and see. And now, I finally have the man of my dreams,” she whispers tauntingly into my ear even as I stand rooted to the ground.

This is a nightmare. It has to be.

“Do you know how passionate Helios was in bed?” she snickers as she cups her own breasts, rubbing her nipples until they harden. “He kissed me and clawed at me like a beast. He was savage and I loved every minute of it.”

It hurts so much that these two had spent the night together, especially more so when Helios knows very well that she tried to hurt me at the coronation. I feel nauseated, as if I am about to throw up but I swallow down my bile.

I fist my fingers and feel my nails dig into my skin. It is painful, but the pain is nothing compared to the heartbreak I am feeling right now. But what right do I have to stop them? I am only the Beta of the Morningstar Pack; I am not his Luna.

As Alpha, Helios has the right to bed any woman he wants, my sister included.

I need to regain my composure; I am here for official business and I must not let matters of the heart get in the way. Forcing my eyes to open, I say as calmly as I can, hiding the cracks in my voice, “Jamie, please leave. I am here on official matters.”

My order is met with a cackle of laughter. Jamie slaps her thighs and clutches her stomach as she giggles and snorts, laughing as if she has just heard the funniest joke in the world.

“Leave? Oh Laurel, don’t be silly. Helios would want me to stay.”

She walks even closer and towers above me, her blood-red lips curling up high. She pokes me in the chest, hard, and says, “You should be the one to leave instead. You are stopping us from our lovemaking.”

“Jamie, I am speaking to you not as your sister but as the Beta of the Morningstar pack. Please leave now.”

Jamie sneers at me and bares her teeth. She begins to shift and is just about to lash out with a hammer-like claw at me.

“WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?” a deep baritone booms from across the room and both of us immediately stop.

Helios has awoken. He runs a hand through his black mane. Our argument must have pulled him from his slumber. He turns his head to the side and looks at both of us with his eyes of obsidian fury.

His thick dark eyebrows furrow and his strong clean-shaven jaw turn downward into a scowl.

Jamie’s smug look immediately melts away and is instantly replaced with one of a damsel in distress. She runs over to the bed, goes on her knees, and clings to his arm, “Oh, Helios! I was just telling Laurel not to interrupt your slumber but she wouldn’t listen. She was so mean, she wanted to use her status as a Beta to kick me out. She was even going to – “

“Shut up.” Helios swings her hand away. “Leave.”

He sits up straight now, in a posture and gait that screams power and strength. With a single word, my sister, who had been acting all high and mighty just moments ago is reduced to a puddle of tears. She starts to cry, “But Helios, we were having so much fun. You and I, we were --“

“ENOUGH! LEAVE!” he bellows.

Jamie is sobbing and looking at me with pure resentment. But our Alpha’s word is law and Jamie quickly gathers her clothes and flees the room.

I slowly approach Helios and pick up a robe that lays strewn on the floor, wondering if Jamie had helped him to disrobe. I grit my teeth and force myself to focus on the task at hand.

“How did she get in here?” Helios barks, annoyed as he grabs the robe from my hand.

Wait. Was he not the one who asked for her to come?

But I lower my head, knowing that I do not have the answer. “I…I don’t know. She was here before me.”

He merely sits by the bedside and sneers at me. “Funny, isn’t it? This is exactly the kind of thing you need to know as Beta,” he says, his words dripping with sarcasm. Helios has always had a temper that can rival the gates of hell.

“How would I know? I’m not the one who slept with her,” I mutter.

“What. Did. You. Say?”

Crap, I forgot his sharp ears. But right now, I don’t feel like apologizing to him. In fact, a part of me wants to lash out and then hide until he goes away.

Helios sighs. It is the kind of sigh that shows he doesn’t know what to do with me. He pulls the robe over his herculean figure and is about to stand up when suddenly, he lets out a groan and sways. His muscles tighten and his body is now covered in sweat.

Pushing aside my heartache, I reach out an arm to steady and support his massive weight with my tiny frame. Worry fills me to the brim. Why is he burning up again?

“Helios, what’s happening?!”

“It’s starting…” he whispers. His eyes are closed and shadows from the window dance across his face. His expression is masked in pain.

“What is?”

He’s not making any sense. “Helios, I’ll call for the pack doctor –”

Suddenly, he screams and his nails dig into my skin, drawing blood. Instinctively, I try to pry his fingers away but he’s holding me too tight.

“Laurel, listen...listen to me. What you are about to witness is to stay a secret between us, do you understand?” The urgency in his voice frightens me. A foreboding sense fills me. Something is about to happen. Something bad.

In my confusion, I do not answer and he tightens his grip on me. “Do you understand??”

A frightened sob escapes my lips. I nod.

“Good, I need your..”

Suddenly, he stops and snarls. Our eyes lock for a fraction of a second and I realize that his usually obsidian eyes have turned crimson red.

Wait, it's a full moon. How did I not notice it until now?

For years, there have been talks about Helios going into hiding every full moon. There were stories about him, and none of them had any good words for the Alpha of Morningstar. But I had always brushed them off as vicious framing...until now. Seeing him like this, I realize that this myth came from the truth.

I hear the sound of bones snapping and his body begins to shift into his wolf form. Fur starts to envelop him and he throws his head up, letting out an excruciating howl at the moon.

His eyes are now narrowing at me with a dangerous light and his fangs glint chillingly in the moonlight. Step by step he advances, backing me into the corner of the room. Then, he lets out a menacing growl.

In front of my eyes, I see the man I love and revere turns into a senseless beast. He is losing control over his senses.

“Shit, run!” Daphne howls. No, I will not run. He needs help.

Suddenly, he pushes me to the ground and climbs on top of me, effectively pinning me down, and leans dangerously close.

“Please, Helios, it’s me,” I plead.

At the sound of my voice, Helios blinks a little. He frowns, seemingly confused. Then he stares at me with his crimson red eyes and for a moment, a flicker of recognition crosses his face. I seize the moment to try and pull him back to his true self.

Working up my courage, I carefully reach my hand to him, and gently caress his fur.

What did he say before he lost control? He needs my… What does he need?? I scramble my brain, frantically trying to find the answer.

“Helios, stop…it’s me, Laurel,” I call out once more, desperately hoping and praying that he can conquer the darkness within him.

But Helios does not seem to recognize me. He leans in, his face dangerously close to mine. I gasp at our proximity and tense up as he tucks his nose in my hair and inhales deeply. The tip of his noseslides to my jaw, barely brushing my lips and tilts my head up so that my neck becomes exposed to him.

His hot breath fans the exposed skin on my neck, igniting a blazing fire in the pits of my stomach and he starts to sensually move down my neck.

Goddess…what is he doing?!

His touch sends a tingling sensation all over my body so much so I do not know whether I want him to stop or not.

Then, without another word, he roughly grabs my wrist, brings it to his lips, and sinks his teeth into my skin. Blood trickles down my hand and Helios starts sucking on my wrist at a feverish pace.

The pain! I trash furiously under him, trying to push him off but Helios’ wolf is stronger. He holds me down as he continues to draw blood and right that instant, the scorching heat on his body disappears.

That is when I finally understand what is happening.

My blood.

He needs my blood to gain control of himself!

Then I remember that Helios’s fever had subsided the moment he drank my blood at the coronation. So that is what he called me here for.

My teeth dig into my lips to stop myself from screaming out and I force myself to block out the pain. My heart beats for him and if this is what it takes to calm him down then so be it.

And as he sucks away my life force, I see the colour of his irises change and suddenly, he starts to turn back to his human form.

In his thirst for blood, he has sucked too much from me and I start to fleet in and out of consciousness. My vision tunnels and the world around me starts to dim but just as the last of my consciousness ebbs away, I hear Helios call my name, “Laurel.”

He pulls me up into his arms.

“I'm sorry. It’s over now,” he says, his eyes softening with a rare gentleness that often eludes him.

Lines marr my forehead and I struggle to speak. “This…this is your secret then? You shift and lose control of yourself every full moon, don’t you?”

I am surprised by how everything has become so crystal clear even when my body is in its weakened state. I expect Helios to chastise me but to my surprise, he lets out a chuckle.

“Careful, Laurel,” he warns. “You are trespassing in a danger zone that no one else has set foot in before.”

So it’s true. No one else knows about this.

“I didn’t trespass.” I boldly raise my head and look into his eyes, “You ordered me to come.”

Helios lowers his head, so close to me as if he’s about to kiss me. “Yes, that I did. And now you know my secret. But be careful, little Laurel. There will be more nights such as these…nights when I will need -“

“My blood? ”

He smiles, albeit bitterly. “My little Laurel, you’re a clever one. “

I try not to blush at him calling me his. One compliment from him and I’m melting like ice cream under the hot sun.

“I found out at the ceremony that your blood can calm the beast within me. Strange how it’s you out of the thousands in the pack.”

He lets out another bitter smile. “You can see how ‘inconvenient’ this curse can be. I lose myself and wake up in strange places. That or I wake up in the arms of women I don’t know.”

My heart misses a beat at his confession. So he didn’t know it was Jamie….

“I’ll do everything for you Helios, I mean Alpha,” I blurt out. “I’ll never betray you.”

Helios cocks his head and cups my chin. He opens his mouth as if to say something when suddenly, a knock comes at the door.

“Helios! It's me, Nox. Open the door!”

Shit.

Our gazes meet and Helios immediately drops my hand. Helios’ psychotic uncle, Nox Morningstar is here.

There is not a minute to lose. Quickly, he stands up and I follow suit, scrambling to pick up his clothing that lay strewn all over the floor. He turns to face me, allowing me a full-frontal view of his body and I can feel the heat from his stare even as begins to dress himself.

The door pounds again, Nox is losing his patience. “Helios, open the door!”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, wait a minute will you?!” Helios blurts out a curse, quickly slipping into his shirt. I turn my head, keeping my eyes on the window and quickly smoothen my clothes and run my hands through my messed up hair. And just as he finishes dressing up, he strides over to me.

“Don’t breathe a word about tonight to anyone,” he whispers, breathing down my neck and I stiffen.