Melody must have fallen asleep because the next thing she knew her phone was chirping an alarm at her, time to get up for school. She sat up, and stretched her stiff limbs. She had not fallen asleep in an ideal position and her body was loudly expressing its displeasure. After popping and cracking her joints back to almost normal, she checked the messages on her phone. Her mom had sent nearly a dozen messages chewing melody out for what she cooked last night and being rude to Frank. Melody tried to think back, had her mother always been this hateful? She didn't think so, but Melody and Beverly never had the closest bond, they were more like oil and water they were so different from each other. Melody had always been a Daddy's girl. Until he left her anyways. Shaking her head, she tossed the phone back on her bed, ignoring the messages and pushing all her negative feelings deep down into a locked box at the back of her mind.Melody showered, got herself ready, and was actually ready ea
Melody exited the school and turned towards the bike rack, and once again saw Alexander there waiting by the bike rack."What are you doing here? School ended over an hour ago." She asked, voice dripping with venom. She was not in the mood for anymore adolescent boy bullshit today. Her bullshit quota was more than full for today. For the week really after today's incident."I heard about your gym class today, I wanted to make sure you were ok?" His voice sounded like he was actually concerned about her. Melody did not understand what was up with this guy."I'm fine, didn't you hear? I'm the psycho that punched him. I'm the violent problem." The sarcasm was heavy in her words."I don't think you are the kind of person to hit someone for no reason. Do you want to talk about it? I'll actually listen if you want to talk." He reached his hand towards her, laying a hand on her arm. She felt sparks where he touched her, like he was electric.Melody sighed, ignoring the strange electric tingl
Melody knew her mom was going to be mad at her, but she wasn't prepared to walk in her front door and immediately get a slap to the face from her mother before any words were even said. Melody's mouth hung open. Melody's mind was blank in shock. All she could hear was a thin ringing in her ears. She held one of her cold hands against the now flaming skin of her cheek where her mother had struck her. She could see her mother's mouth moving, but she couldn't make out the words. It was like she was underwater.Her mother grabbed her roughly by the chin with pinched fingers and looked directly in Melody's eyes, breaking the trance she was in."Are you even listening to me? Melody Grace, why am I getting phone calls from the school about you assaulting your brother? What is wrong with you?" Her mom was right in her face, fuming, spittle flying into Melody's face while her mother screamed at her.Melody could barely think she was so rattled by the slap. She moved her lips like a fish trapped
The next morning Melody woke up, and the night before felt like a dream. Everything that had happened from the moment she entered this house yesterday afternoon was so unbelievable that it had to have been a dream. But when she looked at her canvas shoes that were caked with mud and pine needles, and saw her reflection in the mirror with a faint bruise on her cheek she knew that it was all real.Once again she got ready in her room, and waited until the last moment before darting down the stairs and directly out the front door to her bike, avoiding everyone. She was going to need to figure out a way to get a lunch packed for herself, she didn't want to live off cafeteria food and vending machines. Maybe she could get a mini fridge up to her room somehow and keep some things to at least make herself a sandwich in the mornings.Her bike ride to school was peaceful, the woods and trees seeming far less intimidating in the bright morning sunlight than they had last night. She had done her
Melody worked to find a routine that kept her out of sight of her family as much as possible over the next few days. It was mostly successful, especially since she was able to happily stay in her room away from everyone. She had grown to love her room, high up and separated from everyone else. Her private sanctuary was her perfect refuge. The only thing that wasn't perfect was there was a strange annoying buzzing high frequency sound sometimes. She didn't like how it sounded in her ears. But if she turned on her music it was easily ignored, especially while she was working on her halloween costume. She was trying to make herself a corset waist cincher for the first time. Her little familiar sewing machine fit perfectly on the desk that had been here when she moved in, and was the ideal set up for sewing.Alexander had helped her avoid her family the day after he had run away from her at lunch by offering to drive her to pick out a costume from a store for the upcoming halloween dance
Alexander was excited for the Halloween dance, it wasn't that he cared about the highschool dance, but Melody refused to tell him what her costume was going to be. All he knew was that she was going to try and make a corset. Everytime he thought about options for what it could be, his mouth watered and pants became uncomfortable. He couldn't help himself, she was his mate after all, and he had been waiting years to meet her.He hated that he was lying to her right now about so many things. Who he really was, his age, how much he actually knew about her now. So many lies. Since the day she told him about how her father had walked out and abandoned Melody when he left his cheating wife, Alexander had called his mother and asked her to use his vast resources to try and locate the man. But Melody's father was very good at disappearing and wasn't likely in the country any longer. Her father really had just walked away from her.It made Alexander so angry, how could someone just walk away f
It was the night of the school's Halloween dance. Alexander had been a proper gentleman and bought two tickets for himself and Melody. Melody and her mother's system of giving Melody warning when she was supposed to make dinner had brought peace, and allowed Melody access to the kitchen again.A couple days ago Alexander had helped her get a mini fridge up the steps, a small cupboard, a hot pot, kettle and microwave so she could stock up on easy to prepare foods when needed. To help compensate for the pantry stable based diet she was getting at home, Alexander had offered to bring her a lunch from his uncles for school, and had enlisted the help of the pack kitchen to help him prepare the perfect bento box style lunches he could every day.He was impressed when he finally got to see her bedroom. It was much nicer than he had prepared himself for. He had easily hefted the small mini fridge up the narrow steep stairs, and had already mentally steeled himself to see a spartan room. But t
Melody tried her best to entice Alexander to take her somewhere private, somewhere where they could do what her body was now begging for. Anywhere dark and alone.She was so horny, she had never felt like this before. The dance was almost over, she kept pressing her body against Alexander's while they danced, closer and closer, until she was grinding against him.But no matter how hard she tried to throw herself at him, he remained a constant gentleman. His hands stayed in chaste locations while he held her in his arms as they danced. He knew what she was up to, what she wanted, he could smell her arousal and it was killing him. Not until she knows the truth. It's not fair to her if she doesn' know everything. It was his mantra, repeating it over and over in his head while he tried to ignore how good she felt pressed against him. How her body perfectly curved to meet his as she pressed herself against him. It was torture. He was desperate to know how it would feel to have her underneat
Josephine and the elite teams did exactly what they had set out to do. They had moved so efficiently that they had knocked out most of the command structure entirely before the hyenas had a chance to even sound an alarm to warn the others that their doom was coming.Any who did not actively fight, were given the choice to end their days there and now or move semi willingly to an enclave Josephine had been working on for far longer than Alexander had realized. To Josephine, Melody was just another target, one of far too many in a larger pattern. One that Josephine had been working to end on her own long before Melody had even been born.Alexander was in awe as Guillermo filled him in on the progress during a rather social seeming jog several weeks after the incident; which was all Alexander could bring himself to say about it all. Still working on it with his therapist. But things were going better. He was focusing on being a dad, and decided to take up carpentry. If he was going to li
Melody drove up to the familiar house, the smell of burnt clutch heavy in the cabin of the vehicle. Melody didn't know how to drive a manual, let alone an old truck with a heavy gear shift and broken power steering. Thankfully it didn't matter. The truck just had to get her here. Looking all normal, and human and alone. If the truck had to stay behind because Melody had wrecked the transmission on the relatively short easy drive over, no harm done. Flint would carry her to Alec's pack lands and virtual sanctuary until they could arrange to get back to their own home.The home looked significantly worse than she was prepared for. The picket fence she had admired that first day hadn't been painted in a while when she had left, and hadn't been touched since. Many boards were missing or broken. Beverly must have hated it, she had been a realtor and she was good at it. At making homes look good enough that people wanted to live in the warm homey environments she created. Looks were often d
"You don't have to do this yourself, Guillermo and I can take care of it.." Alexander pleaded with Melody. That evening as she insisted on preparing everything to travel across the country to execute Frank. Throwing random clothes into a suitcase while she stomped around the room on feet far too heavy for someone of her size."Yes I do!" she was nearing hissing at him as she insisted strongly. She paused, packing the suitcases, "I need to do this, he hurt my whole family Alexander. He needs to pay for it. I need him to pay for it. To know he brought his end on himself, I want him to know." Her words were so heavy with with such a finality to them, that Alexander, never able to really say no to her finally gave in. She could come on the mission, only if the shrink and doctor cleared her first. After this afternoon's panic attack, and early pregnancy he was sure she wouldn't get the clearance from the doctor. She's pregnant, no doctor would let her go out to murder their step father.He
Alexander and Melody spent their time with their kids and Diana. Letting Alexander's mother take care of everything while Melody and Alexander played on the floor with their kids, ate snacks, and just enjoyed the peace of their family. Raven was stomping around in her room out back, apparently a nap was not coming easily. "I guess it's not all she hoped it would be?" Alexander ventured softly while James was cuddling in his lap, almost asleep with a picture book in his hands."She has wanted this all her life, maybe dropping a vampire sighting on her this early wasn't the best idea." Diana said, softly, her voice like a lullaby as James drifted off to sleep. Melody was just returning from putting Ansley down for a nap, and smiled at seeing James limp in his fathers arms. She came over, gently and carefully picking the little boy up who snuggled into his mother's body as she picked him up, and took him to have a nap as well. Giving Alexander some time alone with his mom."Alpha doesn'
The next morning it was confirmed by Guillermo that Frank and Robert had almost certainly had something to do with Beverly's murder. Randy was only innocent of this particular crime because he was already in prison for a statutory rape charge. A combination of wire transfers from offshore accounts, messages on burner phones, and finally a time line established when Guillermo searched recent security and surveillance cameras around the small town where Melody and Alexander had met. Trying to figure out what had happened and when.Beverly was a woman who liked routine he learned, and even though she couldn't find a job after she had been laid off, had tried to keep busy. She volunteered, working at the animal shelter some days, food bank on others. Spent an hour or so in the town library applying for jobs before hitting the grocery store before heading home to cook for her family. She didn't seem to interact much with anyone in the town. She hadn't carried a cell phone in over a year be
The first couple photographs showed three women, roughly Melody's age, nothing else in common between them. They were all of different heritage, but all were very dead, by the similar ragged horizontal slash across their throats. No metal blade had opened their throats, that was the mark of a clawed hand. Then there had been two men, Melody didn't know them, but her heart filled with sadness as she realized these were all probably the dead mates to alphas. Who in turn according to Alexander research, never knew their mates were taken and murdered, instead thought they had been rejected. That each of these people had been stolen and their lives ended, causing echos of heartbreak for so many people, filled Melody with guilt that twice she had been taken, and twice she escaped mostly unharmed. She didn't know why she was ok in her home now, and these people weren't.Alexander was just finishing up with Guillermo, his own worry at a new level with the news from his head of security. He dr
This was how his life should have been. Raven would be unbearable if she ever learned that she really had been right all along. She was born for this, Alexander wasn't. He didn't feel any guilt at all now. As he laid Melody in a rocking chair so he could run a bath for her, he checked on his mother as she did the same for Ansley.James was staying with Robin and her family tonight. James adored his older cousins, and seeing how other people lived their everyday lives. He was a nosey kid, Alexander hoped he didn't drive his very controlled sister insane overnight. James was more in tune with his grandmother or Lark. Almost like Robin could feel his worry, Alexander's phone buzzed with a notification, he checked and saw a video of a wide grinning James holding a Mario Kart Steering wheel in his small hands, his face aglow with joy as he tried to play with his older cousins, who were laughing at his eager attempts to widely steer around the course. The sound of generations, and blended f
Melody awoke with the most unwelcome deja vu. The particular heavy and slow feeling of waking up after having been knocked unconscious. Judging by the rhythmic pounding and pain radiating from the back of her head, it had been physical this time instead of chemical. She didn't know if that was better or worse, she still felt sick and nauseated, and the headache was worse, but her body didn't feel as clumsy.The overwhelming wrong feeling had diminished, but things were certainly not right. But at least she was able to think now. She looked around, lovely another cement room from floor to ceiling, a single caged in bulb in the ceiling for light, and a clean, if uncomfortable pallet underneath her. Things smelled clean, which at least wasn't offensive and an improvement on the first kidnapping. Melody wasn't scared this time, she was boiling under the surface like a secret lake of lava.Yup, she had been kidnapped again. Ansley! Where was her daughter? Who had taken her. Melody knew she
The next week was perfect, better than ever before. Alexander was scheduled to see his counsellor at least twice a week, he was getting Raven up to speed on current pack issues and general local politics. He felt lighter. Like himself in a way he had missed without even realising he had been missing something at all.Melody's days were a little more boring. Delia had texted her on schedule all through the weekend through until Sunday night. Then she had called to let Melody know she was taking a week off school and going on vacation with the man she had gone home with on Friday night; and was still with. Melody had worried about her friend, but after talking on the phone, Delia was safe, and happy, and excited. So Melody wished her friend well. Maybe the dark tall brooding man Delia was with was a shifter too, and Delia was his mate. Melody gnawed on her lower lip wondering how she would even try to ask her friend if that was the case, without letting too much slip if Delia wasn't in