Chapter 2

Novalie POV

As the days passed by and I began preparing to go away to school, I found it crazy to think that one day that would be my own little suite, and Aunt Marianne would finally have the bedroom to herself. I couldn't help but to wonder if she would be lonely while I was away. Before I knew it, it was Thursday evening and we had just finished up showering after cleaning the kitchen after dinner. Aunt Marianne and I went back to our room and as she was making sure I had everything I would need packed up, Alpha mindlinked me to come to his office. I told her I would be back and hurried up the two floors to his office.

I knocked my usual knock, and to my surprise Luna Natalia opened the door and asked me to come inside. She quickly closed it and made her way back around Alpha Eduardo's desk to stand behind him as he spoke to me.

"Are you all packed up and ready to go in the morning?" He asked me as he relaxed back into his leather office chair.

"Yes Alpha, Aunt Marianne was just helping me make sure I didn't forget anything." I replied as played nervously with my fingers.

"Good. Now I asked you to come up here to speak with me so we could have a serious conversation before you leave tomorrow. It's important that you understand everything I'm about to tell you Novalie, as well as understand that there will be serious consequences if you fail to obey me. Now, you are easily one of the best Omegas to be born into this pack, you are smart, helpful, useful and incredibly beautiful, which makes you incredibly versatile. That is why we are choosing to make you head you Head Omega. But do not be fooled, you are still just an Omega. Now I understand that you and my son have quite a... how do I put it... well, let's say an intimate friendship. There's no need to try and deny it, Luna Natalia and I aren't blind and we certainly aren't fools. We are well aware of the closeness of yours and our son's friendship. However, that relationship can not, will not, and does not leave these packlands. He is your Alpha, and while you are away at school you will treat him with the respect and reverence of an Alpha. Nothing more, nothing less. Am I understood?" Alpha Eduardo leaned forward seriously as he spoke to me, studying my features.

"Yes sir, ofcourse Alpha, I understand." I lowered my neck in submission as I answered him with my heart pounding in my ears.

"You better, because I will not have my son miss out on having a respectful, Alpha bred female as a mate because she chose to reject him due to this sickening flirtation with you. If it were up to me you wouldn't even be going to the same school as him. Hell, if it were up to me you would have been kicked out of this packhouse and sent to a training house when this little disgusting fling of his with you started. You are not, nor will you ever be good enough for my son. You are nothing more than a dignified trickbaby of a whore, and the longer this has progressed the more I see that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. But rest assured, if I hear one whisper of gossip about you and my son you will be pulled from the academy and sent straight to the brothel. No more school because whores don't need an education." Luna Natalia spat at me full of disgust.

"Yes Luna, I understand." I answered as I fought back the tears threatening to spill from my eyes.

"Good, then you may go. And Novalie, we mean it. We won't have our son's future Luna rejecting him because she's afraid he'll be sleeping around with his Head Omega." Alpha Eduardo spoke sternly as I nodded my head and played with my fingers to keep myself breaking down into tears.

"Yes sir." I whispered before turning on my heels and beelining to the door.

I had shut the door behind me and only made it a few steps before I hit a block of solid muscle. I hadn't bothered to lift my head when I came out of the Alpha's office so I didn't see him coming, though I didn't need to see him to know exactly who I had bumped into. I would know his scent even in a crowded room, as I had spent the entirety of the week before engulfed in it. We should have known that we couldn't hide what was going on between us from his parents. I had done my best to always wash his scent off me before speaking with or seeing them, but out in the middle of the ocean on a boat, there really wasn't anywhere safe for us to hide the time we spent together or the closeness between us. He grabbed my arms to steady me as he asked if I was OK, but I couldn't really hear him as if I were drowning in the ocean while he yelled from above the water. His right hand went under my chin to lift it so I would look at him, and the moment my eyes met his the tears I had fought so hard to hold back sprang loose.

I pulled myself out of his grasp before pushing past him as I wiped my tears away. He looked as though he were heading to his father's office so he would know soon enough what was wrong with me, as I was sure he was about to get the same lecture I had just received, only his would be full of love and caring with only his best interests in mind. Luna Natalia had been so cold and heartless towards me, her words had been laced with such hatred and disgust for me. She had always been kind to me before so I couldn't wrap my head around why she had been so mean, though in the back of my mind I knew the answer. I simply was not good enough for her son. He was an Alpha and I was simply the careless mistake of one of their best money making Omega whores. A mistake that had killed her, and lost them thousands of dollars.

I sat in the laundry room calming myself before I went back to the bedroom I shared with Aunt Marianne. I didn't want her to worry about me, or to have any anxiety about sending me to the Academy. I knew what giving me this opportunity had cost her, and it had been her entire life savings. She had given Alpha Eduardo every cent she had saved over the years to prove that she could pay my tuition. I wouldn't make her fear that it had all been for nothing. And I most certainly wouldn't give them a reason to pull me out of school and put me in a brothel. I would stay far away from Eddie at school.

Aunt Marianne deserved that much from me. She had sacrificed everything to ensure I had this opportunity. Sure, I had put in the work to excel at everything I did, but without her saving every cent she could over the years I would never have gotten this opportunity. The short lived love story Eddie and I had shared had been fun while it lasted, but it needed to be over now. I had to accept the fact that just like every other female Omega in this pack, I would never have a mate. I would never have the love of someone who was made just for me. Hell, I would never even have someone who wasn't made specifically for me to love me. My life would be lonely, just as Sarah's had been, just as Aunt Marianne's has been. I would instead be expected to dedicate myself, to dedicate my life to this pack and taking on the responsibility of ensuring that everything within it ran smoothly. Midnight Moon Omega females paid the ultimate price for the pack. They lived lives of loneliness and solitude, their dedication was to the pack.

We are the lowest of the low, we don't deserve love, happiness or respect. Our lives belong to the pack. I supposed I should get used to saying we, because like it or not, I am a female Omega in this pack. It would be foolish to think that Eddie would dare to differ from the Alphas before him and change the standard for us. I always knew that I wasn't good enough for him, that one day he would meet his mate and she would become the Luna I would serve. But it didn't hurt to fantasize that he might choose me, or atleast it hadn't hurt until today when I was hit with a reality check. I am an Omega female of the Midnight Moon pack. The opportunity to go away to the Academy to get specialized training is a gift within itself, especially seeing as how I am just the trick baby of an Omega whore. I need to take the blessings that I've been given and not be greedy or ungrateful. Eddie belongs to another, and though it might hurt, I have to accept that. I always knew this day would come, better it be sooner rather than later. Better it be now before I fall too deep in love than later.

I allowed myself to feel the pain of my broken heart and cried sitting there on that dryer for a little while longer before I finally calmed down and made my way back to the bedroom. By the time I made it back Aunt Marianne was already asleep in her bed, after she had packed all my things up and sat them against the wall. I didn't have much, only two duffel bags compared to the three piece luggage sets and two carry on bags that the ranked kids would take with them. Seeing my bags was only a reminder of my status compared to the boy that I had allowed myself to stupidly fall in love with. I was smarter than that. Yet, tomorrow was a new day, so I allowed myself to go to sleep knowing that the next morning I would wake up smarter, with a heart of stone and guarded walls so that I would never be so stupid again. I knew my place in this world, and never would I allow a handsome face to deceive me into thinking it was any different than it really was again.