"Where is the mermaid?!"
The fake smile Dallan had plastered on disappeared as fast as a pin thrown into a pile of haystack. He quickly pushed himself back to a comfortable sitting position. What the fuck! Mermaid?!!
When did it become right for the pack members to ask him about whoever he brought into the pack? Why was the mermaid getting them excited?
Dallan allowed the questions to pour into his head even though he had no answers to them.
When at last the truck stopped close to Dallan's quarters where some of the more daring ones were gathered, all the warriors swung into action. They disembarked and guided the alpha through the crowd.
Already, Dallan had given orders for Hazel to be locked in a room in his mansion. It was to serve as a temporary site until he figured out what to do. Kai followed him into his chamber.
Dallan rushed into his room. "Gosh, these people are noisy!"
"They have been this way since I knew them. Are you just taking note of their noisy nature?" Kai stood at the door and folded his arms. Dallan collapsed on the bed, facing the ceiling.
"Kai, I am so confused. I am scared, and it's making me worried. It's been so long since I felt this way. The last time something like this happened was after the death of my parents."
"You are the one bothering yourself. Free your nerves and accept your mate. That is the best thing to do. The best thing would be to tell Hazel first, then announce it to the pack..."
"No!" Dallan shot up from the bed. "That can't happen! Do you know what the people will call me? Do you know what the other packs will call me?!"
Kai exhaled. "Do you know what made your father a great leader? He never allowed the voices of others to make him lose focus. He focused on his mate. Your mother, goddess bless her soul, led him on the right path. He was ruthless and bloody, and she was his calm. Don't you want to love like that? Must your responses to everything be to put on a macho attitude, square your shoulders and grit your teeth? Don't you think you deserve to rest, be happy like everyone else?"
Dallan stopped for a while. Yes, he had always received bits of advice from Kai, but it had never been so intense, direct. It made him stop to reconsider his decisions. The way Kai spun around and left the room made him feel hollow. Was he intentionally pushing people away from himself?
After almost thirty minutes of deep thinking, Dallan rolled off the bed and went into the sitting room. The men still lingered around with Kai who was telling them what to do. Dallan had always appreciated how Kai assisted him in running the pack. The goddess had given him Kai as a "temporary Luna" as Dallan always put it whenever he wants to tease the beta.
It was only natural that Kai felt irked when Dallan started rejecting the very thing they had all been waiting for. Argh! Dallan felt like ripping off his own hair.
"Where is she?" he asked the closest warrior. If Kai heard the question, he did a very good job pretending not to. Dallan knew he heard; hell, everyone in the sitting room heard the question, after all, wolves had a kind of ears that made it impossible to keep secrets.
"We put her in the fourth room to the right on the third corridor."
"Thanks."
"Errm... Y—Yes, my alpha." The male prostrated.
Dallan almost sighed. The appreciation wasn't necessary, but it had almost become a custom. Even after all these years, the men—more like the entire pack—were still not used to receiving offers of appreciation for little things that were their duties, especially when that appreciation came from the alpha.
Without another word, Dallan slowly ascended the stairs. Any moment from now, the elders of the pack would come—and his headache would increase. Dallan felt as if he had not lived in this mansion since childhood. Why did the place seem strange, unrecognizable? Or was it just him?
The building itself was gigantic, the biggest in the pack. When his parents were alive, his father made sure the relationship with the pack stayed on the alpha-people level. That way, no one came into the building unnecessarily. If you did, you must have been permitted, or it must have been a very important emergency. But... Dallan changed that. Though the entire pack did not have access to the house, he still allowed the important people in. Even when Dallan wanted to settle disputes or pass judgments, he preferred doing it in his sitting room with less probing eyes than going to the open space on the field where it would seem he was passing out a death sentence. The rooms in the mansion were numerous, too many to count.
Some buildings in the pack lacked the presence of a soul. While other packs complained about lack of space, Dallan made sure silhouette pack got enough and more...
The gigantic staircase led straight to a three-path way. The one on the right led straight to the corridor where his 'sanctuary' was located. That entire corridor was off-limits. Only Kai and Abe, one of the council of elders who was also a warlock, had the grace to see the holy of holies and go unpunished. The path to the left led to numerous rooms he could not start counting. His parent's space was also there. No one also went there since he saw it as a place to feel them whenever it was necessary. A lot of other rooms were also there. Dallan could not start listing the sub-corridors there. Right now, he had no business with all those places.
His business laid right ahead, literally on a straight line.
Dallan walked to the fourth room on the right. He paused outside the door for a moment. Where did the sudden nervousness to see her come from? This wasn't what he expected to feel.
The first waft of air he received when the door opened a crack had him swooning. He almost stumbled as he ungracefully set eyes on Hazel. What was that scent? Mate scent?
She was sprawled on the bed facing the window, only on a robe which left very little to the imagination. Her peaceful rest was interrupted. She slowly swung her head to the back, allowing her black hair to fall over her chest. Just like that, they started a silent stare competition.
Dallan lost all grip on his consciousness. The beautiful scent that pervaded the room coupled with her looks and held him spellbound. His eyes traced all over her smooth lap, resting at the creak in the middle of her thighs which the robe hardly covered.
It seemed a relaxing incense was distributed in one corner of the room, the corner Hazel laid. Dallan swallowed. He felt the surge of his wolf, the unconscious adrenaline pumping through him. Unintentionally, his feet started a slow journey towards her. He did not see the look of hunger in Hazel's eyes; he did not notice her thighs trembling. If he had seen that, maybe he might have understood that the confusing feelings were mutual.
Hazel slowly sat up like a creature put under a spell. Her green eyes were fixed on Dallan, every bit of him. She swallowed all the saliva forming in her mouth. How could a man look so delicious? His blue eyes dug into her so hot that she began to question if hot coals had not mistakenly been poured on her skin. He stood still like a monument, an unmoving statue. He still had rough clothes on, but the perfection of his features was all she could see. Subconsciously, her gaze went to his face.
Gods! Those eyes... and lips.
The dark curtain his loose hair made on both sides of his face partly blocked some parts of his icy blue eyes. But Hazel had seen enough to heat her. She baulked, scurrying back into the depth of the bed, quivering. It would have been practically impossible for her to discern the cause of the tremor since there wasn't a reasonable cause for such.
The more she tried to tell herself lies by bringing up some excuses for her shiver, the more she understood that the hunky male standing some feet away was the cause. She held her breath when Dallan took another step closer. His fists balled at the sides; his chin grew taut. As Hazel watched with a racing heart, his eyes started glowing yellow.
Dallan knew it was the change in colour of his eyes that made her knit her brows. Of course, his wolf was warming up to take part in the excitement—if he could call it that. Just when his shin touched the bedpost, sanity returned. He folded his arm at the back and started clearing his throat.
Hazel joined him moments later. Hers looked more real since she had been holding her breath for so long and needed relief.
"I came here to see you." The ice returned to Dallan's voice. "I am sure you must be enjoying yourself."
"Oh, yeah!" Hazel replied sarcastically. "It's very comforting to be taken—no, kidnapped, then taken to..." She put on a look of disgust and eyed the room. "... taken to this... goddess-forsaken place."
Like it or not, that stung. Dallan felt his humongous ego flatten. He knew very few packs that had up to the infrastructural standard silhouette pack boasted of. That, and the organization of the pack members, made it a regular place to visit.
"You should be grateful," Dallan snorted. "Of all the places you could be, I decided to bring you into my mansion, into one of my rooms. I could have sent you to the kitchen to work with the ladies there. Trust me, it will not be very convenient for you that way." The cackle Dallan heard from her made his skin tingle.
"Do I look like someone who gives a fuck? Huh, Dallan?"
"It's my Alpha or Alpha Dallan to you."
"I will decide that." Hazel pursed her lips. "Maybe the kitchen will be more lively and less... unsatisfactory. Don't you think?"
Dallan scoffed. What audacity! He eyed her. Her eyes were set firm; her chin was raised in defiance. Her looks thrilled Dallan to the extent he found himself staring, wondering if he had underestimated her. She excited and confused him at the same time. "You are feisty, aren't you?"
"I try." Hazel shrugged. The stubborn glint that Dallan so much despised and craved at the same time flashed across her green orbs. She smirked, rested her palms under her stubborn chin and gazed directly into his cold eyes. "I also wonder if you will be very feisty yourself. Are you?"
Her confidence irked Dallan. Never in his entire century had he found someone who could look him straight in the eyes and remain defiant. From what he had learned about his eyes, they could melt an individual into goo. And they had always worked in giving out an imposing demeanour.
Well, not with Hazel.
Dallan anger slowly rose to a level of rage. He was so angry that he didn't even know what expression to give out. In the end, he settled for a smile. "Do you know what keeps me worrying?" He inched closer to the bed with that smile stretching across both sides of his face like an elastic band. "Do you know what makes me turn a blind eye to your insolence?"
"How would I know except you tell me, Dallan?"
The way she kept calling his name with a little upward lip curve was doing unimaginable things to his groin as his mind wandered off in different directions. "It's because you are my mate..."
"What!"