The car was silent for a good two minutes before Rae began asking Helena questions again.
"So, what's his name?" she nagged her step-sister again.
In all honesty, two minutes was quite a stretch for Rae. She was always an impatient one.
"I don't know," Helena shrugged.
"What?" Rae asked as they hit a stoplight. She turned and looked at Helena, wide-eyed and shocked.
"We agreed no names," Helena added.
'A stupid agreement if you ask me,' Hera grumbled in her head, giving her unsolicited opinion. 'What if we want him again?'
"Well it seems like you regret leaving his bed this morning," Rae chuckled as their car passed the very hotel Helena had just stumbled out of.
She watched as the staff scrambled out into the streets, they looked like they were searching for something, but the car was moving too fast for Helena to figure out why they looked so distressed.
"I think he's an Alpha visiting for Romeo's Alpha Rite and the Blood Moon Ball," Helena declared as she turned her attention back to the busy street.
"Relax," Rae said as she reached out and squeezed her best friend's hand. "Dad didn't want people crowding the packhouse especially since you're visiting. He has the Alphas staying in a hotel in the city. No risk of running into your amazing one-night stand at home."
They'd stopped at the red light, and Helena was trying to hide as much as possible while they stopped in front of the hotel. She'd slouched and turned away doing her best to be invisible.
"You know that this car is heavily tinted, right?" Rae chuckled as she looked at her best friend who was acting out of character.
Helena groaned as she sat up.
While she drummed her fingers on the door, impatiently waiting for the light to turn green she felt a prickly sensation and turned to where it was coming from.
To her surprise and horror, the very man she'd spent the night with was standing at the top of the stairs by the entrance of the hotel. He wore a collared shirt with sleeves rolled up to his elbows.
"Fuck," she whispered glancing at the stop light, it was still red.
One hand was balled into a fist and the other raked through his raven black hair.
"What do you mean fuck?" Rae asked as she looked in the direction that Helena was transfixed.
"Oh fu—"
"Drive," Helena said as soon as the light turned green.
Rae stepped on the gas and drove.
"Helena—" Rae began to say when Helena's phone began to buzz.
Alphonse: Did you survive night one?
Helena: Fortunately.
Alphonse: Anything interesting?
Helena bit her lower lip as she contemplated telling her friend about last night.
Helena: I met someone.
Alphonse: I thought you didn't do someone.
Helena: I don't, it was one night.
Alphonse: It sounds like more than just one night.
Helena: The sex was amazing but I don't do relationships or Alphaholes. So no, it was just one night.
"Helena," Rae said, calling her attention again.
"Wait, Rae," Helena said as she focused on messaging her friend.
Helena could suddenly breathe easier. She was home.
Alphonse: So no mate yet?
"Helena," Rae called again, her tone frustrated.
Helena took a deep breath and closed her eyes.
She knew Rae wanted and explanation for how she had reacted. Rae had seen the man too, there was no way she hadn't noticed how attractive he was.
"Look, the guy earlier at the hotel was my— no—" Helena said, shaking her head, scolding herself for calling the man her Alpha. He was just an Alpha. "He was the Alpha I met last night."
"Oh," Rae gasped.
"Wait," Helena said as she felt her phone buzz again.
Alphonse: You'll be there for the Blood Moon right?
Alphonse: It's kind of dull without you around.
Sometimes Helena worried when Alphonse asked her questions like these. She didn't want him to get the wrong idea that they could ever be more than friends.
Helena: I don't want a mate.
She pocketed her phone and returned her attention to Rae.
"I'm sorry, that Alpha was different, he felt different," Helena finally confessed to her best friend.
"And you feel guilty," Rae said accusingly.
Helena slowly nodded, as much as she wanted to deny it she did feel guilty for feeling that way towards a man who wasn't Romeo.
"Because of Romeo?" Rae continued to ask.
"I think we've long established that," Helena grumbled.
"Maybe he's your mate," Rae teased.
Helena stared at Rae, her mouth agape at the mere suggestion that she could be mates with the Alpha from last night.
We won't know till the Blood Moon, right?' Helena asked her wolf as she thought of the one night every few months that a wolf could feel the full draw of the mate bond.
"I mean, you can't stop thinking about him, right?" Rae added.
'Right?' Helena asked her wolf again, this time pressing even more into their bond.
Her wolf was eerily silent and it bothered her. Hera was never silent.
"Helena, relax," Rae said as she gave Helena a concerned look as they entered the familiar route to their pack's territory. "Sometimes a mate isn't a bad thing."
Helena nodded, pretending to consider Rae's words.
She didn't want a mate. She'd seen what havoc the mate bond could bring.
After parking her car Rae leaned back and let out a sigh of relief.
"We made it home and he didn't see us, I think," Rae chuckled, shaking her head.
"Who didn't see us?" Helena asked as she gave Rae a confused look.
"Romeo, didn't you see him?" Rae tilted her head to the side as she opened her door and slipped out of the car. "He was standing outside that hotel looking all bossy and shit."
Helena felt the blood drain from her face.
There was only one man standing outside the hotel, it was the same man she had spent the night with, her Alpha.
Romeo was the Alpha she'd slept with, the man that had occupied her mind since she woke this morning and whose touch she continued to crave.
"Earth to Helena!" Rae said as she tried to grab Helena's attention.
What was she supposed to tell Rae? That the Alpha Rae now thought was her Mate was Romeo, Rae's brother, her stepbrother.
How could she not have recognized him? How many years had it been since they last saw each other? Six? Seven?
'Who are you kidding? You've been counting the years,' Hera said in her head.
'Nine years, three months, eight days,' she thought to her wolf.
Her family constantly sent photos of home to her and she'd never sent any back, it wasn't exactly a surprise that he hadn't recognized her. She was different now, she'd grown.
But Romeo, whenever she anticipated a photo had him in it she wouldn't even look.
It hurt too much.
She only had herself to blame as to why she didn't know that the man that she'd spent the night with was Romeo, her stepbrother, her first love before she even knew what love was.
"Wh—" Helena's door was yanked open before she could even get a word out and she was soon surrounded by a familiar comforting scent.