Alpha’s Hybrid Cinderella – Chapter 13

I was drowsy all day Saturday. We had gotten back reasonably early all things considered, but I was so accustomed to waking up before the c***k of dawn in Dark Moon that I couldn’t rid myself of the habit here. I suspected it would stay with me all my life. Some things just couldn’t be fixed, the same way some scars remained engraved in flesh for life. I had my share of both.

What must Elly and Maria be thinking now, I wondered as I looked out my window. I didn’t miss them at all, but there was no doubt in my mind they missed my presence. For all the insults they had hurled at me all my life, they had been so dependent on my service that they couldn’t get by on their own for even a single day.

And yet I couldn’t even be glad for it. I wished we’d never encountered each other, but if I couldn’t have that, I wished I could magically forget everything I had ever unwillingly learned in Dark Moon. The punctuality and industriousness that marked my character had been beaten and punished into me mercilessly. Daring to wake up after dawn meant sobbing for hours as they grabbed a reed bundle to whip my calves and feet with, and jeering that if I weren’t so lazy, I wouldn’t have been beaten at all. My fault. My fault. My fault, they had said.

s lying in wait to strike. What they saw as weakness was simply biding one’s time.

ff.

ke to sleep next to him in the same bed.

now any better, I would have thought I missed that warmth.

.

him. Maybe I’d done something to make him start disliking me. That might be why he hadn’t asked me to sleep next to him a second time…

ast night. Now all I could think about were stupid things like that, instead of spending my time doing useful things like readin

uctive.

self. Everyone was attracted to Evan.

dn’t want to casually date anyone. And I didn’t like one night stands. I wanted a serious relationship, one that could last.

mates. If I fell in love with one and they found their destined other half five years later, they would have no choice but to go running off to them instead. No matter what Ken said about options, that was just the nature

onvictions. Just like Evan, who was devoted to the power he craved s

elcome at her little cabin with Leo on the outskirts of the city. I could go there, and figure out how to strike out independently in the weeks following.

cowardice speaking, and sour gra

more I listened to Evan’s heart, to his thoughts, to his soul, the more m

of course it wasn’t.

***

finally returned, but even then it was only a sliver. The manor was quiet as I crept to the first floor kitchens, and I shrugged off the desolate loneliness of the darkness as I moved. Such isolation. I was tempted to abort my mission and go back to bed just to avoid it.

me in the kitchen made me stop in my tracks.

m head to toe.

uette reached for something on the counter. A water pitcher. Gulp, gulp. I could hear the sounds from all the way in the doorway.

n intruder? A silent break-in? I should sound the

But no.

It w

ked and sweat

es!

uscle glowing in the moonlight. So broad, so muscular. Narrow waist, powerful hips, strong thighs.

ll in with a single accidental glance, and to make it all even worse, there was no way I could ever hope to er

t falling over in my haste. My hand hit the doorway with a slap, and that ruined any remaining chance

ay out in the hallway.

almost whispering. “I didn’t know…”

e else would be up.”

at all. If they all stayed in their clothes when they shifted, they would rip straight through them. Common sense to take them off before shifting. Unlike me, who had torn my clothes apart that first day I had shifted in response to Flicka’s dumb taunting.

told myself.

Why were you out running so late? Are you still unable to sleep?”

site. I have to stay up for something, and I ran t

y as if he weren’t standing naked just a few meters from me. This was awf

now…”

. I was going to melt into the floor.

alk around, really.”

and. Same reason I went for a run,

ight.”

As I left, a faint voice ghosted into my mind, just barely within range.

.

ice. I’d heard it before. Evan’s wolf?

away.