LUNA ALEXANDRIA: The Alpha's Buried Daughter

Chapter 5: Call Me Alpha

I was starting to like mornings in the Dread Pack.

In Nightshade, mornings meant chores and being invisible. Here, mornings meant Lucy Whitewood banging on my cabin door at 6 AM with two mugs of black coffee and saying, "Up, new girl. If you can survive my training, you can survive anything."

My body ached in places I didn't know existed. My wolf, who I had finally named — Nyx — was loving every second of it. For the first time, she had space to run.

It had been five days since Cole Evans, the Alpha of the most feared pack in the north, brought me across the Dead River.

Five days since Kelly Kingsley decided I was her personal enemy.

It started small. My laundry that went missing and was found in the lake. My training daggers that were suddenly dull. Whispers when I walked into the dining hall: "Check out the scarface, thinks she can be Luna."

I never told Cole. I didn't want to be that girl — the stray who cries to the Alpha.

But Lucy saw everything. And Lucy told Cole.

On the fifth morning, Cole called a pack meeting.

Every single member of the Dread Pack — almost two hundred wolves — gathered in a circle in front of the lodge. I stood near the back with Lucy, trying to make myself small, still wearing his jacket because I hadn't figured out how to give it back without it being weird.

Kelly stood in the front, smirking at me, thinking this was about border patrol schedules.

Cole stepped into the middle of the circle. He wasn't wearing his leather jacket. He was wearing a black shirt with the sleeves pushed up, showing the tattoos that ran down his arms — marks of every battle this pack had won. His presence alone made everyone stand straighter.

He didn't raise his voice. He never needed to.

"Something has been bothering me," he began, his green eyes scanning the crowd slowly. "When I built this pack, I built it on one rule. Does anyone remember what that rule was?"

"Respect is earned, not given by birth," Lucy called out, and a few others echoed it.

"Exactly," Cole said. "In my father's old pack, titles meant you could treat people like dirt. Alphas were gods. Lunas were trophies. Omegas were nothing. I watched my father beat my mother because she was 'just an omega.' So when I killed him and took this pack, I said never again."

The circle went completely silent. He never talked about his father.

"So imagine my disappointment," he continued, his voice getting lower, colder, "when I hear that some members of my pack think they can decide who is worthy of being called pack. That they can steal clothes, dull blades, whisper about scars. That they think because they've been here longer, they can disrespect someone I personally brought under my protection."

His eyes finally landed on Kelly Kingsley. And they stayed there.

Kelly's smirk vanished.

"Kelly."

She straightened up. "Yes... Cole?"

The entire pack felt the temperature drop.

Cole took one slow step toward her.

"What did you call me?" he asked, his voice dangerously soft.

Kelly blinked, confused. "I... I called you Cole? Like always?"

"I see," Cole said. He looked around at everyone. "Let me make my title very clear to those around me, because it seems some of you have gotten too comfortable."

He turned in a full circle, making eye contact with every wolf there.

"My name is Cole Evans. To my friends, when we are alone, I am Cole. But when we are in this circle, when we are on pack business, when we are in front of a new member I have claimed under my protection — you will call me ALPHA."

The word hit like a hammer. His Alpha aura — that terrifying, suffocating power that made other Alphas kneel — rolled out. Every wolf, including Lucy, bowed their head instantly. Except me. He was shielding me from it.

"Especially you, Kelly Kingsley," he said, now standing directly in front of her. "You have been in this pack since you were fourteen. I saved you from a pack that was selling you. I gave you a home, training, a place. And how do you repay that? By disrespecting my Beta, Lucy Whitewood, when she gives you an order? By harassing a girl who has been here five days and has done nothing to you?"

Kelly's eyes filled with tears, but they were angry tears. "I was just—"

"You were just forgetting your place," Cole cut her off. "So let me remind you. Lucy Whitewood is your Beta. You will call her Beta Lucy. And I am your Alpha. You will call me Alpha. Not Cole. Not babe. Not whatever you call me when you sneak into my cabin at night thinking I don't notice. Do you understand?"

Gasps rippled through the crowd. Kelly's face went bright red. She had been telling everyone she and Cole were together.

"And as for Alex," Cole said, finally turning to look at me. His expression softened just a fraction, but his voice was still firm for everyone to hear. "Alex Dimitry is not a stray. She is not Nightshade's reject. She is a member of the Dread Pack. And until she decides otherwise, she is under MY protection. Anyone who has a problem with that can challenge me. Right now."

Silence.

No one moved. No one would dare challenge the Alpha everyone feared.

Cole nodded once. "Good. Then we're clear. Beta Lucy will continue Alex's training. And Kelly — you are on kitchen duty and border cleanup for the next two weeks. Without your wolf. Learn some humility."

Kelly Kingsley was shaking — with humiliation, with fury. She looked past Cole, straight at me, and her eyes said "This is all your fault."

Cole walked over to me then, completely ignoring her. He stopped in front of me, and in front of the entire pack, he did something that made Lucy Whitewood actually smile.

He tilted his head down slightly, so his forehead almost touched mine — a gesture of respect Alphas only give to their equals or their Luna.

"Welcome home, Alex," he said quietly.

And for the first time since I arrived, no one in the Dread Pack dared to whisper about my scar.