Her secret mate

Red bag

The party started slowly with guests arriving in small groups. As the supposed host, I greeted each guest and played the role of the future Luna like my life depended on it. To no surprise, very few people cared about me or what I said, they were all here for Darcy.

At my own birthday celebration, I was not the most important person, but I guess it's nothing new. When I was younger, the same thing happened with my parents and I guess it's quite similar now.

How come I never noticed that before?

My thoughts were pulled back to the current moment as I felt a light tap on my shoulder. Slowly, I turned around with my usual fake smile ready to greet yet another Luna or a future Luna with the most fake kindness, but that fake smile was instantly replaced with the real on, as behind me stood not yet another stranger who was there to play politics, but someone I knew, someone who smiled at me with the most genuine smile.

"Alisha, I was sure that you had already left for home!"

Without missing a beat, the younger girl pulled me in for a tight hug. Shocked by a sudden physical show of affection, I froze as she pulled me in even tighter.

"How could I miss your birthday?"

Slowly she pulled back and gave me yet another bright smile.

"But Colin said that you were getting ready to leave..."

She shined a more mischievous smile at me.

"Well, my brother wanted to leave before the party started as his assignment was to keep watch over you up until the moment your boyfriend returns, but I wanted to wish you a happy birthday in person."

"So you manipulated your poor brother into staying longer?"

I finished for her as heat poured into her cheeks.

"Something like that... but I knew that he wanted to be here also..."

She motioned for me to get closer to her in a way that made it clear that she had a secret to tell me.

I could not help myself. I indulged the young girl and leaned into her.

"You did not hear it from me, but... I think my brother like likes you."

Her face was so red as she said that, and I could not help myself but laugh. Almost for a fact, I knew that she was wrong, because Colin could barely stand me, to the point where he preferred not to stay in the same room as I, so him liking me was quite the opposite to reality, but I didn't have it in me to break the young girl's dream.

"Well, I highly doubt that Colin feels like that towards me."

I tried to be genteel with her and, to my luck, I was saved from talking about this topic because Colin appeared right behind Alisha. I guess he felt his name being called and appeared right behind her.

"Here you are, please stpp disappearing at parties like this. I almost went crazy looking for you. You know how dangerous parties like these are, with all these alphas around..."

It was clear that this was not the first time that they had this conversation. Especially because Alisha stopped him before he could say anything else.

"I know, I know... and they would love nothing more than to hurt a helpless little girl like me. But you forget that all of them know that you are my brother and almost everyone in this room is scared of you. Also, we are guest of the Phoenix pack alpha and no one is stupid enough to disrespect him like this in his own home, so chill. I just wanted to talk to Valerie before she got pulled into another boring conversation with one of those stuffy snobs..."

I could not help myself, but bust out laughing at the blunt answer she gave her brother.

"ALISHA!"

The tone of Colin's voice made both of us freeze and for the laughter in my throat to die.

"How many times do I have to remind you of your manners? You can't talk like that in public."

He was scolding Alisha, but for some reason I also felt like I was being scolded alongside her. The tone of his voice made me feel so small and so in trouble that all I wanted to do was ask for forgiveness.... this is the first time I had this reaction to someone scolding me. Almost always it was the opposite. I wanted to fight and do the opposite to what I was being told.

But I guess Alisha was either immune to the tone of his voice or at least acted like that, because she just rolled her eyes at him and turned back to me.

"What ever..."

She said as she grabbed the package from Colin's.

"Oh yeah, I almost forgot, we got you a present."

It was a beautiful burgundy colored gift bag that she extended to me. Suddenly, feeling really shy, I took it from her hands and peaked inside. The moment I saw the color of the fabric inside, I recognized it instantly.

"We picked it together, Colin wanted to pick something a bit more settle, but I knew that it would suit you really well..."

"Yeah... it is not really future Luna, but maybe you can wear it somewhere in private...'"

My eyes lingered on his face for a moment and his cheeks were as bright red as mine were. He did his best to avoid meeting my eyes, but finally he lifted them and I saw the same shyness in them alongside a lot of different emotions in them, but they all changed instantly. He saw something behind me. In a second, his whole body language changed and, as familiar hands wrapped around my waist, I knew the reason why.

"Here you are darling..."

Darcy murmured right next to my ear as he laid a soft kiss on my cheek.