Bullied By Her Alpha Mates

8

Ariel's POV.

The rest of the week was quite uneventful but I couldn't help but feel uneasy. This silence felt like the calm before a storm.

It's now Saturday and today, I went to my dad's place to help out with some menial duties to lighten his load a bit. I went along with Juandre, Brie, and Stacy, who helps out once in a while.

Saturdays like these are pretty chill in the cafe. No rush, just a steady flow of Omega customers, coming for their daily dose of caffeine.

Oh, right! Elias Dane's cafe was just a low-end change for Omegas and low-ranking Lycans to enjoy a few luxuries - coffee, and being served. The decor, service, ingredients, and locale were all just slightly standard - which is still way too lowly for Alohas, Betas, and pure-blood Lycans to patronize.

It was situated on the rural outskirts of the Castor pack's territory, the only reason we could survive this long in these rough parts is that Dad has a great reputation among the stronger Omegas around, and Mom's work at the Castor Manor also allowed her to be acquainted with a few low ranking Alphas and Betas. These connections were enough to act as a deterrent for troublemakers and to grant our family some immunity in the community.

There was also once, a long time ago, when the previous Alpha of the Castors (Locke Arrowsmith), before the Quad's father, happened to be on the run from savage, brainless, and feral dire wolves. My dad happened to save him and granted him temporary shelter. Locke also complimented my dad's coffee - said it was simple and yet exquisite.

All these together stabilized our little family a bit around here - up to an extent.

"Refill on table five!" Stacy called out to me.

"Right away!" I answered and quickly made my way towards the target table.

"Here's your refill - in the house," I said with a strained smile, as I served the customer. Stacy had already dashed off to take the orders of a few newcomers. Brie was lazing around, acting cute, and lounging around on the counter.

"Wait!" I heard the girl I just served call out to me. I quickly turned back to hear her.

"Miss, do you need anything else?" I asked politely.

"No, not that," she started.

The customer was quite young - probably around my age. She looked down and ordinary except for a few distinct and unsightly scars on her face and arms. Those seemed to be recent because with a werewolf's innate ability, even for Omegas, regenerating wounds like these shouldn't take too long.

"You are Ariel Dane, right?" She continued. I could see that she was nervous as she kept tracing the edge of her cup with her finger. "You just started attending Apex Wolves Academy?"

"Oh," my smile froze. "Yeah, that's me. Do I know you? Do you need something from me?"

"No, no! I mean no harm," she quickly said, sensing my scary aura. "Could you please sit with me for a while? I have something important to tell you."

Since she asked politely, I see no harm in granting her this request. Besides, I'm also a bit interested in what this total stranger whom I've never met has to say to me.

The cafe wasn't too busy now, either. Juan and Stacy can handle things for a while.

I sat down opposite her before I even realized that I've seemed to have seen glimpses of her face in school from time to time. She's probably just another lucky or unlucky AWA Omega student too.

"Okay. So, what's up?"

She bit her bottom lip a bit and had an apprehensive and hesitant look in her eyes. She finally sighed, downed her whole cup of warm coffee, and looked me in the eye.

"Candy Steele. You should know her by now. She…she has her eye on you now. I was unlucky enough to have the same hairstyle as she did once during the first year and since then, she's made me a walking, talking work machine - a shadow of my former self. I pick up her lunch, clean her cool furniture, fetch her books, carry her bags and items, and even act as a chair when in gym class. She vents her anger and frustrations on me physically…"

She stopped for a moment because tears were already threatening to fall from her eyes. She used a moment to compose herself.

"That's sad and cruel," I managed to blurt out.

Truly. It is. I can't even imagine going through all those. I was raised with some semblance of pride. So, I'd rather die than live such a life.

"It is…but forget about me," she continued, rubbing her dead-looking eyes with a napkin. She looked around for good measure to make sure we weren't being too loud or listened to.

"From about Tuesday after that little snafu in the halls, up until yesterday, she's started her plan of trying to break you enough for her to use. She's been spreading scandalous rumors about you. Stuff like your mom stealing from the Castor Manor, your dad being a drug and human trafficker, and even you, being a slut and cheap Omega whore."

"What!" I quickly stood up and slammed the table in anger. The current customers, my dad, Brie, and Stacy all turned to glance in our direction.

"Sorry…I was too, um…excited. Hehe." I played it off with a fake chuckle and sat down again.

That b***h! What did I ever do to her to warrant that much hatred? Apart from mistakenly bumping into her once, I've never had any interaction with her before. Wasn't it a bit excessive?

"They're all not true. I know. But the Alphas and Betas in school don't. For all they care, Candy might be telling the truth. They don't care about us. We're only pastime entertainment to them. Candy plans to first ruin you socially, then get down and dirty and eventually break you physically and mentally until you're her plaything. Heck, once she's tired, she might even dispose of you."

What!? Dispose of me? What is that supposed to mean?

Looks like this academy might have been worse than I thought!