From Beta to Luna

Chapter 9 — The Confirmation

Raina

    I felt like I was suffocating, like I was drowning under that Alpha’s gaze that was fixated on me the entire duration of the meeting. 

    What was his deal! Why the hell was he staring at me, and only at me?

    But deep down, I knew why. 

    I knew from the moment I stepped foot into the conference hall and was flooded by the sudden scent of sandalwood and fresh rain. 

    I knew the moment Amelia began howling in my head, almost making me go cross eyed from the intensity of her howl. 

    I knew the moment I was in his presence and felt the overwhelming desire to cross the room and claim him as my own, not caring who was watching. 

    I knew he was my mate. 

    I was fighting to control myself the entire meeting, forcing myself to avert my gaze because I couldn’t handle making direct eye contact with him—couldn’t handle getting the confirmation that he was, in fact, my mate. 

    The moment Alpha John ended the meeting, I immediately whispered to Xander that I had to get out of there. 

    “Is everything okay, Raina?” Xander asked me, worry evident in his eyes. 

    “That Alpha over there,” I responded, “I don’t wanna be near him.”

    Xander nodded in understanding, and I hurriedly took off from the conference hall when I realized he was beginning to make his way towards me. I was vaguely aware that someone came running after me, but not daring to look back in case it was the mysterious Alpha from the meeting, I began sprinting as quickly as I could back towards the packhouse. 

    I could hear the person behind me gaining on me, which caused me to run even faster. Before I could reach the door of the packhouse, strong arms suddenly circled around me, stopping me in my tracks, and I screamed in pure fear, trying to pull away from the person. 

    “Raina! Raina, calm down, it’s me!”

    I paused for a moment and was turned around in his arms to find myself staring up at Owen. Relief flooded every fiber of my being as I willed my heart to calm down. The sudden wave of emotions hit me all at once, and I broke down in sobs. 

    What was going on with me? Why was this happening to me? Goddess, can I just go back to the way things were before this stupid meeting? I wish Owen and I had never left his bed this morning! 

    Owen tried calming me, cradling my face in his hands for a moment before pulling me against his body in a reassuring hug. I leaned into his embrace, finding comfort in his strong body anchoring me and my suddenly fragile emotions. 

    “C’mon, let’s go inside,” he said quietly, and I nodded, allowing him to grab my hand and lead me inside and up the stairs. 

    He led me towards my room, but before we could get to it, we ran into Nathan in the hallway, who looked like he was heading downstairs before spotting us. He took one look at me with my red and puffy eyes, and in a flash, had Owen pinned to the wall by the throat. 

    “What did you do to her!” he snarled viciously, his normally kind blue eyes darkened in anger. “I swear, I’ll f*****g kill you!”

    “Nathan, calm down, he didn’t do anything!” I cried, prying him away from Owen. 

    Nathan pulled me behind him protectively, putting himself between Owen and me while glaring daggers at Owen. “I warned you, Clearwaters, if you did anything to hurt her, I’ll f*****g kill you. I don’t care that we’re on your pack lands, I don’t care that I’ll probably be sentenced to death afterwards, I’ll kill you.”

    “Nathan, calm down, I didn’t do anything to her,” Owen responded with his hands raised to show that he wasn’t a threat, but I could tell by the edge in his voice that he was slowly getting angry at being threatened by a Gamma. 

    I pushed Nathan aside and put myself in between the two of them, annoyed at all the testosterone filling the air. 

    “Nathan, calm down,” I ordered, and he had no choice but to listen to me. 

    I hated using my Beta voice on him, but the last thing I needed was the two of them tearing into each other over a misunderstanding. 

    When I was sure that they weren’t going to attack each other, I calmly said, “Let’s go in my room, I’ll explain everything.”

    They nodded and followed me into the room, and I closed and locked the door as soon as they were inside. I crossed the room and took a seat in the loveseat in the corner, bringing my knees up to my chest and trying to breathe through the panic attack that was threatening to rip through me. Owen sat down beside me, placing a comforting hand on my knee before pulling me into his side and wrapping an arm around me. 

    I leaned into him, thankful that he was being so calm and understanding while I felt like I was spiraling and on the verge of losing my s**t. Nathan took a seat on my bed, his eyes noticeably softening a bit when he noticed the way Owen was carefully attending to me as he pushed the hair out of my face and whispered quiet things to try and calm me down. 

    “Alright, what’s going on?” Nathan asked after a moment of silence, clearly getting impatient. 

    I sighed before straightening a bit from Owen’s side. 

    Owen kept his arm around my waist as I turned to face him and asked, “That Alpha that was sitting directly across from me. With the black hair and green eyes. Who is he?”

    Owen thought for a moment, probably trying to pinpoint who exactly I was talking about, before a knowing light popped into his eyes. “That’s Damien Michaelis, Alpha of the Emerald Moon Pack. Their pack just joined the Allyship not too long ago, probably less than a year ago. Why? Did he say, or do something to you?”

    My throat was suddenly dry, and my hands felt clammy. Should I tell them? Should I tell them what I suspected?

    Taking a deep breath, I decided to just come out with it, “I— I think he’s my mate.”

    Silence washed over us as Owen immediately pulled away from me, looking at me with a pained and conflicted expression.  

    “What do you mean ‘you think’?” Nathan asked, his eyes furrowed in thought. 

    “I mean— I don’t know for sure. I refused to look him in the eyes, I was too scared to confirm it,” I responded, standing up from the couch and running both my hands through my hair. 

    I began pacing the room anxiously before letting out an exasperated groan. 

    “Why is this happening to me? Why now? I never wanted this, I never wanted a mate!” I cried frustratedly. “Why couldn’t I have just never met him and continue f*****g Owen in peace!”

    I paused, my eyes widening at what had slipped out of my mouth before I could control myself as my face immediately flushed with embarrassment. Nathan began yelling obscenities about me being gross while Owen flashed me a teasing smirk. 

    He chuckled before leaning back comfortably in the loveseat, his arm coming up to rest on the back of the couch. “I would love for nothing more than that as well, love, but I don’t think that’d be such a good idea anymore. At least, not until you confirm whether or not he’s your mate and decide what you wanna do about it. Things could get… messy.”

    I groaned again, nodding in agreement. “I know. Ugh, we never should’ve left your room this morning. We could’ve avoided all this if we never went to that stupid meeting!”

    Owen chuckled again before patting the seat next to him, motioning for me to take a seat. Although I was still feeling antsy, I sighed and sat down, hoping that being stationary would calm my racing nerves even though I knew it probably wouldn’t. 

    Owen immediately brought the arm that was on the back of the couch down around my waist again, and although I drew some comfort from his relaxed demeanor, it did little to quiet the jumbled mess of thoughts flying through my mind at a million miles per hour.  

    “And then on top of that, Xander f*****g agreed for me to host that training clinic without even letting me know about it ahead of time! What the f**k am I supposed to do to teach other Alphas and Betas, my Goddess!” 

    I realized by now I was starting to sound a bit hysterical, but I couldn’t help it. There were so many things happening all at once that my head couldn’t keep up with it all. 

    “You’ll be fine, Raina,” Owen reassured. “Just treat it like you would any other normal training session, and you shouldn’t have anything to worry about.”

    I scoffed. “That’s easy for you to say. You’re the future Alpha of Crystal Moon for Goddess’s sake, you’ll probably never have to experience the anxiety of not being taken seriously as a pack’s leader.”

    “I mean that’s true,” Owen responded with a slight chuckle, “but I’d say you did pretty well today. Everyone seemed to like you well enough during the meeting.” 

    “Yeah, I guess they did seem to like me, huh?” I mused thoughtfully. “I was so nervous about meeting the other packs, do you think it actually went okay?”

    Owen smiled tenderly at me, gingerly pushing my hair out of my face. 

    “It went better than okay,” he replied, “they absolutely loved you, just like I knew they would.”

    I smiled at him, almost feeling like I might cry again from how absolutely sweet he was being to me. 

    “Okay, I’m glad the meeting went great and everyone loved you, but more importantly,” Nathan piped up from his position on the bed, breaking up mine and Owen’s moment, “what are you gonna do about your mate? Are you gonna reject him?”

    He had said that last part so quietly that if I weren’t a werewolf with extra sensitive hearing, I probably would’ve missed it entirely. 

    I mulled over his words for a moment, wondering what I should do. 

    If I rejected him, I could continue living my life in peace, never having to worry about being ripped away from Silver Moon or losing my Beta title. However, I knew that if I rejected him, both he and I would go through such immense pain, we probably both would’ve been better off dead. 

    Many wolves who got rejected by their mates often succumbed to the pain and wound up killing themselves. 

    I didn’t know anything about this Damien guy, but I didn’t want to do that to him. It’s not fair to him. It wasn’t his fault that the Moon Goddess decided to mate him with the one she-wolf in the entire universe who didn’t want a mate. 

    But where did that leave me? If I didn’t reject him, I would eventually succumb to the mate bond and find myself needing to be with him, but I knew I didn’t want that— I knew I didn’t want to leave Silver Moon. 

    “I have no idea,” I finally responded anticlimactically. “I don’t even know for sure if he’s my mate or not. Maybe I’m just crazy and was just imagining things, I don’t know anymore.”

    Even to myself, my voice sounded feeble, as if I were trying to desperately convince myself and them that it was the truth. 

    But I knew it wasn’t. 

    I somehow knew, even without having to look in his eyes, that Damien Michaelis was my mate. 

    After a moment of rubbing my tired eyes, I sighed and said, “I think I just need to be alone for awhile. Thank you guys for being here, but I think I need to think some things through on my own.”

    Nathan nodded before standing and coming towards me, his arms open. I stood and threw my arms around him, closing my eyes and relishing in the familiarity of his embrace. 

    “Mindlink me if you need anything, anything at all, okay?” he whispered in my ear. 

    I nodded before breaking away from the hug and watched as he turned to leave the room. Owen stood as well and came to hug me from behind. I smiled before turning in his arms, my hands going up to clasp together behind his neck. 

    “I wish we could’ve had more time together,” he said softly with a sad look in his eyes. “You’re one in a million, and if you decide to pursue things with him… Well, Damien better consider himself to be one lucky son of a bitch.”

    I laughed at this and closed my eyes, leaning my head against his chest and finding comfort in the steady beating of his heart. Although I knew that whatever there was between Owen and me wouldn’t last forever, I still thought we’d at least have a little more time together before we’d have to call it quits. Of course, life never works out quite the way we imagined it would, and here we were, less than 24 hours after one of the most whirlwind romances of my life, getting ready to say goodbye to each other. 

    Life really can be a b***h sometimes. 

    He held me tightly for a moment before pulling back to look me in the eyes. 

    Leaning forward and placing a soft kiss on my forehead, he gave me one last lingering look before sadly saying, “Goodbye, Beta Raina. I really enjoyed our date last night.”

    And with that, he broke away from the embrace and also left the room, leaving me standing there alone with my thoughts. Blowing out a breath, I pulled my tennis shoes off and immediately maneuvered out of my tight sports bra, suddenly feeling suffocated by the tight spandex. I stood for a moment facing the window, my hand on my forehead and my eyes closed as I tried to calm the scrambled mess of thoughts bouncing around in my head. 

    I wasn’t sure how long I stood like that, trying to quiet the thoughts in my head, but after a few minutes, I heard the door open quietly. I turned, thinking that maybe it was either Owen or Nathan coming back in to make sure I was actually okay and immediately froze. 

    My senses were suddenly flooded by the overpowering smell of sandalwood and fresh rain, and I found myself staring into the very same brilliant emerald eyes that I had spent all afternoon carefully trying to avoid. 

    My heart was hammering in my chest, my breathing became quickened and rapid, and I felt my hands get clammy. The whole world suddenly felt like it had stopped turning, and the only things that mattered were me and the beautiful man standing in front of me. 

    And by Goddess was he beautiful. 

    My eyes raked his body, taking in his towering frame and well defined muscles beneath his black Henley shirt. His sleeves were rolled up to the elbows, and his forearms had those veins on them that have always made me swoon. His thick, jet black hair was tousled in messy, yet perfect waves, his lips were thick and full, his cheekbones sculpted and high, his nose perfectly straight, and his complexion a beautiful bronze color, indicating he most likely spent a lot of time out in the sun. 

    My eyes made their way back to land on his eyes, and I could feel myself getting lost in the endless sea of emerald green, which were slowly darkening a few shades the longer he stood there and stared at me. I almost felt like my heart would burst straight from my chest, and I suddenly knew, without a doubt, who he was. 

    Without ever breaking eye contact, we both said at the exact same time, in the same slightly breathless voice, “Mate.”