**CHAPTER TWO THE ALPHA’S WARNING**
1152 Words
For a heartbeat, no one moved.
The night hung frozen between them — Amara trembling in the cold, Tunde staring in confusion, and the stranger who called himself Alpha Kael Ardan standing like a wall of carved shadow in front of her.
Mate.
He had used the word again.
Her mind couldn’t hold it.
Couldn’t understand it.
Couldn’t breathe around it.
Tunde finally shook off his fear, puffing out his chest like a dog trying to appear bigger.
“Look, whoever you are,” he snapped, “stay out of this. This is between me and my girlfriend.”
“Ex,” Amara whispered, voice cracking.
The word sliced her tongue.
It hurt more than she expected.
Kael shifted his stance slightly, just enough to place himself more fully between them.
“Approach her again,” Kael said quietly, “and you will not leave this street standing.”
Tunde scoffed, though his voice wavered.
“You think you can threaten me? Are you mad? Do you know who I—”
He didn’t finish.
Kael stepped forward.
Just one step.
And the air changed.
It thickened.
Darkened.
Pressed inward like the sky itself bowed beneath his presence.
Tunde stumbled backward as though shoved by invisible hands.
“What the hell are you?” he gasped.
Kael’s eyes glowed brighter — gold, molten, inhuman.
“Someone who does not repeat himself.”
Amara felt the power rolling off him — an aura so intense it pressed against her ribs. It wasn’t normal. It wasn’t possible. No human — no man — carried such overwhelming, suffocating dominance.
He wasn’t lying.
He wasn’t human.
And yet… she wasn’t afraid.
She should’ve been.
But instead, her heart beat with a strange, wild rhythm — like her soul recognized him even if her mind did not.
Tunde pointed a shaking finger at her.
“Amara! What is this nonsense? You’re going home with me. Now.”
Kael’s head turned slowly, predator-like.
“Say her name again,” he warned softly, “and you will regret it.”
Tunde froze.
Kael stepped forward.
Tunde stepped back.
She had never seen Tunde afraid of anything — not rivals, not exams, not consequences. But tonight, he looked like a child standing before a storm.
“Amara,” he said again, voice cracking, “don’t let this psycho talk to me like—”
Kael didn’t move.
He didn’t touch him.
He didn’t raise his hand.
He only growled — a deep, resonant sound that wasn’t fully human.
Tunde’s knees buckled.
He dropped to the pavement like his legs simply… failed.
Amara gasped.
Kael’s voice dropped to a dark whisper.
“You will leave. Now. And you will not return to her.”
Tunde scrambled backward on his hands, terror twisting his features. He didn’t speak again. Didn’t look back. He simply ran — stumbling into the night, disappearing around the corner like a man fleeing death.
Silence returned.
Cold wind swept through the trees.
Amara stared at Kael, heart hammering.
“What did you do to him?”
Kael turned to her — and just like that, the lethal aura melted away. His expression softened, though the intensity never left his eyes.
“Nothing permanent,” he murmured. “But he needed to understand you are not to be touched.”
Her breath trembled.
“Why? You don’t even know me.”
Kael inhaled deeply, eyes briefly closing.
“I do know you, Amara Cole.” His voice dropped, rough with something unspoken. “My wolf has known you since the moment your scent touched the air.”
Her stomach tightened.
“My… scent?”
He took a step closer.
“Jasmine. Wild honey. Rain.” He opened his eyes again — fire burning behind gold. “Do you truly not feel it?”
She shook her head.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He looked at her as though she had just confessed she was blind.
“The pull between us,” he said quietly. “The bond. The reason you haven’t run from me even though you know something about me isn’t human.”
Her breath caught.
Because he was right.
She should have run.
But she hadn’t.
Couldn’t.
Her body was trembling, but her feet were rooted.
“I felt… something,” she whispered. “When you spoke my name.”
Kael stepped closer still — slow enough that she could stop him, fast enough that her heart stumbled.
The world seemed to shrink until there was nothing except the sound of her breathing and the soft hum of power thrumming from him.
His voice dropped to a murmur.
“That is the bond between destined mates.”
Her knees weakened.
“I’m not your—”
“Yes,” he said simply. “You are.”
She swallowed hard, her pulse rapid in her throat.
“This is insane.”
He tilted his head slightly, studying her with a gentleness that contrasted sharply with the ruthless aura he’d used moments ago.
“What you saw tonight,” he said softly, “broke you. I felt that pain as if it were my own.”
Her breath shook.
“I don’t know you,” she whispered.
“You don’t have to,” he murmured. “Your soul knows mine.”
She backed away a step — not from fear, but from overwhelm.
Kael didn’t try to stop her.
“Don’t follow me,” she whispered.
He nodded once, slow and controlled, though something dark flickered in his eyes.
“I won’t,” he said. “Not tonight.”
She turned, walking away from him, heart racing.
But before she got far, his voice reached her — low, firm, deadly serious.
“Amara.”
She froze.
Kael’s eyes glowed brighter, burning through the night.
“There are wolves in the city tonight.”
A pause.
“And not all of them are mine.”
Her blood ran cold.
“What do you mean?” she whispered.
He stepped back into the shadows.
“You’re not safe alone,” he said quietly. “And Tunde’s betrayal is the least of your problems now.”
Her heart pounded.
“Why?”
His gaze locked on hers — intense, unblinking.
“Because the moment I found you… others felt it too.”
A breath.
“Someone is coming for you.”
A chill swept down her spine.
Kael took one last step backwards, disappearing almost completely into the dark.
“Go home, Amara,” he said. “Lock your doors.”
A silence.
“And no matter what you hear tonight…
do not open them.”
The wind carried his scent — wild, ancient, dominantly wolf — before the night swallowed him whole.
Amara stood trembling beneath the streetlight, alone and breathless.
And for the first time in her life…
She was afraid of the dark.
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- Writer
