Chapter 1
Leah POV
It was the last week before we were supposed to graduate from High School. I was standing in my room while trying to choose between two different dresses. Jake was going to pick me up in ten minutes, as he does every day. He had turned eighteen a couple of weeks ago, but I was still seventeen. I was hoping it would become clear that we were mates as soon as I turned eighteen. I took out a green dress with a floral pattern from my closet. I held it up to my body and inspected myself in the full-body mirror. I had dreamed of the moment we would realize we were meant for each other for years.
I was shorter than most people in our pack and I had a slim body. I had put my long brown hair up in a sloppy braid. Jake and I hadn’t talked about any feelings for each other, and I really hoped he was as in love with me as I was with him. We’ve been best friends since I can remember.
I put on my dress and ran down the stairs. My mother was making sandwiches in the kitchen. She was my only family; I was an only child and my father had died when I was eight.
“Hi, honey” she greeted happily, and I walked over to kiss her on the cheek.
“Good morning, mom!” I said, grabbing a sandwich she had just finished.
“Hey!” she laughed, giving me a jokingly angry look.
“I’m in a hurry, Jake will be here soon!” I bolted towards the front door, grabbed my backpack, and walked out. I ate the rest of the sandwich as I walked down the driveway and sure enough; Jake arrived in his pick-up truck right away. He leaned against the passenger door and opened it for me without leaving the driver’s seat.
“Hey, Leah!” he said, giving me one of his addictive smiles. He had blonde, short-cropped hair and a muscular body that could make anyone’s mouth water. I blushed, jumped into the car, and put on my seatbelt.
“A few days left until your birthday; how does it feel?” He blinked one eye at me.
“It feels good! I hope you are coming to my party?” I said, fiddling nervously with the skirt part of my dress.
“Of course, I wouldn’t miss it for the world!” Jake took my hand and squeezed. My heart skipped a beat, and I smiled as I looked out the window.
I had decided to start studying to be a nurse after high school. It was my lifelong dream to finally become a doctor for our pack. I had applied to be an apprentice and had been told last week that I had been accepted.
Jake parked the car in the school parking lot, walked out and opened the door for me. I jumped down and looked out over the schoolyard. Perfect, there stood the awful Sally, she was the most popular girl in school, and I hated the way she looked at Jake. Ever since my first day at this school, she had been teasing me and I couldn’t stand her.
We walked past her and of course Jake greeted Sally happily, as he is a perfect person. I rolled my eyes at the gesture. Why did he have to be nice to Sally? After all, she is such a horrible person.
I gave her a fake smile, put my arm in the crook of Jakes arm, and pulled him into the school building. We had science and math the first part of the day.
Most of the students at the school thought that we were a couple, largely because we were with each other all the time. But to be honest, we had never done anything romantic. Not even a kiss on the cheek. But I longed for my eighteenth birthday when we could finally be more intimate with each other.
At lunch, our mutual friend Maria joined us, and she sat down at our table. We ate the meat stew and talked about what we had done this weekend. Maria and I had grown up together, she was like a sister to me and the three of us hung out every day. Maria was a caring girl, had high grades and loved to bake.
“Have you heard about the ball that the werewolf king is going to organize next weekend?” Mary asked, taking a bite of her bread.
“What ball?” I asked and raised my eyebrows. The king had never held a ball before.
“Yes, he is inviting all the unmated girls and women from packs around the country. He is hoping to find his mate, the queen,” Maria continued, poking a piece of potato to the edge of the plate.
I had only heard stories about the king. He was the head of our world. Each pack had an Alpha of course, and you could say that the king was their boss. Stories about him was told around every pack, of how he is ruthless and violent. I had heard a story about how his wolf had eaten a living man once. I shuddered at the thought of the king. He was thirty years old already, and the fact that he was mateless was unheard of in our world. When we turn eighteen, we can sense our mate if he or she is nearby. And on average, most people tend to have found their true mate before turning twenty-six. If you are really unlucky, your mate is dead before you even have time to meet them. Or they were born in the wrong part of the world, and you are too far from each other. But most of the time, the bond between mates always succeeded in bringing them together. The king’s mate was probably dead, I thought, feeling a sting of sadness towards him, since being mateless your whole life must be very lonely. But then I remembered all the stories that was going around about him. Many parents use him as the boogieman, telling horror stories to their pups so that they would brush their teeth or eat all their broccoli.
“Shit. Poor girl that has the misfortune to be his mate,” I said, laughing nervously.
“You turn eighteen on Friday, right? The ball is the weekend after, so I guess you’re invited too,” Maria said. “We can ride together there!”
“Ha-ha, right! If I haven’t found my mate before then, that is...” I said, smiling and blushing. I glanced up at Jake who was concentrated on his phone. I didn’t plan to go to a ball several miles from here.
After lunch, Maria and I parted ways with Jake. He had physics class and we had art for the rest of the afternoon.
Maria put her arm over my shoulders. “Do you really think Jake is yours?” she asked, smiling widely as we walked down the hallway toward the classroom.
“I hope so. I haven’t talked to him about it, but I hope he feels the same way?”
Maria laughed. “Yes, but why don’t you talk to him about it then? You know how sluggish all the guys are, he won’t understand that you’re in love with him without you saying anything. And if you tell him before your eighteenth birthday, maybe he can mentally prepare himself for the fact that one of his best friends is in fact his mate?”
Maria was probably right. I’ll talk to him before my birthday.
