Cursed To The Alpha

Andrei POV

Three days and still no sleep, it irritated me as I watched the sunrise. I spent the night again staring at the shadows on the roof, no reprieve from my racing mind, the "what if's and could have been’s." Not even the screams of the rogue in the basement helped; I killed him too quickly. I should have left him alive, but I could not afford for Kat to hear him screaming. Her hearing was even more heightened than ours now. It was not a risk I could afford to take.

My phone was ringing, yet I couldn’t move as I listened to it ring before it went quiet, only to ring again.

“Just answer it, Andrei, you aren’t the only one tired,” Donnie growls in my head. I rolled on my side, reaching for the d*mn thing and seeing my sister's face pop up on the screen; it was a picture of her, Angie, and some other girl Jasmine. Her name is, they were at school. I could not bring myself to delete it even though it hurt every time I saw my mate's face light up on the screen.

“Hey, Sis,” I answered with a sigh.

“Have you spoken to dad?” She asks, and I rub and hand down my face, sit up and climb out of bed.

“No, I haven’t spoken to Derrick in a few days; why?”

“I was going to see if he wanted to come to my birthing class, Mateo had to take over Patrol, and now I have no one to go with.”

“Where is Ezra?” I ask her.

“Meetings,” she says before sighing. Ah, d*mn it. This is the last thing I wanted to do, but I also hated upsetting her.

“What time is it at?” I ask.

“In an hour.”

“Fine, I will take you; I don’t have to do anything, do I?”

“Really? You would go?” She asked, and I could hear the shock in her voice. Little did she know I would do anything for her. I always wanted a sister or a brother growing up; I wanted a real family, a big family. Kat was my family and family I would die for.

“Yes, why wouldn’t I?” I ask her.

“Just can’t picture you wanting to go,” she says.

“Do you want to go or not, Kat?”

“Yes, but you don’t have to. I can get a lift in town.”

"I'll see you in an hour," I say before I hang up the phone. I grab a pair of jeans and a button-down shirt and lay them on the bed before heading for the shower. I do not think Kat would appreciate me walking in covered in blood. I showered quickly before getting dressed and leaving. The drive there took 30 minutes, and Kat was waiting out front when I pulled into her driveway. I reach over and open the door for her, and she climbs in.

“Seatbelt,” I tell her when she just sits there.

“They are uncomfortable,” she says, and I turn my car off.

“We aren’t moving until it is on,” I tell her; I know she is young, but her hissy fits will not work on me, Queen or not; she is still my sister. She rolls her eyes before reaching for it. “Fine,” she says, clicking it into place before adjusting it around her stomach. I start the car.

“You are just as bad as them,” she mutters, reaching for the radio and flicking through the stations till she finds one she likes.

“How is the pack?” She asks.

“Fine, working. What do you do in the birthing class thing?”

“Mainly breathing exercises,” she answers.

“Like meditation?”

“No, more like a group of women sitting in a circle panting like heifers seeing who turns red-faced first.” she says, and I know Mateo had signed her up for it.

“You seem really interested in it,” I told her sarcastically.

“Mateo signed me up for it, and it gets me out of the house; take the next left,” she says. So, I follow her directions before pulling up at a house.

“This is it? “I ask her, looking at the house. It looked more like a cottage, had cottage-style gardens, and was just on the outskirt of town. Kat opens her door and climbs out. I followed her out before walking the small path to the house and could hear the chatter of women and their partners inside.

Walking into the place, it smells heavily of Lavender and has little water fountains and a huge room, I realized they gutted a house to open it up. A woman walks over with dark hair cut in a bob before stopping as she looks at me.

“My Queen,” she acknowledges Kat before eyeing me.

“Alpha,” she says before looking at Kat, confused.

“Mateo couldn’t make it. So, this is Andrei, my brother.”

“Oh, you brought your brother with you?” She says like she thought it was strange.

“Don’t make it weird, lady; just show us where to go,” I tell her, and Kat nudges me with her elbow.

“What! She is making it weird that I would come like I am some creep getting his jollies off on pregnant women,'' I tell her.

“No, that is not what? Oh, never mind, just take a seat; kat will show you where to go,” the woman says before rushing off; she sits on a yoga ball in the center of the circle the woman and their partners had formed. I found a spot sitting on the floor, and Donnie was growling in my head, not wanting to be here, but I shoved him back, reminding him we were doing this for Kat, and he seemed to settle down.

For the most part, it was mainly breathing exercises until the woman grabbed a remote before flicking on a flat-screen TV and putting on a birthing video. The women had mixed reactions watching a birth. I could tell Kat was fascinated by it as she sat between my legs watching. Some were horrified, and one man fainted. Yep, he will be a great birthing partner, I thought. He couldn’t even handle a video; how would he handle the real thing? I watched as the woman that ran the meeting fanned him with a piece of paper while his mate looked like she was about to murder him for fainting.

I shake my head, turning back to the video when I feel a hand pat my chest making me look up to see Mateo.

“Thanks for taking her,” he says, and Kat looks up at him with a big grin on her face at seeing her mate. She leans forward, letting me up, and I kiss her cheek, letting Mateo take my spot.

“I will ring you later,” I tell her before Mateo grips my forearm before turning back to her. He was always so patient with her, always eager to do what she wanted. Had him even show up home a few days ago for a cucumber, Kat has been craving them, and he drove over to my pack to get her one since the shops were out. Poor guy, now I make sure to drop some over there every time I visit since we grow most of our stuff anyway.

“Thank God, watching that sh*t, I nearly contemplated turning gay,” Donnie says. I shook my head at my wolf, but I was also excited to get out of there so I could hunt down another rogue. I need to hurt something, need their screams to drown out the screams of my pack, need to see their dead faces instead of hers; I need to do anything to get the image of what they did to her out of my head.

Once I was home, I got out of my car to see one of my pack members waiting at the door of the packhouse. His fear was so strong I could smell it, and it enraged me; they did not need to be scared; nothing was getting in or out of this pack, yet they were all too scared to go about their normal lives.

“Alpha?” He says, baring his neck. His blonde locks fell in his eyes as I approached him. His green eyes are fearful when I step in front of him.

“What is it, Clay?” I ask, annoyed, I know they hear the rogues screaming, but they have no reason to fear me; it isn't any of them strapped to the table.

“A few of the unmated wolves want permission to leave, " he stammered.

“What for?” I watch his Adam’s apple bob in his throat. “Speak, I haven't got all day,” I tell him, annoyed that he is wasting my time.

“They want to go in search of their mates,” he says so quickly his words jumbled, and he stuttered.

“Why do they need permission to do that?” I ask him, and he drops his head.

“We just thought to tell you since we lost Luna” I cut off his words, and I don't even remember moving when my hands were suddenly around his throat. I wasn't sure if I did it or Donnie as I strangled him, his hands clutching mine as his eyes widened.

“Speak of her, and you will find yourself strung up on a flagpole,” I growled at him, my words foreign to me; I barely recognized my anger or the things I say before saying them. His face turns purple, and I feel Donnie trying to take over when my hands let him go, and he gasps, clutching his throat, coughing.

“They can go,” I tell him before walking off and toward the forest behind the packhouse. I searched for hours, looking for any sign of rogues, yet word seemed to be getting out that people were going missing near my borders, and when it fell dark, and I still found nothing, I turned around. I was heading home when I could just make out the scent of a fire burning. I walk to the clearing to see if I can spot smoke polluting the air.

“Uncharted,” Donnie says when we realize it was coming from the other side of the mountain. It was usually off-limits because it backs onto a human town; wolves usually steer clear in case of hunters, yet it was the only sign we had in days. So, we decided to chance it, and trekked our way around the mountain only to come to the river.

“Let's go home,” Donnie says, but I have already pushed through the water to the other side and got washed downstream before reaching the other side.

“How are we meant to force a rogue through the water Andrei? We would lose them in the stream,” Donnie says before receding. I just wanted to check it out and find where this camp was. The moon was high in the sky when I picked up movement in the forest. The smell of the campfire grew stronger.

“F*ck Donnie, shift,” I tell him when he doesn’t.

“No, this is stupid; we can’t even get them home.” He snaps, refusing to shift. Fine, I don't need him anyway. I watched carefully for movement, but it was obvious when they picked up my scent because the forest fell silent except for the crackling sound of the fire burning. Stepping into their camp, three men sat around a campfire, and one in wolf form lay on the ground just away from the campfire. The wolf was grey, completely grey, her fur the color of gunmetal, no color except the blue eyes that stared ahead unseeing like there was no life behind them. The she wolf's eyes; they looked sad. No, that wasn't accurate enough; it was like looking at the eyes of the dead.

They instantly jumped up, yet I couldn’t take my eyes from the wolf that lay by the tree; Donnie pushing forward suddenly amongst the stench of the rogue was the most mouth-watering scent I had smelt since Angie, cinnamon, and vanilla invading my senses. I stared, stunned for a second; I had to be imagining it, there was no such thing as second chance mates, yet Donnie screamed the word in my head before seeing one of the men run at me with a blade in his hand. In my shock, Donnie shoved forward and ripped into his arm, making him drop the blade.

His screams pierce the quiet forest and bounce off the trees, and the other two take off into the woods. I notice that the wolf gets up from the corner of my eye, wanting to escape. Donnie tears into the rogue's stomach, spilling his intestines onto the ground while the man clutches them trying to stuff them back in when we lunge at his throat, our teeth sinking into his flesh before shaking our head.

His blood spraying everywhere, all over our fur. He gurgles as he takes his last breath when we hear a yelp that turns into a whimper. Donnie shifts back, and I turn around to find the wolf still by the tree though she was struggling to remove the collar around her neck that she was chained to and was no longer in her wolf form. Long Blonde hair fell to her waist and over her *ss as she crouched low to the ground, trying to undo the chain. Hearing me coming toward her, she growls, and she shifts back, but even that doesn't help as she struggles to get the chain undone before I approach her.

She turns on me, baring her teeth and snapping her teeth at me. “Stop, I won’t hurt you,” I tell her, but that just made her growl louder as she steps back; her fur hackled up, and I bent down, keeping my eyes on her in case she goes for my throat. She does, and I drop the long chain, fall back, and put my hands up.

“Why is she chained?” Donnie asked me worriedly as he peered back at this wolf that appeared to be ours, though I couldn't understand how that was possible.

“I don’t know,” I tell him. I didn't really want to think of why they had her chained; I just wanted to get her off it.

“I will unchain you, just don’t bite me,” I tell her, kneeling and reaching for the chain slowly; she growls, her eyes not leaving me as I wrap my hand around the thick chain. I tried to break it, but it was far too thick even for me to snap. Finally, I get up, moving too quickly, and she lunges at me, her teeth sinking into my arm. I shove her off harder than I intended, and she hits the tree before jumping back to her feet. I scramble backward on my hands and feet just as the chain forces her back, ripping her backward.

I growl at her before getting to my feet and walking over to the dead rogue by the campfire and rummaging in his pockets, no key, which means one of the other two must have had it. I looked around before finding an old worn axe stuck into a fallen tree where they were sitting. I pull it from the log before turning back to the she-wolf. Her blue eyes widen, and she starts ripping on the chain, trying to break it.

“Wait, you are only hurting yourself; stop it,” I snapped at her. Yet she continues to yank it the closer I get. She growls at me before trying to bite me, so I grab the scruff of her neck before shoving her head down on the dirt and stepping over her, squeezing her between my legs and holding her there. She thrashes, and I lift the axe before bringing it down on the chain. She yelps and my ears rang from clinking the axe; it was so blunt it took three hits on the chain before it snapped, and she took off, nearly knocking me over as she pulled backward between my legs and darted for the trees.

“Oh, little wolf, you don’t want to make me chase you,” I growl before shifting.

Shifting, we follow her scent, Donnie looking for any sign of the she-wolf; she was lite on her feet and quick. She would have been hard to find except the clink of the chain that was still attached to her neck hitting the ground as she ran from us.

We made our way around the mountain, she was heading in the direction of home, but when I came to the river, all noise was drowned out by the waterfall.

Smart, she knows her scent would be hard to find, yet I couldn't hear the chain anymore.

"Maybe she stopped," Donnie whines sniffing the ground and following the river.

"She might have jumped in to be washed downstream," I tell him.

"Get the pack out here," he says, and I must agree better with more eyes. I opened the link feeling for what was left of the pack; I hated it, hated feeling their sadness, yet rarely used the link to teether us all.

"There is a grey she-wolf along the border somewhere with blue eyes, help me find her, but no one is to