Secret Baby of the Alpha Wolf

Prologue - Poppy

Ten Years Ago

The lines grow thicker the longer I stare at them, and I can’t tell if I want them to disappear or if I want to smile.

Tendrils of fear wrap around my neck as if I’m being choked. Absent-mindedly, one hand goes up to my chest, fingers toying with the pendant dangling from a gold chain, tracing the curves and intricate lines of the bird with its wings spread out inside the golden circle.

Perhaps it’s the comfort I crave in this moment—the warmth of a mother’s love and reassurance that I need when faced with such dread.

It’s not that I didn’t know before this. I felt it, sensed it stirring in the core of my womb. Even my missed period two weeks ago was enough of an indication. But I needed cold, hard evidence to solidify what I already suspected.

And the two red lines staring back at me are all it takes to make this real.

I’m pregnant.

I sneaked out a pregnancy test kit from the clinic this morning, dodging bullets from the mouths of the pack members who never fail to pull the trigger whenever they find a chance.

No one can know about this yet, and I would have been damned to hell if they suspected I was sneaking out a pregnancy test to put my doubts to rest.

Doubts?

Probably more like denial.

Now that it’s real, I don’t know what to do.

I have no one to talk to about this, and a stray tear slips from my eye as I clutch the pendant with desperate hands.

It’s the only thing I have left of my mother—not her soothing voice, nor her comforting arms, but a piece of jewelry that hasn’t left my neck since the day I was born.

Drawing strength from the pendant because it’s the only place it can come from right now, I take a deep breath before tucking the test back in its cover and hiding it in my vanity bag that I push inside the drawer.

I may not have many friends in the Valley Walker Pack, and both my parents might be dead. But there’s one thing I can do, and it’s going to be the hardest thing I have ever done.

I have to tell my unborn child’s father that I’m pregnant.

I shake off my wariness and return to what I was doing before I decided to take the test. In some ways, I needed the confirmation before telling him. After all, tonight is a big night for the pack.

It’s Damian Walker’s swearing-in ceremony.

As the youngest son of Alpha Chester and Luna Diane, Damian is taking over as Alpha of the Valley Walker Pack after his older brother, Dorian, walked away to join his uncle, Elias, in Fort Smit.

Alpha Chester’s brother is the alpha of his own pack, Nightclaw, and Dorian decided to join it after his friend died.

While many of the Valley Walker wolves have been sympathetic to the alpha and luna’s oldest son losing his friend from another pack, there have been whispers going around—suspicions that Dorian was responsible for the death of Finch Lycoan, the eldest son of the Blood Moon Pack’s alpha.

Some believe that it’s guilt that drove Dorian to leave Valley Walker, but no one dares to breathe a word about Dorian anymore. Not in front of Damian, at least.

It’s been a rough two months for Damian, who’s had to step up and shoulder the responsibility his brother left behind. And tonight, when he becomes the alpha of Valley Walker, I can’t help but wonder how much things are going to change.

Damian Walker hasn’t been the same since Dorian left.

That’s why I’m afraid of telling him that I am pregnant with his child.

Gulping hard, I pick up the iron and steam the hem of my dress—the dress I designed and stitched myself specifically for this special occasion.

Though Damian hasn’t been particularly looking forward to tonight, I knew I had to do something special to commemorate his swearing-in ceremony.

Take the edge off a bit, even if it’s for a stolen moment after the ceremony.

And it’s only once I’ve stepped into the off-shoulder blush pink gown, running my hands over the bodice that soon won’t fit so perfectly, that I realize that maybe my dreads, my worries, have all been for nothing.

It’s just pregnancy jitters, I decide as I paint my lips a matching shade of pink.

Damian always praised the color on me, and tonight, I plan on surprising him by showing up to his swearing-in ceremony in the dress I made.

Maybe, once the formalities are over and he bears the title his father has retired from, he won’t be as dissociated as he has been these past few weeks.

Maybe, just maybe, the man I fell in love with years ago will return to me tonight.

The final touch is a set of earrings matching my necklace that I used all my savings on—gold hoops with a bird identical to the one on my pendant, with one eye made up of tiny pink quartz crystals—and a gold bracelet I got on my birthday last year.

The only thing that’s missing is a gold ring on my left hand—a piece of jewelry Damian promised he’d gift me one day when the time was right.

I’m hoping that will be tonight, after he becomes Alpha, and after I’ve given him the news.

A sliver of fear courses down my spine, but I push aside my trepidation and decide that I’m reading too much into the way Damian has been acting lately.

Stress. Pressure. I have to be understanding.

We’ve been together for nearly a year, a relationship built on trust and love, even while we haven’t been able to make our relationship public.

It’s mostly because Valley Walker doesn’t see me as an equal.

An orphaned omega wolf, whose mother died in childbirth, and whose father remained a woodworker all his life, sticking to the outskirts of Cedar Valley in an isolated cabin that I inherited when he died a few years ago.

Left to my own devices, I was content sticking to the shadows, doing my work as a volunteer in the pack center, and spending most evenings watching the sunset from the cliff overlooking the valley.

Until one night, Damian found me on the cliff, revealing that he’d been watching me sneak away from pack celebrations and disappear out there, all alone. I was shocked that he noticed at all, since I’d had a crush on the alpha’s youngest son for as long as I could remember.

I had no idea that he remembered me from high school, or noticed my measly existence at all.

An unexpected friendship turned to something else when, on my nineteenth birthday, he gave me a gold bracelet and a kiss that turned into a promise that once Dorian became the alpha of Valley Walker, our relationship would become public, and the next gift I’d receive was a ring to match my necklace.

I’d been clinging to hope that soon became a fine thread when Dorian left. Damian has been under immense pressure, and I felt the difference the moment he found out his brother had abandoned the pack.

The only hope I have left is that Damian will honor his promise. Our relationship has been under so much strain that I’ve been so afraid of losing him, even when he assured me a few weeks ago that he still loved me.

I’ve never doubted him in the past, and I shouldn’t doubt him now.

“Pregnancy jitters…” I murmur with amusement under my breath as I head out of my cabin and make my way to the pack hall. My confidence feels reignited enough to face the dreadful wolves who usually mock me for being an omega.

It’s not like my status ever stopped Damian from being with me.

My chin held high with dignity, I enter the hall, the steady chatter and soft piano notes mingling to create the ambiance of tonight’s celebration.

Even if this is bittersweet for Damian and his family, who, for years, expected Dorian to be the one taking over for Alpha Chester when he retired, the pack has been highly anticipating the next era of leadership from Alpha Chester and Luna Diane’s heir.

Avidly ignoring the skeptical looks of scrutiny and scorn from the bitter pack members, who seem to still have time to pay me any attention—even if it’s negative—I make my way to the back row of benches. I’m safer at the back, out of sight, knowing that only one pair of eyes matters to me.

“Hey, Poppy!” Simone, the only girl in Valley Walker whom I consider a friend, comes shuffling down the row, panting as if she ran a mile to reach the hall. Her face is flushed, and her pupils are blown out, and I giggle in a cupped hand as she takes a seat beside me.

She’s been seeing one of the soldiers who trains regularly with Damian, and that’s been my alibi for going anywhere near the training arena for months—I get to ogle Damian while pretending I’m there to accompany Simone.

“Hello, Simone…” I drawl, wiggling my brows suggestively. “Where have you been?”

She blushes as her eyes widen at me, but that’s when she notices my dress. She reaches out and runs her fingers across the frills framing the neckline.

“You look pretty tonight,” she says with a satisfied hum as she nods thoughtfully. “I wonder why. Or rather, who you’re dressed up for.”

“No one,” I say, and I’m the one blushing this time. I tap her on the wrist when silence falls over the hall, and even the pianist stops playing.

But Simone doesn’t stop prying. She leans in just as my attention goes to the front of the hall, where Alpha Chester and Luna Diane walk in, followed by their guards, before Damian and his guards enter.

My heart stops beating for a second, which is long enough for our eyes to meet, and that’s when I realize I’m holding my breath, excitement bubbling in the pit of my belly like a lovesick fool who loses her composure at a second’s glance with her lover.

His blue eyes sparkle like the azure of a clear sky. Gone are my anxieties, my worries about our future, and my chest tightens with the love that remains a certainty between us.

I smile coyly as Simone whispers, “I know you have a thing for the future alpha. That’s why you look so beautiful on his special night.”

My smile deepens as I turn to her and say, “Don’t be ridiculous, Simone. I’m only an omega. I could never dream of it.”