Chapter 5 - Yvonne
I never thought I’d see Dawson again—not after fleeing Snehvolk and leaving Girdwood for good. I never even thought I’d see this village again, and I don’t look forward to leaving the confines of these four walls that appear like a newly built structure.
Did the clinic move since I was last here? Did the alphas and elders finally decide to do renovations to better accommodate the three hundred members of the Snehvolk Pack?
Why do I care, anyway?
I’m probably just trying to distract myself with unimportant questions that don’t need answering.
This situation I’m caught in is an impossible one; how did I end up back in Girdwood when I swore I’ll never set foot here?
What’s worse is that it was all because of him.
Dawson Black.
If he hadn’t taken my virginity and then proceeded to break my heart with his brutal rejection the next day, I wouldn’t have left.
I’d have remained oblivious to the taunts and mockery I faced growing up, and I would have continued seeking solace in the pack library with my face hidden in a book.
Those vanilla and oak-scented pages held more beauty than this life could ever show me. Scoffing internally, I can hardly believe this twist of fate.
There’s always a common denominator, and he’s standing right beside me, silent as if he’s awaiting thanks for saving my life.
What was the point of any of it if I’m back at square one?
I'm back here, in Girdwood, thrown to the wolves who despised me all my life. Sure, my standing in Moonshine wasn't any better, but at least their only reason to look down upon me was because I was a single mother.
Here, Snehvolk hates me because of the past transgressions of my family. I'll just be back to being the hated outcast, shunned at every turn.
But Moonshine now holds the deaths of their betas over my head.
“Why…” I pause for a breath, though it's still impossible to look at Dawson. “Why did you bring me here, Alpha Dawson?”
An uncomfortable silence stretches all around, pulling taut like a rubber band that finally snaps and draws my face to the side to find him staring at me through the deep pools of his blue eyes, as if he's searching for entry to my soul.
My breath hitches in my throat.
Did he mean what he said when he declared to Moonshine that I was his mate?
Have the words I once dreamed about him saying finally arrived?
They don't have the effect I thought they would on me. Too much time has passed. What would it matter now, anyway?
It's not like I'll ever forgive him for rejecting me back then.
“I…” Dawson begins, smoothing a palm over his nape as he lowers his intense gaze, releasing me from the suspicious scrutiny that holds me in confusion.
“... I had to bring you here when you passed out. You used to be a Snehvolk wolf. I wasn't gonna abandon you out there.”
My lips part involuntarily, a protest to that claim dangling on the tip of my tongue. But I snap my mouth shut when I let the emotion it evoked subside.
Sure, Dawson did abandon me in the past…
But, if that's his reason for bringing me back to Girdwood, it means that when he said I was his mate, he was only saying that to get Moonshine off my back.
A wave of relief washes over me.
“So, that's the only reason?”
Dawson stops rubbing his nape, looks up with the crystalline depths of blue eyes that I can easily get lost in, his dark brown brows knitting in the center.
“Of course,” he concedes with a curt nod. “I brought you here to protect you, Yvonne.”
Nodding as I process this, I wonder how much protection I'll receive when I'm sprung back into a pack that despised me before. The old life I thought I left behind almost six years ago is back to haunt me, and there's nothing I can do about it.
It's worse that Dawson is claiming to be my protector when he's the one who caused the upheaval in my life when he broke my heart the most.
This isn't going to be easy.
***
“You've healed well, Yvonne,” the healer, Rissa, informs me as she reads through her notes on a clipboard. “It's only been twenty-four hours since Alpha Dawson brought you in, but your speedy recovery means you have the clearance to leave the clinic.”
Nodding thoughtfully, a fleeting frown passes my face.
“Is—is Alpha Dawson going to show me to my new living space?” I ask, recalling what Dawson told Elias last night. He said there was a newly built cottage behind his house, and he’d place me and Gio in there.
The healer looks up introspectively from her clipboard, pausing as if to gauge my expression. I must be wearing my hesitation and discomfort on my sleeve, because she sighs as she sets her notes down.
“Alpha Dawson has arranged for Luna Aurora to show you to the cottage. Because of, er—you know—it will be safer if you stick with the luna. That way, no one will bother you.”
I gulp hard at the reminder that despite being born to Snehvolk, I’m still very much an outcast. No one here wants to risk me being put in a predicament where I’m forced to face the hostility of the others.
But even with the past hanging like a dark cloud over my head, I haven’t experienced any ill-treatment from the healer. I do remember her from before.
We used to attend afternoon classes together back when we were kids.
I wonder if she remembers me, and again, it’s as if I’m an open book when Rissa reaches out and places a reassuring hand on my shoulder.
“I remember you from school days,” she chimes sweetly as she answers an unspoken question, her forest green eyes sparkling with kindness. “You loved reading,” she giggles. “You never mixed with the other kids, and always had your head in a book.”
Giggling back nervously, I lower my gaze as I feel heat spread across my cheeks. “Reading was always an escape for me.”
“Was it so bad that you had to leave?”
I look up to find those gorgeous green eyes sparkling with curiosity that unnerves me. I’ve never been able to open up to anyone before.
The one time I did, I was hurt tremendously by his rejection…
The reminder of that pain has me tensing up again, reaffirming those high walls I’ve built up.
It’s not like I can openly tell the healer why I’d left Girdwood, or that the harsh treatment I’d faced growing up was the driving force for my departure from the Snehvolk Pack.
The last nail in the coffin for burying my life here was Dawson’s rejection, but it was a build-up of the cruelty I’d faced for many years that drove me out of the pack for good.
My twisted fate may have led me back here, but it doesn’t mean that anything has changed. On the contrary, I have to keep my guard up and remind myself that I’m only here for Gio.
“I-I found my mate outside of the pack,” I lie tentatively.
Rissa nods in acceptance. “You have a beautiful little boy,” she smiles. “He looks just like you.”
“Th-thanks,” I murmur sheepishly, feeling my cheeks betray my diffidence when Rissa continues to stare deeply into my eyes with a kind warmth that feels foreign.
“You have the most beautiful eyes, Yvonne. I never noticed before, but there’s a kindness to them. I hope we can be friends.”
Gulping hard, I’m not sure how to respond to Rissa’s kindness. But I’m saved by the bell—or, rather, the door opening.
A fit of giggles follows a set of stomping feet as Gio appears, his jet-black hair shimmering underneath the white light shrouding the room as he comes bouncing forward.
“Mama!” he exclaims eagerly as he throws tiny arms around my neck just I get to my feet. I wrap my arms around him, pulling him closer as a wave of familiar relief washes over me.
My only consolation about being back is Gio’s safety, along with the cheerful grin that radiates through his silver eyes when he pulls back.
“My baby…” I whisper, cradling his plump, creamy cheek as my heart is gripped by the maternal intuition that allows me to notice how content and joyful Gio is. It’s something I can’t ignore, since I’ve never seen him as happy as he appears to be now.
“He couldn’t wait to see you,” a melodic, girlish giggle interrupts the moment, though it doesn’t feel out of place with how warm and inviting it is.
My eyes flit to the robust she-wolf at the door, who oozes authority in her soft, feminine aura that shields her like a golden glow and lightens the caramel brown of her eyes.
Even her chestnut brown hair is radiant, the waves appearing to be swaying with a breeze that isn’t even evident in the room.
My eyes drift to her ripe belly, and that’s the only indication that she’s pregnant. There’s a glow on her face that’s unfamiliar—it’s something I didn’t have while I was carrying Gio.
I can’t quite pinpoint what it is, though I suspect that her alpha, Elias, pours love into her.
The kind of love I didn’t have while I was pregnant.
But it’s so much more than that. Her very presence whispers royal mysticism, and she isn’t anything like what she’d been made out to be based on her rank.
“Luna Aurora,” I breathe, gasping when I realize that she was the pack’s lowest-ranking omega.
Just before I left the pack, I used to hear the hushed murmurs about the only omega who didn’t receive her wolf on her eighteenth birthday. It gave the pack more reason to despise someone else, taking the spotlight of their hatred off me for a while, so I could disappear without being noticed.
She’s changed so much…
“Yvonne Lang,” Aurora beams from ear to ear, the smile touching her eyes. “You’ve changed so much, I barely recognized you.”
“You remember me?” I frown, to which Aurora nods as she approaches the bed.
“Of course, I do. You were always in the library whenever I went there.”
“I never noticed…”
Aurora chuckles nervously, and for the first time, she appears mortal. “I was always sticking to the shadows. It was safer there.”
“I can relate,” I murmur, drawing in a breath to compose myself lest I become too familiar with the luna.