The Unwanted Presence

I forced my battered, aching body to turn back toward the kitchen sink. I needed to hurry and finish scrubbing the heavy iron skillets and bleaching the countertops. The Alpha had made his orders explicitly clear, and I was acutely aware of the grueling, backbreaking day of cleaning that lay ahead of me. The massive estate had to be flawless, and the clock was already ticking.

Truthfully, I genuinely did not mind the grueling physical labor of cleaning. In fact, I welcomed the endless list of chores. Scrubbing floors, polishing silver, and washing endless piles of laundry served a vital, life-saving purpose in this house: it kept me completely out of the pack's line of sight. If I was tucked away in a dusty corner or hidden in an unused wing of the estate, I was invisible. And if I was invisible, I was not actively being beaten. Our massive pack house boasted ten luxurious guest rooms that were currently sitting empty, completely devoid of life. I started my assigned tasks by moving from room to room, opening all the large glass windows to thoroughly air out the unused, stagnant spaces. I loved taking a brief second to close my eyes and just breathe in the crisp, freezing mountain peak air that instantly rushed into the suffocating house.

Changing out the linens was a relatively quick and mindless process since every single guest room had its own attached walk-in closet fully stocked with crisp, fresh sheets. The Luna, my mother, took an obsessive, almost manic pride in the fact that the entire pack house was perfectly color-coordinated. Every single bedroom that housed pack members or visiting guests was meticulously decorated in its own specific, unwavering color scheme.

My absolute favorite room was tucked far away to the south of the pack house. Its color scheme was a natural, soothing light green. I loved working in there because I was able to look out the tall windows and see nothing but the endless, sprawling forest tops swaying in the wind. Simply being inside that room brought a rare, fragile sense of peace to my otherwise tormented soul. Because I loved it so much, I purposely took a little longer in that specific room, meticulously changing the heavy linens, perfectly smoothing out every wrinkle, and carefully folding fresh, fluffy towels in the attached washroom.

I was just finishing up, tucking the final corner of the light-green duvet under the heavy mattress, when my body suddenly went entirely rigid. My highly sensitive ears twitched. I froze at the distinct sound of approaching voices echoing loudly down the hardwood hallway.

I instantly stopped breathing, my heart hammering violently against my ribs. I quickly identified the approaching voices. It was Mora, the Beta’s wife, and her daughter, Tinsley. Mora was my mother Sloane’s absolute best friend. Pack rumor had it that when they were younger, they both desperately hoped to be my father’s destined mate. When my mother won that title, Mora stood fiercely by her side as her Maid of Honor. They were so close that they were even pregnant at the exact same time. My mother was pregnant with me and my older brother, Elian, while Mora was carrying Tinsley. Even though my mother was the Luna and did not normally attend the common births of the pack, she had stayed firmly by Mora’s side when Tinsley was born—just four short days before I was brought into this world. Mora was not outwardly violent and physically abusive like my father or her husband, Beta Vance, but she certainly was not kind. She simply turned a blind eye to my suffering.

Her daughter, however, was a completely different story. Tinsley was unimaginably vicious and cruel on the inside, inheriting all of her father's sadistic tendencies. On the outside, Tinsley was undeniably one of the pack's greatest beauties. She was very tall with incredibly long legs and a cascading waterfall of shimmering, golden-blond hair. The Moon Goddess had blessed her with strikingly high cheekbones and a deeply voluptuous, perfect hourglass figure. Whenever Tinsley confidently walked into a crowded room, every single male wolf could not help but stop and stare in raw awe at her beauty. Unfortunately, that breathtaking beauty was strictly skin deep. Beneath her flawless exterior was a rotting, hateful monster. Tinsley had violently broken my nose on multiple occasions just for breathing too loudly in her presence, and she had spent years actively spreading vicious rumors throughout the pack that I was a filthy, used slut. She deeply resented me because she firmly believed she was meant to be the next Luna. According to Tinsley's twisted logic, my dead brother, Elian, was probably her destined mate, and she vehemently blamed me for robbing her of that future.

Terrified of a physical confrontation, I remained completely silent, hiding perfectly still behind the heavy wooden door of the light-green guest room. I prayed to the Moon Goddess that they would just pass right by this room so I could quietly move on to the next one without enduring another beating.

"Wear the red dress, Tinsley. Specifically, the one with the high slit in the side," I heard Mora explicitly instructing her daughter, their footsteps pausing just outside the door.

"I know, Mom. I will make Alpha Kaelen mine," Tinsley replied, her voice practically dripping with extreme arrogance and unearned confidence. "I have waited my entire life to be a Luna, and becoming the Luna of the Azure Peak Pack is my ultimate destiny."

"Your father has not been able to tell me much about Alpha Kaelen's personal preferences, other than he strongly believes his favorite color is red, and that he definitively has not found his mate yet," Mora emphasized, her tone sharp and intensely strategic. "This is critically important, Tinsley. You must do whatever it takes to make him fall in love with you. The Azure Peak Pack is one of the largest, most powerful packs in the entire northwest. The upcoming Mabon Ball is the perfect, strategic setting for you to secure him. You may never, ever get another chance like this."

"Don't worry, Mother. I will have absolutely no problem catching his eye and keeping it," Tinsley boldly claimed. As she made that arrogant statement, I knew deep down that she was telling the absolute truth. No man had ever been able to look away from her gorgeous figure.

I remained frozen, scarcely daring to draw a breath until I finally heard their arrogant voices slowly fading down the long corridor. Only when the silence fully returned did I let out a massive, trembling sigh of relief. As the adrenaline slowly drained from my system, my mind began to piece the puzzle together. It suddenly dawned on me that Mora had explicitly mentioned the Mabon Ball.

Mabon was a massive, highly sacred holiday celebrated wildly throughout the entire werewolf community. For regular humans, it was simply the mark of the harvest season. But for werewolves, it was an incredibly exciting, primal time because it meant that the cold nights were getting significantly longer, thus allowing our wolves to hunt more easily and freely in the dark. More importantly, it was a rare, massive inter-pack gathering. It was one of the only times multiple different packs got together to celebrate in peace. This was vital for our survival because often, destined mates did not belong to the same pack. The Mabon Ball was specifically designed to allow unmated wolves to finally find their destined halves.

It was an event that I knew, with absolute, soul-crushing certainty, I was strictly forbidden from attending. I had never been allowed to attend a single pack gathering, let alone a Mabon Ball. Nor had our relatively small pack ever hosted something of this massive magnitude before. From their conversation, I now understood exactly why I was working my fingers to the bone preparing these guest rooms. Our pack was hosting Mabon, and the notorious Azure Peak Pack was coming. I quickly shoved the dangerous, lingering thoughts of mates and balls out of my mind and immediately went back to scrubbing the floors.

Later that evening, the grand dining room was absolutely buzzing with electric, chaotic excitement as I obediently served out the massive dinner. Every single pack member sitting at the long, polished mahogany table was eagerly talking over one another regarding the upcoming ball and what luxurious outfits they were going to wear. I even heard my father’s rare, booming laugh echo through the room at something Tinsley said. I kept my eyes firmly glued to the expensive rug beneath my torn shoes, silently moving like a ghost as I cleared the dinner plates.

As I nervously prepared to step back out of the kitchen to serve the dessert, the festive mood in the room abruptly shifted. Tinsley, heavily intoxicated by the attention and the excitement of the upcoming ball, decided to utilize the good mood to openly torture me.

"Alpha, it is such a massive relief that you wisely decided to have the Mabon Ball professionally catered, because this disgusting pig burns absolutely everything she cooks!" Tinsley complained loudly, making sure the entire table was watching her.

Before I could even register her movement, Tinsley maliciously picked up her ceramic dining plate, which still held a heavy portion of her leftover, grease-soaked lemon tilapia, and viciously threw it directly at my head. The heavy plate slammed hard against my skull, shattering instantly. Greasy fish, warm lemon butter, and sharp ceramic shards rained down my hair and face.

"Eat it off the floor, you dog," Tinsley sneered with a vicious, hateful glare, pointing her manicured finger at the mess scattered across the rug.

I knew far better than to refuse or talk back. Humiliation was always better than death. With my head bowed in total submission, I obediently crouched down onto my hands and knees. I reached my bare, chapped hands out to carefully pick up the shredded pieces of fish.

"No! Dogs don't have hands, you moron!" Tinsley screamed.

Without a single second of hesitation, Tinsley pulled her leg back and swiftly delivered a brutal, devastating kick directly into my exposed ribs. The heavy, steel-toed sole of her designer boot connected with my fragile side with catastrophic force. A sickening, incredibly loud *CRACK* echoed clearly through the sudden silence of the dining room. Searing, blinding agony instantly exploded through my chest as the bone snapped clean in half. I sharply inhaled, biting down onto my lower lip so hard that I tasted hot copper, desperately refusing to cry out or shed a tear. Showing pain only made them hit harder.

Clutching my shattered side, forced into ultimate, unimaginable degradation, I lowered my face completely to the ground. Trembling violently, I crawled over the expensive rug and began to eat the greasy, cold lemon fish directly off the dirty floor using only my mouth.

"Yeah, eat it all up like the fat, freaking pig you are! You're so fat that you killed your own brother, you worthless pig!" Tinsley taunted loudly, the entire table watching the spectacle in cruel amusement. Tinsley was rapidly picking up speed, entirely fueled by her own sadistic high.

Suddenly, I felt a massive, freezing weight slam into the top of my head. Tinsley had fully grabbed the large glass bowl containing the sticky brownie sundae I had just meticulously prepared for dessert and completely dumped it over my hair. Thick, freezing vanilla ice cream, heavy hot fudge, and chunks of dense brownie slid sickeningly down my face, mixing horribly with the greasy fish butter and the fresh blood leaking from my scalp.

"Here, little piggy! Eat it all up, you fat bitch!" Tinsley cackled, completely unsatisfied with simply humiliating me.

She violently pulled her leg back again and delivered a devastating, ruthless kick directly to my face. The sheer force of her heavy boot smashing into my nose violently snapped the cartilage once again. Blood instantly exploded from my nostrils, spraying brightly across the floor and mixing sickeningly with the melted ice cream. My vision flashed a blinding, terrifying white as I collapsed fully onto my side, clutching my face in sheer agony.

Before I could even attempt to catch my breath, Tinsley lunged forward. She grabbed me roughly by the roots of my sticky, blood-soaked hair, violently yanking my head backward so I was forced to look up at her beautiful, twisted face.

"It absolutely should have been you that died, not Elian," she spat, her venomous words cutting far deeper than any physical blow. She hawked deeply and spit her warm saliva directly into my bleeding face. Disgusted, she roughly shoved my head back down into the floor and slowly stood up, brushing her hands off.

My brain was thoroughly rattled, my vision swimming with dark spots. For a brief, disoriented moment, my scrambled mind mistakenly thought the brutal assault was finally over. Shaking violently, I planted my hands on the sticky floor and mistakenly attempted to stand up.

That simple, pathetic action instantly enraged Tinsley. She spun around with lightning speed and ruthlessly punched me directly in the stomach. All the oxygen violently rushed out of my lungs as I folded in half. Tinsley didn't stop there. She grabbed me entirely by my throat, lifting my toes off the ground as she forcefully pinned me hard against the wooden dining room wall.

I gagged violently as I felt her incredibly strong fingers tightening mercilessly around my throat. She was slowly, purposefully crushing my windpipe. My throat was absolutely on fire. My lungs screamed in sheer, agonizing panic for air that I could not pull in.

*FIGHT BACK! TEAR HER APART!* my inner wolf screamed viciously in my mind, clawing desperately at the mental barriers, begging for absolute bloodshed.

But I consciously forced my wolf down. I knew I couldn't fight back. Even if I miraculously killed Tinsley, the Alpha would torture me for weeks before finally executing me. As the oxygen entirely depleted from my brain, thick, suffocating black dots began to entirely crowd the very edges of my vision. My limbs went completely heavy. I consciously resigned myself to the encroaching darkness. I stopped fighting her iron grip and simply welcomed the end. It was finally time for me to die.

*BANG!*

The heavy, solid oak doors of the dining room suddenly burst wide open, slamming aggressively against the walls. A breathless, wide-eyed patrol warrior rushed frantically into the room, entirely disrupting the assault.

"Alpha!" the warrior gasped urgently, completely ignoring the sight of me being choked to death. "The Azure Peak Pack... they have arrived a full day early! They are at the borders right now!"

"Shit! I need to change!" Tinsley cursed in sheer, absolute panic.

She instantly dropped me. I crashed heavily onto the hard wooden floor in a pathetic, crumpled heap. Tinsley spun around wildly and practically sprinted down the hall toward her bedroom to shove herself into that red dress.

Left entirely alone on the floor, I curled into a tight ball, gasping violently for breath. My broken ribs screamed in fiery agony with every frantic heave of my lungs. I was completely covered from head to toe in a deeply humiliating, sticky mixture of leftover fish, melted ice cream, hot fudge, and my own warm blood.

Absolute chaos erupted overhead as I lay bleeding on the floor. I listened as my father scrambled in a sheer, unadulterated panic, loudly shouting orders to gather his Luna and Beta to properly and respectfully greet the terrifying surprise arrivals.

As my father rapidly rushed past my broken body toward the grand foyer, he paused for just a fraction of a second. Almost as a completely dismissive afterthought, Alpha Garrick looked down at me with utter, profound disgust.

"Clean up your disgusting mess and completely disappear out of my sight," he snarled viciously, his commanding Alpha tone vibrating through the floorboards.

Bleeding, broken, and violently gasping for oxygen, I squeezed my swollen eyes shut. He had absolutely no idea the immense, overwhelming wave of pure happiness that washed over me at that simple command. To completely disappear into the shadows was exactly what I wanted.