Chapter 2 Almost free

I slipped in through the back door, hoping to avoid notice, and tugged my uniform top over my shirt as I clocked in. Their voices carried down the hall—still yelling. From what I caught, Gramps was furious that my boss wouldn’t hand my job over to my sister.

Unbelievable. The lengths he’d go to just to ruin me.

The cook caught my arm and pulled me aside.

“Hey, Nancy’s covering the front register until your grandpa clears out. Just stick with me on orders for now, alright?”

I’m five-foot-seven with a temper that flares hotter than I’d like, but today I had to keep it in check. I slipped on my hair net and gloves, falling into rhythm beside Sam as we rushed through the food orders.

“Training after work?” Sam asked.

“Yes—three times a week.” I couldn’t help the smile tugging at my lips. I was top of my class. Every pack member trained to fight, but I’d always been different. Stronger. Faster. My body was lean and toned from years of running track and relentless drills.

Alpha had held me back on purpose, telling me it was to “keep the peace” with my sister. He didn’t want anyone to see just how much better I was. “Consider it extra lessons,” he’d said with a wink.

What no one knew was that after normal sessions, he sent me to train privately with the Pack’s Elite Master Trainers, tucked away in another building where prying eyes couldn’t see.

This was my final year. When I walked across the stage to graduate school, I’d also be finishing my training. And then… my real life could begin.

I passed my sister’s training group on the way to my own. They trained in front of the building—the reserves. Their job was to stay back with the pack during an attack, guarding the shelters with the elders, children, and mothers with newborns. They didn’t have the strength to stand on the first, second, or even third line of defense.

My path led further back, to the far building where the Alpha class trained. I’d been moved up to the senior level now, the strongest of the strong. My father had once been Alpha’s Beta, and my mother the daughter of the last Alpha. Everyone knew I outshone my older sister, but my parents never flaunted it. They tried to encourage her, but she was lazy, content with excuses, while I pushed harder.

I was saving every spare dollar for graduation. To everyone else I was just a nerdy she-wolf who worked the fast-food register—nobody important, invisible beneath the grease-stained lights of the diner. My peers saw me as a clerk, a nothing. Only Alpha and my boss ever treated me like I mattered. They had my back when no one else would.

My own blood hated me for being albino. To them, I was a freak, something to whisper about. It didn’t matter that Alpha believed my mother when she said I was born in the image of the Moon Goddess—that I was special from the very first breath. He protected that truth like it was sacred.

Holidays made my chest tighten. Family photos. Forced smiles. I hated being in them, and nobody fought me on it—least of all Grampa. He made sure everyone knew where I stood.

Next to them, I was a sore thumb. I used training as my excuse, telling everyone I needed extra help because I was falling behind. That lie made Grampa happy—he loved the thought of me failing.

The truth was different. Alpha had given me those extra sessions because he wanted me sharpened into his top warrior. Training was my escape, my freedom from the torture of family photos and hollow smiles. I owed him everything. In many ways, he was more of a father to me than anyone else had ever been. I knew he’d been in love with my mother—I saw it in the way his eyes lit up at the mere mention of her name.

Lycans didn’t need much sleep. Sleep was for those who felt safe in their homes. I didn’t. Most mornings I was gone before anyone else woke up, slipping out the door before breakfast, before the family drama could suffocate me again.

My sister lived to torment me, especially when she had her friends at her side. She had the perfect little life—Lucas, the golden-boy quarterback, and her spot on the cheer squad. I never went to the games. I always made sure I was scheduled to work, but that never stopped them. After the final whistle, they’d all come crowding into the diner just to sneer at me from across the counter.

Sam always noticed. He’d pull me into the back, handing me an apron and asking for help with orders. He knew exactly what was happening, and he tried to shield me in the only way he could.

Sarah loved to threaten me. “One day I’ll have you thrown out of the pack,” she’d hiss, like she already had the power. I never gave her the satisfaction of a reaction. I’d just smile, because I knew the truth: Alpha would never let that happen. I’d never be a rogue.

She called me an embarrassment to the pack, but Alpha said I was the blessing that kept us in the Moon Goddess’s favor. She didn’t know I was the Moon Goddess’s mirror—my face a reflection of her own. She didn’t know about the gifts the goddess had sewn into me at birth. No one knew. I’d thought about telling Alpha, but the night before I’d dreamed the Moon Goddess herself told me to be silent—“Not yet,” she’d whispered.

As I was slipping my coat on to leave, outside in the alley behind the diner, a voice threaded through my head like a thread of cold air.

*hi Alora*

I froze. Could it be? I’d dreamed of the day my Lycan would reveal herself to me—was it finally happening?