Caph crossed his arms across his chest.Ran noticed what he wasn't wearing a shirt for the first time. His lean and muscular torso was bare and tempting.For some reason, she felt her cheeks heat up.Caph grinned even wider. 'Does it bother you? That our arrangement has everyone fooled?'Unconsciously, she took a step back. 'That's not what I–.'He tilted his head. 'Then what's the problem? Do you like me?'The memory of Caph's hand on her face came to her mind. She remembered the electric touch when he gently swept her hair behind her ear and the glowing warmth of his blue eyes on her.The same pair of eyes were fixed on her now, but they were taunting.Ran shoved him away from her and stormed out of this room, yelling, 'No way!'Why had she come to him for help in quelling the rumours? They were proof that everyone believed their arrangement was real.Ran refused to talk to Caph until the next Full Moon Gathering. With all the rumours about them flying around, there was no need to ex
Ran kept her face as impassive as she could but it was difficult to control the blood rushing to her head.Ran glanced at Caph who smiled proudly, his hands in his jean pockets, unperturbed.Did he realise how grave their situation had become?They had to up improve their act and reassure Acamar of her obedience so that he'd calm down and not marry her off raashly!Either way, it was an official engagement now.Their act had to be flawless.The First Shifting Ceremony passed by in a blur. The bonfire was lit and music blasted from large, ancient-looking speakers. Werewolves began to mingle and boisterous conversations echoed through the clearing. People were downing cups of cow's blood so they'd have enough strength to party through the night.Usually, Ran would retreat from the clearing to her secret place to do some stargazing. But because of her uncle's announcement, people kept coming up to her to congratulate them. She noticed Acamar's eyes on her in the distance, dark gaze daring
'I'm not trying. It's just what it looks like when I'm trying to be nice.''That's even worse,' Ran said drily. An unusually serious expression came over him. His eyes glowed blue again for a moment. Static crackled ominously between them.'Have you heard about bonded mates?'.She took another sip to distract herself from the change in atmosphere, but her cup was empty.'It was a thing in the past. Sort of like werewolf soulmates.'Caph nodded. His eyes turned green as he turned to explain, 'Yeah. Our ancestors used to only marry their bonded mates. But we don't do it anymore. Because there's too many werewolves, too many packs now.'Where was he going with this?Was he implying that he was looking for his bonded mate?Was that why he accepted her proposal of a fake arrangement?'Yes,' he answered her thoughts. His green eyes pulling her in like quicksand.He was flirting with her again! There's no way to make him have a serious conversation with her.Ran brought her empty cup to her
Caph was a fast learner.In the day, he followed Acamar to various parts of Punggol and learned about every inch of Eridanus's territory. In the evening, he would hole up with Ran in her father's study for what Cass dubbed 'couple time'.As much as Ran disliked the thought of Cass coming up with more illicit rumours to spread about the both of them, she needed the cover it unwittingly gave her to show Caph what her father had been up to without her uncle getting suspicious.'He was not a brute force kind of person,' she said, unrolling a large ancient-looking map on the darkwood desk. 'He preferred to talk instead of fight, which you know is unusual for a werewolf.'Caph smiled. He peered over her shoulder at the map, his warm breath making her neck tingle.She resisted the urge to elbow him backward.'My father would negotiate with both werewolf and human, instead of burning bridges and declaring war. As a result, Eridanus territory shrank over the years. He gave up disputed land to t
One evening, Caph found Ran in the study surrounded by a pile of books on the floor, frantically flipping through pages in search for something.He was late tonight, which would usually make her snappy, but today she was too preoccupied to even notice his presence in the room.She flipped to the end of her book without finding what she was looking for, grumbling to herself in annoyance. Then, she dumped it unceremoniously on a wobbling tower of books behind her and repeated the process with the next book on the shelf.'What are you doing?' he asked. Usually, she handled the books in her father's study like they were ancient relics.Ran slammed the book in her hands shut and growled.It was banished to the top of the highest stack.'Searching.' She pulled out another book and began leafing through the pages at a rapid rate, crinkling the yellowed pages as she went.Caph crouched next to her, taking in her flustered and bristling profile. 'For your father's collection of erotic books?' H
Ran didn't expect Caph to notice the subtle change in her demeanour, much less pinpoint the exact cause of her anxiety.Werewolves could sense a person's emotions more easily than humans but they often ignored such sensations and considered them a distraction from the important stuff.Having the ability to see something didn't necessarily mean you would pay attention to it.But Caph noticed and did not brush aside her frantic overturning of her father's study as something meaningless.He also noticed that she missed a prime opportunity to make sarcastic remarks about him.'It's my first time going,' she answered gruffly. 'I wasn't Beta yet four years ago.''You'll be fine,' Caph said, resting one hand on her shoulder.Ran glanced up at him to check if he meant it.He did.His blue eyes were glowing with pride.'These past two weeks, I've been learning about what your pack has accomplished here in Punggol. Every member of your pack I spoke to thinks highly of you. You have done a lot fo
Dingo was once a member of the Eridanus pack.And when Ran was ten, she declared that she would marry him.After the rogue attack, Dingo vanished. He was an orphan. His mother died at childbirth and his father had long been banished from the pack, so the previous Alpha raised Dingo alongside Ran.He had been the one everybody thought would become the next Alpha.Ran also liked him very much.They were inseparable—until the attack.The pack mourned him just like they mourned her parents.Yet here he was, alive and well, in the arms of another woman.Ran frowned. Surely she was mistaken. Maybe she was still asleep.She had not seen Dingo for ten years. How could she be sure the man before her was her childhood sweetheart?He might be some other werewolf named Dingo.But the woman clearly called Ran his first love.And his chocolate brown eyes were the same as the ones in her memory.Uh well...in the memory she boxed up, locked three times and threw into the furthest depths of her brain t
The ballroom was sparsely decorated. Aesthetics was wasted on werewolves after all.Chandeliers lit up every inch of the large space and there was a buffet running through the middle of the hall. Unlike the tables at Septrion County's Full Moon Gathering, these tables were firm and tall although they stood on slender metal legs. They were draped with white satin cloth and laden with dishes in neat silver compartments.It was extravagant.But that was to be expected. Every pack contributed to the Summit funds after all.It was the one day every four years that werewolves celebrated the flourishing of their kind after all.'Close your mouth,' Caph whispered.Ran clenched her teeth and scowled at him. 'It's already closed! Close your own.'He grinned at her.He said that to get her to relax.She took a deep breath. Caph held up the gift bags in his other hand. 'Where do we start?'Ran recalled her father's notes and Acamar's instructions.First, they greeted the Alphas from their own coun