CHAPTER THREE

KARLA'S POV

Lance had given me thirty minutes, enough to find my mate if he truly was here. Considering how filled up this would be, everyone who was eligible would be here.

I hung back in the dark trying to find my friend, Layla. The last time I saw her was shortly before I found my wolf, and I was desperate to see what her wolf ranked.

Despite having limited time, I was hesitant to go mingle for fear that someone would mock me for my weak wolf. After ten minutes without seeing my friend, I decided to join the party when a delicious smell wafted up my nose. Zeal, who had been moody all morning, perked up.

"Where was that delicious smell coming from?" I swooned. It suddenly clicked in my head that it might be coming from my mate. Promptly, Zeal whined, "Mate."

My pulse leaped in excitement at the prospect of finding the one person in the world that was made just for me. Seeing as the scent was so deep and strong, it must be a beta. I wouldn't dare dream that I would mate with someone with an alpha gene. Maybe now, my father would be proud that I married up.

I followed the smell through the crowd. I was so wrapped up in the scent that I didn't even notice that the crowd was parting before me. The smell was only getting stronger until I finally looked up to see whom I had bumped into.

My soul would have left my body if such a thing was possible when I locked eyes with the last person I ever wanted to have anything with. Aiden. Alpha Aiden.

He stared down at me with the familiar disgust that was in his eyes when I had the misfortune of bumping into him in the pack. Alpha Aiden was my biggest bully in the pack. I took several steps back when I found that the disgust in his eyes had another layer to it tonight.

"A... Alpha Aiden." I stuttered out, and his only response was to sneer.

"It isn't possible." He growled, and I blinked. What was he talking about?

"Alpha, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to bump into you." I hurriedly apologized. I wouldn’t put it past him to actually ban me from the Moon Goddess Festival.

"No, it can't be." He said again. Zeal finally put me out of my confusion when she said, "Mate." It was my turn to shake my head in denial. Aiden couldn't be my mate. Surely, the moon goddess wouldn't be so uncaring.

In a normal pack setting, the alpha would be the most eligible man in the pack, but not in ours. It was an open secret that Alpha Aiden was not interested in having a Luna. He only wanted to find his mate so he could make her his permanent mistress.

"I don't need a woman with a Beta or Gamma blood to taint my Alpha blood." He would often say.

No one would dare mention to him that his own mother was a Beta. If there was a woman with the wolf of an Alpha, he would have claimed her in an instant, but unfortunately for him, only males had Alpha blood in the Blue Moon pack. He had made it clear that he had no intention of making anyone Luna for fear of giving another family power.

Ever since he became Alpha, families with eligible daughters would make prayers to the moon goddess to not make their daughters the Alpha's mate.

I was not even surprised that I had the bad luck of being his mate. Why would the moon goddess decide to favor me now? I thought to myself sarcastically. Aside from the fact that Aiden was an Alpha who enjoyed seeing his pack members tremble out of fear for him, there was another reason I was convinced that the Moon Goddess had a score to settle with me.

I had downplayed how close Ace and I had been before his exile. We were really close, inseparable really. Even after he started going through more intense training in preparation for his Alpha status, he would still find time to come see me. I adored him and followed him around like a puppy. Sometimes, I would wait in the pack house while he was busy, it was during times like this that I would run into Aiden.

For some reason, he had decided that he hated me on sight. Later, I found out he hated me because I had chosen his brother over him, too, and that didn't sit well with him.

I didn't find out the extent of his hatred for me until Ace was exiled and he became Alpha. He would go out of his way to seek me out to bully me.

He must have thought about all these too because the smirk that graced his face was downright cruel. I know he would find a way to make this sacred bond between us into something to hurt me.

Aiden was cruel like that. In that moment, I made a decision. I had two options: to go back to my father's basement, where he would prod me to find out why I turned out this way, or be mated to this monster. It was easy, my father's house it was...

Before I could announce my decision to reject him, his mouth twisted up in a disgusted smirk. "You're an Omega, Karla." Now, he would hold this over my head.

"Alpha Aiden, I, Karla..."

He cut in immediately he sensed my intentions. "I, Alpha Aiden of Blue Moon pack, reject you, Omega Karla, as my mate." He boomed, and the crowd booed in response. My wolf whimpered, and I felt like curling into a ball at the powerful pain that rolled through me, but he wasn't done. "For daring to come out as an omega and my mate, you will spend the rest of your days in the dungeons."

I decided to run.