Chapter 3

Jacob POV

At first, I was a little worried about this party. There seemed to be a lot of younger kids here, but like Kevin had said, it was a public beach area. That started to change as the night went on and the younger ones started to leave. Some of them still looked as if they weren’t even in high school yet, but it is hard to tell their age by firelight. What has me on edge are the ones that, no matter the light, you can tell they are well past the high school age, and in the case of a few of them I’ve seen here, they are well past the average college age.

I don’t know if it is the natural protective Alpha instincts that are working, but I’ve been keeping an eye on one in particular. He is even on Coal’s radar. Who, I might add, is still hyped up. Coal has just gotten worse since we got here. So now I don’t know if it is the possibility of what this guy is going to do or something else altogether. I asked Ben and Zane when we arrived if either of their wolves seemed to be… acting up. Both said that their wolves, Slate and Tank, were fine, but if that changed, they would let me know.

I was sitting talking with Kevin when he suddenly went silent and stiffened up. “What is it?” I ask, thinking that maybe one of the guys that I had noticed earlier was acting inappropriately. But as I followed his line of sight, I saw two girls step out of the tree line off the path that leads to the parking lot. One is tall, 5’10” maybe taller. She has short dark blond hair and the body of an athlete. Very nice to look at, but it’s the other one that gets my attention. She is at least 5” shorter than her friend and on the heavier side. She has long, jet black hair and even from here, I can see that she has beautiful blue eyes. I am willing to admit to the fact that as I watched her nice, round, well-filled out hips sway, my pants started to get a little tight in areas. Trailing my eyes up from her hips, I noticed that she only had a small dip at her waist before continuing up to her breasts. Her breasts weren’t huge, but they were definitely not on the small size either. I know most guys wouldn’t even give her a second look. Maybe it’s because I’m a larger guy myself at 6’2”, 260lbs of solid muscle. Hey, that is kind of how it works with healthy werewolf genes, but I find that I have always been more attracted to larger women. Someone solid. Someone I can wrap my arms around without the fear of breaking them. Someone like her. Her presence has even gotten Cole’s attention. I can feel him pushing forward to get a better look himself. He and I watch closely with enough interest that could be counted as broader line creepy as the girls make their way over to the coolers filled with drinks.

“I think our dream girls just arrived,” Ben says as he steps up beside the bench I’m sitting on. He knows right away which one got my attention, and I’ve known him long enough to know the blond caught his eye. Now that I take a closer look at her, she kind of reminds me of the girl back home that Ben, until recently, had been crushing on. Unfortunately, Alexa is more beautiful on the outside than the inside. I know Ben will never admit it, but it tore him up when he had to put his feelings for her aside for the good of the pack. Alexa is too selfish to make a good-ranked wolf. She would not have been good as our Gamma female or made a good partner for Ben. I wish it hadn’t had to be like that, though.

“Well, it’s time to introduce myself to my future mate,” Ben says as he starts to step forward.

“Which one?” Came the low growled question from Kevin as he stood up. I stood as well.

“The blond…” Ben starts to answer as Kevin lets out another growl. “…but if she is kind of spoken for, that’s fine too.” Ben finishes and steps back behind me out of Kevin’s line of sight. Now, don’t think that because Ben backed down so quickly that he is scared. He just understands when to push an issue and when to step back. This is one of those times. Kevin obviously has some sort of feeling towards her, and Ben will not get in the way of that.

“Just ignore him…” Says Duke, the future Alpha of this pack. He is about a year older than us, but we met him last year at Alpha training. He was in his last year and just graduated this past June. Duke had his arm around his mate, a woman named Trish. “…he had his chance and fucked it up.”

Kevin let out another growl. “I did it for her own good,” Kevin says with another growl.

“Shut up, Kevin. Tell yourself what you want, but you know you fucked up.” Trish says.

Kevin drops his head forward, mumbles something and walks away. Duke watched him for a few seconds, then turned back to us. “Ben, I’m not going to tell you to stay away from her, but…”

“No, I get it,” Ben answers. “She might have told him to get lost, but that doesn’t mean his wolf has accepted it yet. I’m not here to stir up shit.”

“Her friend, on the other hand,” Trish says, looking at me. “Now she is another story. Her name is Raven. She comes from one of the poorer families in the area, but she is the sweetest girl you could ever meet. And smart, she turned seventeen about six months ago and graduated from high school a full year early. She got accepted to her top pick of college with a full scholarship.”

I give Trish a confused look. OK, yes, this girl caught my eye, but Trish is making it sound like I signed up for some kind of dating service.

“How the hell do you know all this?” Duke asked, pulling Trish closer to him.

“Well, that dumbass…” Trish says, pointing in the direction Kevin walked off in. “…may think that he has fucked things up with Sara, which he did. But your smart, beautiful and caring mate may have explained some things to her. And explained them in a way that if he ever gets his head out of his ass and grows a pair, he may have another chance with her.”

“I love you, but the way your mind works scares me sometimes,” Duke says, kissing the top of Trish’s head.

“Wait, so she knows what we are?” I asked.

Trish starts shaking her head. “Oh hell no. I just explained there were some things about Kevin’s upbringing that make him do some stupid things before thinking everything through. He can be the one to explain what we are. That is all on him.