01

Scarlet's POV

The day I found my mate was the same day I lost him.

The rain came down in full force, pounding like war drums from heaven. The pavements were wet and slippery, and the path was dark. The thunder rumbled in the skies in a loud, threatening noise.

I pulled my hoodie over my head, the damp fabric clinging to my body. But I didn't care, all I wanted and all I could think of was seeing him again. 

Him, as in Roman Lucero.

My best friend Emma’s boyfriend. Son of our Pack’s Alpha. And now, somehow, my mate.

Today was my eighteenth birthday, and the three of us had planned on celebrating it in style. When Roman didn't show up, Emma and I waited for a few more hours, and when he finally did, I found out something dreadful. 

Roman was my mate! 

I hadn't expected him to be. I couldn't have. He was my best friend's boyfriend. 

He looked at me—right through me—then turned and walked away.

I didn’t chase him. I couldn’t. Not with Emma standing beside me. But my wolf stirred violently inside me, demanding I follow, demanding answers.

When I got home, it was empty. My parents were running an errand for the Alpha. I wasn’t an only child. I have a sister, but I wasn’t allowed to talk about her.

I tried to make dinner, but it ended up as a disaster because my hands wouldn't stop shaking violently, so I went up to my room to at least get some sleep. I’d always fantasized about meeting my mate. The slow motion moment, the powerful yet intimate scent, the fluttering kisses that follow, and of course, the happy ever after.

But not like this. Not when he belonged to someone else. Not when my heart had no permission to want him.

Maybe tomorrow, he'd talk to me. He couldn’t possibly ignore the matebond now, could he?

A loud thunderstorm startled me. The lightning brightened up my room for a few seconds, and I thought I saw someone jumping over my window ledge. A shiver ran down my spine when I heard a slight movement across the room. It sounded like a damp footstep.

“Who’s there?”

I reached for the lamp and knocked it over instead. It shattered. I screamed.

A hand clasped over my mouth, making me swallow my scream. An intoxicating yet powerful scent hit me, and I realized who it was.

“Roman,” I gasped once he released me. He turned on the light in my room himself and plopped over to the edge of the bed as though he’d been in here a million times, even though it was his first time.

I took a good look at his face. He was bruised. Not just bruised, but wounded as though he had fought with a wild animal. The wounds were brutal, almost disfiguring his handsome face. What the hell happened to him?

He stared at me too, holding my gaze as though I were the most important person in the world.

“You need to treat that,” I told him when I couldn’t think of any other thing to say.

He didn’t answer, he just shrugged. He kept on staring at the wall as though something interested him about it. Roman wasn’t one for many words, even Emma confirmed this. Somehow, I was still bothered about his wounds.

“What are you doing here, Roman?”

He turned his gaze away from the wall and stared at me instead.

“I just wanted to see you,” He whispered, his words sending my heart into a spiral.

That got me excited. Did he want to talk about the mate bond? Is that it? He never ignored me, did he?

“You know what we are, right?” He asked. With a wild smile on my face and a relieved heart, I nodded with hope. We were mates, nothing else mattered. Not even the way he ignored me earlier.

I placed my hand over his palm, and a strange expression crossed his face while I could feel goosebumps run from my palm up to my hand. I pushed my face closer to his and I kissed him.

It was just a peck. A kiss that didn’t last for more than a second. I kissed him because I wanted to.

“I shouldn’t have done that, it was stupid,” I quickly apologized once I saw the look on his face.

Roman let out a deep breath as though he had been carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. He wasn’t as rigid as he was earlier. His beautiful eyes bore into mine, and I felt my breath caught up in a storm.

He moved closer to me and gently placed his hand at the back of my neck. His lips hovered over mine as he kept staring at me, not breaking eye contact. His wound was already healing up, but they left some ugly blue patches behind.

I wanted to ask him what happened, but his next words made me forget about everything in the world.

“No regrets, right?” He asked. Even though I didn’t understand, I still nodded, and just like that, he captured my lips with his.

Roman pressed my back into the mattress, his mouth trailing heat down my neck. I moved my fingers to his hair, and my breath hitched as his body moved over mine, slow and deliberate like he was savoring every moment. As for me, every tiny detail was getting etched into my brain. It was my first time, and I was glad it was with someone I would be building a life with forever.

I gasped softly as the intimacy between us built gradually. It became more raw, more intense. The way he looked at me made me feel special. I felt as though I was the best thing in his world.

Once we were done, he held me close like he would never let me go. I was happy.

The next time my eyes opened, it was from a nightmare. I dreamt that Roman left after rejecting me. I turned to my side and reached out to him, only to realize it was empty and all he’d left behind was a piece of paper.

It read: “I’m sorry!” and at the back of the paper: “We’re too broken, Red.”

My wolf recoiled to the back of my mind from the coldness that seeped from Roman’s side of the bed. He’d been gone for several hours.

Tears ran down my face as I crumpled the piece of paper between my palms and tried to hold back from wailing.

I was so stupid that I made a fool out of myself. He had the guts to call me Red even after he used and dumped me.

Maybe this was a prank. Maybe Roman would turn up later.

I was wrong!

The next day, every member of his family turned up dead except for Roman, who went missing and was accused of being the murderer. 

Even though I saw Roman that night and he didn’t look like someone who’d committed not one but two murders, I didn't say a word, out of hatred and pain.

I let them believe what they wanted.

I made Roman into the monster they already thought him to be.

Because maybe, he was.