Chapter 2

*Dexter*

My head lifted at the sound of the creak coming from the opening door. I paused with the file I'd been reviewing in hand, waiting to see who it was. There was only one person I knew who liked to dare me by coming into my home office without knocking. Sophia. I kept my gaze fixed on her as she closed the door gently beside and strutted further into the room, coming to stand in front of my desk. One would think with the way she acted that she was my mate or something when in reality it was actually far from it.

I didn't like her.

I wasn't exactly sure I had gotten to the point where I could say that I hated her yet, but for now I was very sure that I didn't like her. I only tolerated her because of the promise I had made to my father. For some reason, despite this being the twenty-first century, my parents had felt the need to try their luck in setting up an arranged marriage. They'd gone and made a pact with one of the Alpha's of the neighboring packs, promising that I was going to get married to their only daughter. Then they died and left me with the promise to get married to her.

I guessed that I should at least be happy with their choice of words. The promise had been for me to get married to her. No one had mentioned anything about actually mating her. And we all knew it. I knew it. The council knew it. She knew it. Her family knew it. She was only still sticking around with the hopes that after we'd married, I was going to fall in love with her or some bullshit like that and then end up mating with her. It wasn't happening though.

Not in her wildest dreams.

Don't get me wrong, Sophia was a good woman. She just wasn't my type. Probably because my type was a little more like the woman I met up with in the woods every Tuesday, but that was a discussion for some other day. Speaking of the woman in the woods, yesterday had been Tuesday and for the first time since we'd silently fallen into this tradition of ours, she hadn't showed up. Which was a bummer actually because I couldn't seem to decide whether she had ghosted me by accident or if she was done with the tradition.

I was surprised that I was so bothered by it.

But more than that I was also a little bit concerned. My concern mostly stemmed from the thought that she might have gotten into trouble and there was no way I could help. If there was one thing I had come to know about her, it was that she was extremely strong willed and defiant. Other than that, I knew next to nothing else. I didn't know what pack she was from, I didn't know who her parents were or if she had any siblings. Hell, I didn't even know her name.

And she didn't know mine.

Somehow we'd both nonverbally agreed that exchanging personal information was irrelevant though I wasn't exactly sure why. The sound of a throat clearing brought me back from where I'd unconsciously wandered to. I didn't need to look at Sophia to know that she'd have an irritated look written all over her face. It wasn't my fault that I couldn't help but let my mind drift off whenever we were together. The last thing I needed was the reminder that we were supposed to be married in less than three months.

I pressed my lips together, trying not to let her see how irritated I was with her presence. I sat up straight in my seat, my gaze drifting to the closed door before coming to rest back on her. "You didn't knock before coming in." I pointed out, despite knowing within myself that there was no use. She was going to come up with some excuse as always and just do it over again.

She crossed her arms over her chest, and even though we were a few meters apart I could clearly see her trying to control her annoyance. It was times like this that I felt bad. She didn't exactly deserve to be treated the way I treated her. But then it was also times like this that I reminded myself that I'd given her the option of calling the whole arranged marriage thing off and she'd refused. That had been after I'd realized that though I couldn't call it off because of the promise my parents had made to her parents and the promise I'd made to my parents, she could.

Call it off, that is.

All she had to do was tell her parents that I was interested in getting married to her but she wasn't interested in getting married to me. It was that simple. She wasn't going to do it though. She had the thought in her head that she was in love with me and someday I was going to fall in love with her too. She hadn't ever said the words but I knew. I was certain. It was there in the way she looked at me.

She shook her head at me as she walked even closer. "I shouldn't have to knock on your office door before walking in, Dex." She stated softly. There was that name again. Dex. I wondered why she wouldn't just call me by my full name. It was almost like she felt shortening it made us a bit closer somehow. It didn't, of course. I couldn't be bothered about the way she addressed me. She could call me whatever nickname she wanted and it would still change nothing. "We're going to be married soon enough."

Yeah, all thanks to you.

I simply shrugged a shoulder in response. I knew better than to even follow the conversation. It was going to end with her telling me how I was supposed to start treating her like we were already married. The last thing I needed was to get into an argument with Sophia. "Are they here yet?" I asked, diverting the conversation. The graceful arch of her eyebrow let me know that she knew exactly what I was doing. She didn't call me on it though.

A deep exhale filled the room, as she looked at me. After a few seconds, she nodded, pushing her hair behind her ears. "Yeah, they asked me to come get you." She stated. My eyes narrowed slightly. I could hear the way her heart seemed to be beating erratically in her chest. I could see the slight flush in her cheeks. She was lying. No one had asked her to come get me. She'd probably just volunteered on her own. And If I knew the council well enough, which I did, I was willing to bet that no one had paid any attention to her words.

I didn't like her, but them? They hated her.

I just nodded slowly, choosing to not let her know that I could see right through her bullshit. It was only going to make her want to get better at covering up her lies. I'd rather she not know that I could detect them so easily. It took me a second to realize she was actually waiting for me so we could go down together. Pinching the bridge of my nose in agitation, I let the file I'd been holding slip out of my grip and fall down to the table.

I pushed my chair backwards with the back of my knee, standing to my feet and walking out the door with her right in front of me. We walked downstairs in silence after I'd locked up my office and soon enough we were seated in our designated chairs in the conference room. I took a look at the images being projected on the screen and barely stopped myself from groaning out loud. Not this pack again for the goddess's sake.

The picture of Diamond Spark Alpha was currently on the wall. I stared at the aging man, feeling all the anger and hate I'd managed to tamper down immediately boil back up to the surface. I hated him. Only seeing his picture on my wall made me want to punch something. We'd had an agreement. He'd been in trouble with one of the neighboring packs and I'd risked the lives of my pack warriors by asking that they go over to his pack and help out.

Like any other smart Alpha would, I'd made the most use of the opportunity by striking a deal with him. Only that I hadn't yet known what it was at the time. All I'd asked was that they let me extend my pack's boundary a little bit on their end since my pack seemed to be growing in population by the very day. It was no secret that the goddess had specially blessed Black Glow with everything we could possibly want.

Our werewolves were very fertile, increasing the population by thousands every mating season. We could have easily had a conversation about my proposition and come to an agreement. But he'd decided to double cross me and break the terms of our agreement instead. Rather granting me the favor I'd asked or inviting me over for a polite discussion, he'd tarnished our alliance by sending a group of pack warriors to attack my pack.

That attack had cost us a lot because we hadn't been expecting it. At first I'd been willing to spare both his Luna and him. But not after I'd heard the outrageous number of young pups that had been killed during the fall out. No one messed with the young ones in my pack and went free. Of course, the council had been in support. We'd decided that rather than launch a revenge attack on them, not wanting their own pups to be affected the way ours had been, we were going to take down everyone in the Alpha's family.

I'd gotten the job done myself to avenge those little ones who had barely had a chance to live. The Alpha had two daughters. We'd brought back one as our prisoner but only because I'd commanded it. For some reason I hadn't been able to take her life like I'd taken her parents. Maybe it was because I hadn't thought it would be a fair thing to do. Her parents had been the one who'd wronged me not her. Taking her life would simply be stooping down to their level and I'd rather have died than done that.

But still.

I was going to punish her. Killing her parents wasn't nearly enough vengeance for all the members of my pack that her parents had killed. The other daughter on the other hand seemed to be a mystery. According to the council they hadn't been able to get a single picture of her yet for us to know what she looked like. I found it very strange. How could she not have taken a single picture of herself. I knew for a fact that if she had done so we would have found it by now.

And the captive sister had chosen to not give up any detail that might help in our search for her.

I finally dragged my gaze away from the picture, taking in the expression of everyone seated around the long table. I was a little more relaxed seeing that they were as angry as I was. We were definitely going to avenge the loss we'd incurred, that I was sure of. "Shall we begin?" I asked, making sure that everyone replied in the affirmative before we started the meeting. After much deliberation we concluded that we weren't going to be bothered about the missing daughter, rather we agreed that we weren't ever letting our latest captive go.

She was our slave now whether she liked it or not.