TALIA I woke the next morning feeling like myself again, dread coming over me. And I thought the first time I went into heat had been a disaster. Yesterday had been even worse. I had not only completely embarrassed myself, but I had also caused so much pain to everyone around me. That was not at all how I imagined sending the text message to Blake would go. And, God, that car ride home. If hell was a place on earth—that car ride was only a slight improvement to being tortured by the crazy bitch. I didn’t even want to leave my room to go to the washroom, fearing I might bump into Blake or, worse, Jasmine. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to look anyone who was in that living room yesterday in the eye again. And, God, the pain I felt when Alex looked at me. I could sense his emotions so strongly, as if they were my own. His heart had broken right in front of me. I wanted to leave him, but I never imagined he would feel like that when I did. I could still feel the aching in my chest, as

TALIA After dinner, Luke drove us a half hour outside the pack, to a casino, with Libby in her car seat next to me. She was being uncharacteristically quiet, which was very nice. As Lucy was about to get out, she leaned in to kiss Luke and he said, “I’ll have my ringer on, baby, so call me if you need anything.” “We’ll take a taxi home, baby,” Lucy replied. She then leaned her whole body into the back to kiss Libby on the forehead and got out. Once Luke’s car pulled away, Lucy led me inside. “It’s thirsty Thursday!” she exclaimed. “The club in here is small, but it’s not bad. Unfortunately, it’s closed on Thursdays. But that’s okay. We can go to the Chinese restaurant. They have a great bar scene.” “Don’t you have to be twenty-one to drink in the US?” I asked. “I have a hookup.” Lucy smirked, handing me a card. “Texas? This doesn’t even look like me!” I said looking at the fake ID Lucy had handed me. “Trust me, they don’t care. Just make a bunch of eye contact and flirt a lot. Al

TALIA True to her word, Lucy began to help me piece my identity back together. First, she took me down to the town hall that housed my birth certificate on Friday. The office was fortunately empty that day, so we were able to walk right up to the desk, where a man that probably wasn't older than twenty-five greeted us. With no hesitation, Lucy leaned forward on the front desk, allowing her top to fall open and reveal the lacy bra adorning her cleavage. She shamelessly flirted with the young man helping us, allowing her fingers to touch his bicep. He was helpless under the spell of her attention. I couldn't blame him. Lucy was very beautiful with a long, lean body, and perfectly silky blonde hair. And, damn, that girl knew how to flirt! Before long, he had produced a brand-new birth certificate for me, which I clutched to my heart. When we returned home we spent time emailing all the schools I'd attended in Canada for records of attendance, so I’d have proof of living long-term outsid

BLAKE After the trip to the Pine Forest Pack, things seemed to be back to normal with Jasmine and me. Between our work and training schedules, we didn’t have much time to meet up, but Jasmine seemed to have forgiven me. After almost a week of mostly text conversations and quick meetups just to bring her coffee before training, I was looking forward to seeing her later that night when she’d be over for dinner. It was a Tuesday, and Luke and I were, once again, seated across from each other in the office, catching up on our paperwork. After my father passed, my work had practically doubled, now that I was also in charge of the casino. Fortunately, the casino had a whole management team, so my job was mostly just oversight. But there were still constantly decisions to be made, and I had to keep tabs on what was going on to make sure things weren’t getting mismanaged, especially since the pack relied on the casino’s income to stay afloat. “Hey, Blake,” Luke called out to me. “Yeah?” I

TALIA It had been two weeks since I’d joined Blake’s pack, and the dread in the pit of my stomach was getting worse. I’d been completely avoiding the situation with Hugo and Alex. We were in early November, and it was now cold enough to require a coat when I went outside. I’d finally be moving out of the packhouse and into my new apartment in less than a week. For now, I was saving money so that I could afford some furniture once I moved, even if it was just some random old furniture people posted for sale in the pack F******k group. I at least wanted to buy myself a new mattress. I was grossed out by the idea of sleeping on a used one. I was still able to use the Wi-Fi on my phone, so it wasn’t a complete brick. Not that it was easy to find places with Wi-Fi around here, but both the packhouse and the café had it. It wasn’t always super reliable, but it got the job done. I could easily try to reach out to Hugo again through an I*******m DM, but then I was ashamed that I had promised