Willow

Chapter 17: Awful habits

After leaving the winter garden and the crown prince, I went to my room to calm down and assess my thoughts. It didn't work. To any being without a soulmate, it would probably seem as if I was overreacting because I'd just met the guy. But to a wolf, their mate was their everything. And just this afternoon we'd worked on strengthening our bond. So to see him attached to a female, one who he had a past with, and one with characteristics he might find desirable, it was driving both me and Violet wild. So when dinner came around I sat stiffly next to a chattering princess, trying to control the urge to bite her head off. I didn't dare look at the individual across from me, and his betas wisely didn't try to converse with me. Ray sensed my brooding and knew better than to prod, so focused on his mate instead.

I retired to my room straight after dinner and decided to focus on getting some work done. I pulled open my laptop and started responding to emails from both work and the pack. After going through the office files Maddy sent me and approving and rejecting deals that had been sent in, I decided to call my gamma. 

"Hello?" Collin answered sleepily.

"Hello Collin," I replied, "I need you to update me on the happenings in the pack."

"You know that it's like five something in the morning on this side of the world yeah?" he grumbled.

"Not in the mood, Col. Pack update. Now." I demanded, trying my hardest not to take my frustrations out on my Gamma. Oh well, it was happening anyway. 

"Selene, what crawled up your pjs?" he muttered before quickly continuing, "Well since you've been gone we've had to deal with five transfers. Two were due to finding mates and the other three were wanderers," Wanderers were pack members that wished to live among humans, "they were dealt with and they'll arrive in a month to officially end the pack bond when you get and Ray get back. We have seven requests of wolves to join the pack and your guy, Calvin, helped me run background checks on them and besides the three that were shady, we took in the rest. There were no rogue sightings except some kid who said he caught a wiff, and the nursery is complete and the teachers you hired arrived safely. Uhh, yeah that's about it."

"That's great Collin. Send me the files of the members that left and joined. I want to go through them. Also re-arrange the patrols. I don't care if it was a wiff, we still need to be careful," I ordered and then decided I needed to chill, "How are you and Sienna?"

"We're all good Willow, she's still teasing me about challenging you but all good," he said chuckling and then almost tentatively asked, "What's up? You don't sound too good."

I sighed deciding I needed to vent, "Get Sienna on the line too, I'm not explaining this twice."

"Bitch I was hear and waiting for you to call me!" Sienna hollered in making me laugh momentarily. But remembering what I had to explain I sobered up.

"I found my mate," I stated as directly as I could.

"WHAT?!!! AND YOU TELL ME NOW!!" Sienna screeched and I had to move the phone away from my ear, "Who is it? Is he hot? Tell me now! Ray said he found his but he didn't tell me you found yours! I'm going to wring that bastard's head-"

"Sienna! Calm! Can you remain quiet till I'm done?" I commanded and sighed in relief at the silence, "He's Alpha Wolfsbane from the neighboring pack. He and I- we got off on the wrong foot. He was mad because I'd refused a meeting between the packs because of- because of my trauma. And in the heat of the moment I ran from him, which I admit wasn't my best move. He threatened to mark me and that triggered one of my panic attacks and after that- oh for Selene's sake, the outline is that it was shit in the beginning but we got to an agreement and everything was fine for like half a day, and then he goes and has the princess of all people wrapped around his arm. You can imagine how that made me feel."