Alexa's PoV
Reluctantly, I slowly opened my eyes to reveal the unfamiliar room that appeared before me. My eyes wandered around as I blinked, trying to adjust to the brightness.
I thought back to what happened, I had come to find Max and now I was lying on a couch. I looked around the living room just as he came in through the door.
"Here," he handed me some water and painkillers. "How are you feeling?"
His voice seemed to have softened, the genuine concern in it was apparent causing warmth to spread over me.
"I want answers." I got straight to the point, after swallowing the blue and white pills.
He pressed his lips into a thin line, as though he was considering what to do.
"I can't do that here, not now."
"Why not!" I was starting to get annoyed, I need answers.
He grabbed his head as though my raised voice caused it pain.
"Because the guys could get back at any moment and you can't be seen here. How about this," he considered. "You come with me, outside, and if by the end of the day you still want to know, I'll tell you everything."
Wait the guys? How many lived here? Actually, the house was huge, even bigger than Cathy's so it would make sense if he lived with the others.
That wasn't the point though, he thought I would change my mind by the end of the day? Everything was so confusing, what did he know that I didn't?
"Okay." I simply agreed.
He walked to the door. "Let's go."
I followed him outside.
"Where are we going?" We only have several hours until the end of the day.
"To a shop."
A shop?
We took a different bus which took us to the center of the city.
He walked at a quick pace down some small, grey alleyways. We arrived at a tiny shop that looked like some small convenience store. A bell rung as he walked in, not bothering to see if I was following him.
The same sound echoed around the shop as I walked in, to see a tall man come from the back of it. He was wearing some old clothes with a few rips on them, and some grey jeans as he walked forward to hug Max.
"Hey, how are you doing?" The tall man said, with a deep voice.
"Good thanks, how's everything here?"
"The business isn't doing well to be honest." The man said, scratching the back of his head.
"Anyways, you better get started, you're late." He motioned to the counter, "not that I'm surprised though." He muttered the last part.
As Max moved to the back door, the tall man's eyes landed on me. "Who's this?" He had an amusing glint in his eyes.
"Alexa, she'll be helping out." He replied shortly.
"Ah, I thought Max had finally changed and got himself a girlfriend." He smiled, "Sorry, I'm Chris. It's nice to meet you though." Chris shook my hand enthusiastically.
"Nice to meet you too." I smiled back.
"Anyways, if you just help with shelving those items over there in that box." He motioned to a package.
I nodded whilst advancing to open it.
There were a few items including toothbrushes, and shampoo, but also food like potatoes and ham.
I picked up some of them and walked over to the cold section where the ham was stored.
I turned back to see Max smile at some customers that had bought some food. There was a small child, a girl who was holding an ice cream which was about to melt and fall over.
Just as I had predicted, the ice cream fell with a splat onto the floor. The girl started crying, staring at her strawberry ball on the dirty floor.
Unexpectedly, Max walked around the counter and opened a freezer to take out a vanilla and strawberry ice cream. He got down kneeling so that he could look into the girl's eyes. His lips stretched into a smile as he handed to girl the ice cream whilst saying something.
The girl's eyes immediately brightened up as she stared at the ice cream, whilst Max handed it to her.
The parents looked at each other, and then gratefully thanked Max as they paid and gave him a tip.
He thanked them and told them to come again.
I never expected that side to him, but something about the gentle way he had looked at that girl made my heart skip a beat.
~~~~~
"All done!" I exclaimed, staring at the empty boxes.
"Good, let's go." He waved at Chris and motioned for the door as I followed him.
"Bye Chris!" I shouted back.
"It was nice having you." He laughed, watching Max drag me out of the shop as I was taking too long.
I looked at him as he was walking. He didn't make an attempt at trying to change my mind about knowing more, instead he had brought me to help out at a shop.
"Where are you taking me now?" I questioned, crossing my arms.
"That girl made me want ice cream." He grinned.
"I still want to know what that was that night. You just left me there!"
"It's not like you should be surprised. You're probably more confused about.. Nevermind."
He was right, those emotions were bothering me more than why he left, but how did he know?
"Ace told me to go see you? Why?"
"I told you I'd tell you later, stop ruining my mood."
"Me? Ruining your mood, are you serious."
I had stopped walking, shocked by his attitude. He, however, had continued walking, I had to run to catch up to him.
"Hey wait up you jerk!".
"Ow." I grabbed my head, at the same time Max stumbled grabbing onto the side wall.
"Dammit," he muttered. "Are you ok?"
"Yeah, this headache's been killing me."
"Come on, calm down. I'll tell you later."
"You better."
He chuckled. "We're here."
He brought me into the pink ice cream shop, the cold from the freezer made me shiver. Why were we getting ice cream in the middle of September?
"Maxy, good to see you!" An old woman exclaimed.
Since when was Max so popular?
Maxy? Oh this was great. I had something to tease him about.
"Hey Penny, how are you." He greeted the old woman.
"Oh you know, not well, you're the only cute guy to come visit my shop, there was this one man, he had come from playing golf, we started talking but then all he did was complain about his sore back. Wasn't good enough of a man for me." I laughed at that.
"I like her." I looked at Max.
He shook his head with a smile.
"The usual? Ah and who's this young lady?"
"Hi I'm Alexa." I gave her a smile, looking at all the flavours.
"Nice to meet you I'm Penelope but call me Penny, any friend of Max's is my friend. "
I smiled whilst Max nodded as Penny started to get him a triple cone of chocolate, strawberry and vanilla. My jaw hung open. "You're going to eat all of that?"
"So? I can't even get ice cream without you having to comment. It's not like I need your approval." Max retorted.
Penny smacked him on the head. "Is that how you talk to a girl Max! Especially the first to actually be able to deal with you."
"Hey!" He grumpily picked up his ice cream mountain and went to sit down.
"Ignore him, what would you like?" She addressed me.
"I'll have rasberry and caramel please." I pointed at my favourite flavours.
"Coming right up." she gave me the scoops with a smile. "Dont pay much attention to him, you're the first girl he has brought here you know. I'm happy to see him actually talking for once."
I looked at Max. I'm the first he's brought? So he's not a player? That's probably a good thing.
I thanked Penny and went to sit down next to Max who was happily eating his ice cream.
I wanted to know about him, and the different sides he kept showing today.
"So.... Maxy, what's with all the places you dragged me to today?" I teased, a sly smirk playing on my face.
He frowned. "Don't you dare call me that."
"Oh come on don't be so uptight... Maxy."
"Oh you've done it now." He reached over to flick my head.
"Ow!" I grabbed the new throbbing spot.
"Should've just shut up when I told her to."
"Whatever." I disregarded his attitude and took a bite of my ice cream. "Oh my God this is so good." My eyes widened.
I started gobbling down the ice cream letting the flavours invade my mouth.
Max stared at me "You're such a kid." He smiled.
"Hey, what's that supposed to mean?" I tried to speak, my cheeks stuffed with ice cream.
He leaned closer, making me swallow the ice cream quickly due to the proximity. His thumb brushed the corner of my lip, wiping some ice cream away.
His touch sent electricity throughout my body, my cheeks heating up from the motion.
"Are you finished?" He pulled away. "There's still one place I want to go."
I cleared my throat. "Yeah sure, let's go." "Wait! I'm paying though."
"Don't, I'm the one who 'dragged you here', remember?"
We ended up splitting it, Penny smiled at us as we left the cute shop. I'd be sure to come back, their ice cream was delicious.
"Can you walk?" He asked concerned.
"Yeah, my headache isn't as bad as it was before, at least the ringing stopped." I pointed out the positive.
That didn't seem to relieve him. He just carried on walking, at a nice pace so I could keep up.
Some time later, as the sun was setting, we arrived at a park. He walked towards the playground.
He smirked. "You think you can climb this?" He pointed to the jungle gym. "Or do you need help."
"I'm not weak I can do it thanks!" I huffed, puffing out my chest.
He easily made it to the top in what seemed like seconds, as though he flew to the top. After he looked back down at me, I grabbed the ropes and started climbing. Why was this thing so high? Happily my fear of heights wasn't so bad as to make me fear a small jungle gym. By the time I got to the top, Max had already settled on the flat resting spot.
Okay it was actually pretty tall.
Next to me, Max sighed whilst staring at the sky.
I followed his gaze and gasped. The sunset was beautiful as the pink, purple and yellow clouds drifted away in the horizon. In the distance, the sun was disappearing as it made way to darkness, the only light coming from the streetlights.
"Wow." I muttered.
"I love coming here, just watching the sunset and stars. The quiet is really calming here, it helps me forget about everything." Max closed his eyes, reminiscing.
I understood him, the peacefulness of this place at night made this a delightful experience, one that I was happy he shared with me. "Thank you for taking me here." I spoke quietly, staring as the sky grew darker.
"I owe you an explanation." His eyes hardened as he turned towards me.
I nodded, I was waiting for this but now that he was finally going to give me answers I couldn't help the nerves building up in me.
"I- don't even know where to start. You're not going to believe me even if I tell you." He looked down.
"Tell me, please."
He didn't look at me as he started. "Do you remember last week, when you were wondering around the woods and got ambushed by some wolves?"
I nodded, "How did you know?"
He paused, taking his time answering. "Because I was there."
How did I not see him? I don't remember him being there.
"Think about it, did you not recognize me?"
I looked at him, inspecting him, searching for what he meant.
Surely I would have recognized him if he was there? My head was hurting and I couldn't think straight. All those events that happened to me for the last couple of days didn't make sense. I wanted answers but something in me made me fear why he would bring up the wolves. I couldn't remember seing him, or even a shadow of a person. I just remember how terrified I was and how if that wolf hadn't saved me I wouldn't be alive today.
There was a wolf that saved me, a wolf with crystal blue eyes.
When my eyes reached his eyes I gasped. The reason those eyes looked so familiar was because I had seen them before, my first night here, staring at me from the edge of the woods, and they were the same eyes of the wolf that saved me. "You mean.. You're.. How is that even possible?"
I grabbed onto the ledge, trying to steady myself.
He continued, "Because that's who I am. How much do you know about werewolves?" He questioned.
My throat felt dry, this was the first time he said it out loud, I didn't want to believe it before since he hadn't said the word.
"Stay with me dammit, snap out of it. You don't understand the predicament we're in."
"I wanted to know so tell me, but how am I meant to trust you, this seems insane. You're literally telling me you're a fictional character from the stories I read."
"I know, you don't have to believe me, but right now this is the best I can do."
I didn't stop looking at him. This was crazy. But it added up, the size of those wolves was abnormal.
"How much do you know, I'm guessing books can't be that accurate." He seemed amused by the idea.
"Just that you transform during a full moon, you're more powerful and faster than normal wolves and that you have a mate." A mate would be weird, I couldn't imagine what it felt like for a wolf to find his mate.
He laughed at my words, "For one, I can shift whenever I want, I don't need a full moon but do you know much about mates?"
Where was he getting at, "No? Why would I know anything about them?" This wasn't making any sense.
"I need you to listen to me, but promise me you won't run away." He stared straight into my eyes.
My heart rate increased. I wanted to know more, as scary as this was, it intreagued me. "I promise." My voice came out shaky.
He took a deep breath in. "When a wolf turns seventeen, he is able to find a mate, this might be straight away or even several years later, but every wolf has a chance at a mate. A mate is special, if they form a bond, mates can feel the other's emotions, knowing if something's wrong, they can also hear each other's thoughts."
This all seemed so surreal but I nodded, telling him to continue. "How do you know who your mate is?"
His voice wavered. "You can smell their perfect scent, its intoxicating, it seems as though no one else matters as you stare into their eyes, you just want to be close to them, hug them and hold them close, you can't get them out of your head and they're the only thing that matters. Not only that but you're heart feels like its going to jump out of your chest just by being close." He seemed to speak from experience. Is he just trying to tell me that he found his mate?
He continued as I was processing his words. "If you haven't completed the bond yet, being apart from them will be hell, you'll feel sick, and your whole body will feel like it's giving up on you."
He stopped, staring at me. "You might get a headache, which over time will become so horrible that you'll keep stumbling and probably fainting."
My voice caught in my throat. "Do you mean that... You're? I.. Me?"
He looked deep into my eyes, his stare piercing my soul.
"We're mates Alex."
~~~~~
Well done and thank you so much to those who got through this long chapter!
I've got a lot planned ahead ;)
-Bella