Alpha Vaughan

Chapter 2

Present day.

Alaska

.

The sound of someone popping their gum filled the small room. "Nope, pass," Eunice, my bossom--but no less aggravating--friend said.

"How about this one?" I stifled a longsuffering sigh, holding up yet another ensemble from my closet.

She casted her gaze heavenwards. "Hilda," she groaned. "You've been displaying just about the same type of clothes for the past ten hours."

She was right, about the clothes. But there was one thing she was wrong about. "It's been just two hours, not ten."

She leaned against the wall defeatedly. "Well it feels like it."

I balled up the green top in my hands and threw it towards her direction. It landed splat on her face. "Stop being a spoilsport and come help me look for what to wear."

"It'll be no use," she grumbled. Just like my entire existence.

Already knowing the answer, I still asked anyway, "How so?"

"Because your closet's filled with just jean shorts and T-shirts. No gowns."

"No occasion's ever come up for me to wear one." I pointed at her. "You know that."

She knew. Having gowns meant you had special occasions to wear them to. Parties. Luncheons. Pack conferences. Dinners. Luxuries I couldn't afford.

While my sisters went to different events after the other, I stayed back in the pack-house, hidden away, until I'd memorised every single corner and chip in the walls. I was, in all essence, father's little, dirty secret.

"What are we gonna do now," she asked

I rose a shoulder in a shrug. "I could borrow one from you."

She gave me a deadpan look.

Eunice didn't own a lot of dresses either; she was an Omega. And I was as good as one, if not worse than one. Omegas were the lowliest of the lowliest, the bottom of the pack hierarchy, the ones who cooked, cleaned-- did everything beneath the notice and capabilities of the higher tiers.

And I was lower than one, because even Omegas could shift into their wolves...

Being Latent was a curse that had followed me through the complicated stages of childhood through adulthood, a scar on my very soul. And I had, inevitably, sustained a few monikers during my formative years. Latent Hilda, Latilda and Hilda de Lat, to name a few.

My gaze slid towards the single window in the room. Lights from the watchtowers lining the rear ramparts flashed around, casting the forest surrounding the pack-house in a dark, gloomy shadow-- although I could still see it as clear as day. Courtesy of my wolf's night vision. I was Latent, but not without the better powers and baser urges of a werewolf.

At that moment a blade of light sliced in through the tiny window, and fell on a spot in the middle of the cramped room. It looked inviting. Tired of ransacking my closet for clothes I won't find, I went over and sat on it.

Eunice stirred from her prone position on the narrow bed, an eyelid flicking open to reveal green eyes. "Why are you sitting?"

"Because I want to?"

"But we've got a party to attend."

"A plan that was entirely your idea."

"Yes." Her eyes suddenly flashed with determination; I grew weary. "It was my plan," she proclaimed, "and I'll see to it that you go out with me to celebrate your nineteenth birthday."