Enslaved by the Alpha

Chapter 3

I sat in the grass beneath my favorite tree, the willow, and leaned on the bark watching the children play from a distance. The taste continued to stain my tongue despite that it bypassed my mouth, so I came out here to hunt.

I only managed to catch a small rabbit. How do the Alpha's expect me to eat if I cannot pass tree-line? No animals ever come this close to the pack house, it radiates the scent of a pack of wolves, scaring off all and every animal small enough for me. The rabbit made do though, the blood quickly overpowered the taste of him.

Tiny yells pulled me from my thoughts and I looked over, seeing the children getting chased by the puppies. They all seem so joyful and content, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't jealous. Some look about six and some look about eleven, and moments ago a group of teens walked into the woods throwing me nasty looks. I know I don't belong so I can't be angry. I stick out like a sore thumb. This is their home, not mine.

"Don't go over there, Carson!"

At the sound of the woman's frantic voice, I looked to my side and spotted a blonde little boy in a yellow tank-top and blue jean shorts gunning for me. He was grinning wickedly, staring at my feet, and my line of sight followed his, revealing a bright blue ball mere inches from me.

Children are trusting-danger is foreign to them-and although I know I'd never harm this child or anyone else here, they don't. But they never question why I'm here because nobody dares question the Alpha.

I slowly grabbed the ball and held it out to the boy with cautious movement to show I'm no threat. His grin dropped as if he just realized there was someone sitting here and he took a step back. The woman was screaming behind him, neither of us listened.

He warily grabbed the ball from me and smiled toothily when nothing bad happened. I returned it with a nod and his face paled.

"Mommy!" He suddenly burst into tears, startling me by darting back to the screaming woman who appeared livid assuming I hurt him.

She began to stomp this direction, making it only halfway until a tall, masculine figure stepped in front of her. His bare, sculpted back faced me and an immediate frown overtook my lips. The power wafting from him told me it was the next in line Alpha.

"She didn't touch him," he defended, a deadly silence falling around them. The woman didn't dare argue. Instead, she bowed and walked back to her crying son, taking him inside with one last death glare directed toward me.

My heart stopped when the man turned my way, staring down at me with a blank face as he walked over. I grew lightheaded with the amount of endless possibilities of punishments he could do to me for scaring that little boy.

A breeze rolled by, messing up his already messy, yet wet, hair. His nude, sculpted chest glistened under the scorching sun and my eyes landed on a droplet of water that fell from his stubbled chin, mindlessly following it through every crease in his muscles down to the waistband of his black athletic shorts where it had disappeared into the fabric.

That's when I realized he took his final step and stopped in front of me, kneeling down and out of the sun, staring holes into my face with those distressing green eyes that I tried desperately to avoid.

"I watched you from a distance," he answered my unasked question. My hesitant gaze raised to his, never-ending tears of trauma uncontrollably filling my eyes.

I'm pathetic.

"Actually, I've been watching since I saw you go after that rabbit. I was curious, and slightly uncertain if you were rather aiming for one of the kids instead," he admitted with a smile, but there was something about it that felt much different than Zeek's. It felt as though he was trying to lighten the mood, not make it tense.