Chapter 5 Chapter 5

Alpha Kael

Silence.

I stood at the wooden altar, completely frozen. I was thirty-six years old. I had fought in brutal rogue wars, ripped the throats out of my enemies with my bare teeth, and built the Mad Keepers into the most feared pack in the state. I had seen everything. I had heard everything.

But I had never, in my entire life, heard anything like this.

“My ex-boyfriend... he was a terrible lover. He may look tall, but he is not tall everywhere... you get it, right?”

I stared down at the tiny and delicate woman standing in the sand. Odette. She was wearing a stolen expensive wedding dress that was clearly meant for her sister. Her cheek was bright red and swollen from where her father had just struck her. Yet, she stood tall, her chin lifted in pure defiance, as she publicly humiliated her former mate and claimed she had orchestrated this entire bloody betrayal just to get into my bed.

The audacity of this little omega was staggering. It completely caught me off guard. I had to give her that---she was brave. Stupidly brave.

"If I was lying, would I go to the extent of scheming behind my sister to marry the big old Alpha here?" she challenged, raising a perfect eyebrow at the crowd.

I looked at her ex-mate, Josh. The Beta’s face was so red it looked like it was about to explode. He was shaking with pure humiliation. The warriors of my pack, the Mad Keepers, were hiding their smirks behind their hands. The men of Mist Rain looked scandalized at the tone of her words. She just shattered the image of their perfect hero!

My inner wolf let out a deep, rumbling purr. Mate. She is vicious. She is ours.

I clenched my jaw, fighting the overwhelming pull of the mate bond. Yes, she was my fated mate. The moment my fangs had pierced her soft neck, the intoxicating scent of wild jasmine and sea had flooded my senses. My body burned with an intense violent attraction to her. I wanted to pull her against my chest, mark her again, and kill every single person on this beach who had ever made her cry.

But the human side of me was deeply disgusted.

She was beautiful, yes. But she was also a wicked and a shameless opportunist. She had just confessed to beating her own sister, stealing her dress, and tricking me—all for power and lust. She was a liar. A manipulator. She had thrown away her family and her pack without a second thought. What was the surety that she would be true to me?

I did not come to this pathetic rainy island for a love match. I came for a business transaction.

My mother, the former Luna of our pack, was dying. Her lungs were failing, and the pack doctors gave her only a few months to live. She was the only reason the elders of the Mad Keepers respected me. I was getting older. At thirty-six, I was considered aging for an Alpha who did not have a mate or an heir. There was a thirteen-year age gap between me and this little twenty-two-year-old dancer. I knew the elders were plotting. They whispered behind my back, saying I was too aggressive, too scarred, too much of a rogue to lead a civilized pack forever. They wanted to replace me with a younger and easily controlled Alpha but I would be damned if I gave them that opportunity.

The only way to save my position and secure my throne was to produce a strong heir. I needed a respectable and responsible wife to breed. That was why I had agreed to marry Serena. She was a perfect and dutiful Alpha's daughter.

Instead, the Moon Goddess had cursed me with Odette: a bastard, a schemer, and a shameless omega who had just announced her sexual preferences to two entire packs.

"Alpha Kael," the Alpha of Mist Rain stammered, stepping forward. He looked terrified as he confessed. "Please, forgive this shameful display. My bastard daughter has clearly lost her mind. We will lock her in the dungeons immediately. We can still proceed with the treaty. Serena can be cleaned up..."

I looked at Serena. She was sitting in the sand, covered in blood, clinging to the Beta, Josh. I felt pity for her but nothing more. I had no feelings or attraction toward her.

Then I looked back at Odette.

She was staring at me. Underneath all her crazy and unhinged bravery, I could smell the scent of pure terror on her body. She was trembling while putting on a brave facade. She was playing a dangerous game, gambling her entire life on my reaction. She wanted me to take her away so she could escape her father's dungeons.

She wants to use me, I realized. She thinks she can play the villain to escape her cage.

Two can play the game, right?

I came here for a wife but instead, she stepped in the role of a perfect breeder. Once she give me the heir I want, I will discard her forever.