Chapter 1
Isabella
“I’m better in bed.”
“Well, I have a bigger ass and he’s an ass guy, so...”
“Well, have you ever given hea—”
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. Someone save me, please. I couldn’t deal with another cat fight from Bitch One and Bitch Two behind me about who had a better chance with Alpha Roman. Neither of them really had a chance with him; they were both annoying as hell, and I doubted he wanted something like that in his packhouse.
“Quiet down,” Dr. Jakkobs said from the front of my anatomy class. “I know you’re all excited because it’s the last week of senior year, but we need to get through this review material.” He looked at the class through his thick bifocals, then raised a brow, deepening the creases in his forehead. “After grading your latest exams, most of you need the extra review.”
I gazed down at the exam on my desk and sighed. Dr. Jakkobs had scribbled another big fat 100% with a smiley face on the top of it in red ink.
Bitch One—the nickname my best friend and I had given Vanessa, one of the popular girls, after she made fun of us in middle school for obsessing over wanting to become warrior wolves in Roman’s pack—leaned forward in her seat until she was nearly breathing down my neck. “What are we learning about today?” she asked, her overwhelming strawberry perfume making me choke. “If it’s the female reproductive system, I can definitely volunteer myself as a model.”
What the he—
Derek turned his pen between his fingers and rolled his brown eyes. “Nobody wants to see you naked, Vanessa.”
The class broke out in a fit of laughter, and I pressed my lips together, trying to stifle a chuckle. Derek leaned back in his seat and flashed me his infamous smirk.
Dr. Jakkobs walked around his desk, arms crossed, staring pointedly at Derek and Vanessa. “Enough,” he said. “I doubt you two really want to end up in the principal’s office this time of the year.”
Vanessa huffed and sat back. Thank the Moon Goddess I could finally breathe again.
“Now…” In big letters, Dr. Jakkobs wroteAnatomy Reviewon the whiteboard with pink marker. “Let’s begin.”
I sunk down in my seat and gazed at my notebook which didn’t have a single anatomy note in it. Instead, it was filled with the names of wrestling takedowns and reversals, different boxing combinations, and a list of judo throws that Derek and I had been studying relentlessly.
High school ended this week, which meant that Alpha Roman was going to assign us positions in his pack based on our academic and physical performance. And no matter the number of perfect grades I received this year, I was determined to become a warrior.
Since I was four years old, I had trained almost every day with Derek, had memorized the Lunar Battle Manual that all outstanding warriors read, and even had the opportunity to train with the warriors in our pack last year when Roman was out of town.
Well, Roman never officially told me I could. I just snuck into practice and hoped that nobody would say a word to him about me being there. Derek’s neighbor and retired warrior, Mr. Beck, urged me to practice with them; he told me that when he was training to be a warrior, he snuck out to fight rogues during the night and that sneaking into practice wouldn’t hurt me.
Someone knocked on the door, and Principal Hackle popped his head into the room. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”
Dr. Jakkobs raised a brow at Derek and Vanessa, then turned to Principal Hackle. “No, not at all.”
The door opened wider, and that’s when I sawhim.
Alpha Roman stood right behind Hackle. Tall, tan, and terrifyingly tense. His muscles flexed through his white V-neck shirt, and I sucked in a breath. When he stepped into the room, nobody said a word.
His gaze was fixed on me and only me.
I gazed down at my notes. Trying to look busy. Trying not to think about last night.
“Hi, Alpha!” Vanessa squealed, her nasally voice in my ear again. I could feel her toying with the ends of my brown hair. She was so… damn… desperate. But, hell, so was I yesterday.
Hackle said a few words, then disappeared back into the hall. Roman walked further into the room and stopped when he reached my desk. Was it getting hot in here? My body felt like it was on fire, like everyone knew what had happened.
He cleared his throat.
Please leave. Please leave.
The more I tried to push away my dirty thoughts of Roman, the more my cheeks flushed. He needed to leave now, so I could learn more about the now very interesting topic of female reproductive systems. Vanessa could be the demonstration for all I cared. It’d be so much more comfortable than being stared down by—
