Sip, Sip, Hooray!

Adeline “Eeek! I can’t believe you’re officially 18 at midnight!” Bailey screeched with excitement, throwing herself onto my bed. “Imagine if you meet your mate tonight, NOW THAT, would be the best birthday present ever”, she laughed as she twirled her blonde hair around her fingers. “Oh come on Bails, you and I both know the chances of that happening are basically impossible”, Adeline retorted while her eyes wandered through her closet, “I’m just excited to have a night out with my friends, not thinking of the possibility of my family becoming Omegas or the fact that we now bow down to Alpha Jaxon”. I threw myself onto my bed, just like Bailey had done moments before, I laid beside my best friend, huffing and puffing in fury at my new reality. “That’s not what tonight is about! You’re going to be 18! I still have another three months to wait”, Bailey insisted. “I’m going to make sure I feed you so many shots until you’re dancing on the bar howling out to your one true mate!”, she joked and we both fell into a fit of laughter. A knock soon echoed the room and the doorknob clicked open, “What’s taking you guys so long?”, Leah whined, “neither of you are even dressed yet, so help me Moon Goddess, if you two aren’t ready soon – birthday or not – I’m leaving without you!”. Bailey and I took that as our cue to finish getting dressed. Bailey flicked on her favourite purple dress, with deep slits on both sides of her torso. It was scandalous enough that whenever she wore it all eyes were on her wherever we were. I took longer sorting through a few dresses until I let out a sigh, “I have nothing to wear! It’s my 18th birthday and I forgot to buy anything for it”. Leah’s eyes lit up like the 4th of July, mischief free flowing from them. I knew that look and I knew whatever she had conjured up was going to be trouble. “I’ll be right back”, she chuckled with a wink. The nicking and nocking of her stilettos echoed out of my bedroom and into the hallway, just as quickly as she turned the corner into my bedroom. “I know you’re going to say it’s too much, but it’s your 18th birthday Addie. You’re not going to fight me on this, you need to feel as hot as you look” Leah batted her eyelashes at me. Leah had always had impeccable fashion senses; I wasn’t worried until she pulled the silver sequin dress out of the cloth bag. I immediately froze, “THIS? You want me to look like a disco ball?” I yelped. Everyone laughed at my comment until Bailey made a good point, “think of it as representing the Silver Moon Pack on your 18th birthday, or at least what’s left of it until we all become wolves of the Midnight Pack”. I carefully pulled the sequin silver dress over my hips. It did indeed hug all the right places while stopping right under my ass and plunged deep down between my breasts. “All I know is if by some freak scenario I do see my mate tonight, I can’t guarantee that I’ll be mateless much longer”, I teased my best friend and my sister. After a few more moments of touch ups for our hair and makeup, we were on our way to the local bar, The Lone Wolf. Something in the air felt heavy tonight, but I knew one thing for certain, nothing was going to ruin my birthday. The Lone Wolf was a shifter only bar, granted we didn’t have any human towns within 500 miles of our pack borders. An arm reached out in front of me just as I was about to enter, stopping me in my tracks. Bailey turned around and placed a button on my dress that read “18, buy me a drink”. After carefully attaching it, she looked up at me with pride flowing through her eyes. “Now, we’re ready to get this night started!” I chuckled, I wasn’t fond of the attention seeking button but tonight I was willing to accept drinks from just about anyone. The moment we stepped into The Lone Wolf it was evident that we held everyone’s gawking stares and nothing could have started my 18th birthday party better than that. We walked to the corner of the bar where most of our friends were already holding our tables with an array of drinks already crowding the table. A husky man with dull blue eyes approached our table, I was certain that I had no idea who this man was staring intently at me. He held out a drink for me and said “I can see that someone is officially 18, happy birthday cutie. I’m Don, by the way”, he winked as he turned to walk away in his black dress shoes that were so shiny, I swear I could have seen my reflection. Suddenly, he stopped and turned around so quickly that he almost ripped his green dress shirt that hugged so tightly onto his muscular frame. His scent washed over me engulfing me in a tinge of cedar and whiskey, “oh and great choice on the dress Miss Silver Moon Pack”, he chuckled as he walked back to a group of obnoxiously large men. The power seemed to seep off of them; they were clearly men of status. “Look at the birthday girl, even getting drinks from the men of the Midnight Pack”, my friend Amelia laughed out loud. I stared stunned at her and defended, “the Midnight Pack? What are they even doing here? This is still Silver Moon territory until Alpha Jaxon takes over officially. They shouldn’t be here.” Everyone laughed at the table, “oh baby girl, when you’re from the conquering pack of Alpha Jaxon, you can do whatever you want”, taunted Bailey. Annoyed that she wasn’t wrong, thinking about my father’s soon-to-be Omega position; I grabbed her hand and walked her over to the bar. “I believe you owe me a birthday drink bestie”, as I tossed my long, dark hair over my shoulder with a sly smile plastered onto my face. We shot back the shots of vodka, the burning sensation flowed down my throat and it felt so good. Just before a hand touched my lower back, feeling that it was too close to my ass, I was hit with a wave of cedar and whiskey again straight into my nostrils. Not bothering to turn back, proving how strong my wolf senses were, I sneered out sarcastically, “Hi Don, back to buy me another birthday drink?” A playful smile was plastered on his face as I turned to look at him, “a feisty wolf, I can see. Maybe you aren’t as meek as I thought you were Miss Silver Shadow Pack”. The look of shock must have fallen on my face; I was surprised that anyone even knew who I was in my own pack, never mind the Midnight Moon Pack. “Don’t let it get to your head cutie, we’re not here to celebrate your birthday, although I wouldn’t mind if I was. Maybe you and I should celebrate your coming of age afterwards”, he teased, causing an eruption of shades of red all over my face. He made eye contact with the bartender and held up three fingers, as if he was signaling for three drinks. The bartender slid over three whiskeys on the rocks in gorgeous, crystal low ball glasses and spoke directly to him, “no worries boss, it’s on the house”. With a quaint nod, he turned his gaze back to Bailey and I. “No cutie, we’re here to celebrate Alpha Jaxon’s bachelor party”, his words sent a shiver down my spine. I can’t even catch a break on my birthday; Alpha Jaxon was going to be here?! My insides were already raging with anger. I wanted to lunge at him for taking away my Alpha, probably soon subjecting my family to the lowest level of werewolves as Omegas and how he so easily dominated me into submission in front of my entire pack. Under no conditions was I going to let him get to me tonight, tonight out of all nights, absolutely not. As I tried to compose my clear distaste of my new Alpha, I grabbed Bailey’s arm and politely excused us to Don citing our absence on the fact that there were many other wolves that still needed to buy me a birthday drink. He gave me a smug look and pressed his lips together, “we aren’t scared of the big bad Alpha, are we Miss Silver Shadow Pack?” I rolled my eyes in utter disbelief at this prick and made sure to shake my ass as he watched me walk away, feeling defeated as constantly being looked at as weak.