Chapter 1

"Happy Birthday to you., Happy birthday to you ....idiot!" I hear Michael laughing near my bed. I take a deep breath and burst into tears and try to stop shaking while there is a pool of ice-cold water around me. I'm wet from head to toe, the clothes on me, the mattress I sleep on, everything is wet. I try to pull on the blanket to keep warm up a little , but Alpha Brandon throws a second bucket of water in me watering everything. "Get up, wench! It's time for fun!" and he slaps me on the back of the head, making me fall out of bed. I feel tears streaming down my cheeks. Ahhh! I hate them! Both of them! Michael is my brother or whatever he wants to be because a real brother doesn't behave like him. Alfa Brandon is my mate, my mate who has rejected and humiliated me incessantly over the last year. Today I hope to have a quiet day. I'm 19 years old. Last year at this time Brandon ... Alpha Brandon rejected me and administered the beating of my life in front of his friends. My brother stood impassive and watched the whole scene, visibly amused by what was happening. There are all kinds of stories about werewolves. Some true, some far beyond reality. It is true that we are destined to love and be happy all our lives with our fated mate, but what people don't know is that sometimes shit happens and that's exactly what I've been living for the last year. Not that my life has been rosy before, but since I turned 18 everything has become exponentially complicated. My parents died during a rogues attack defending me while my brother fought with them to protect the pack. I was only 13 years old. Michael was 16 at the time. I was just a kid. Nobody understands that. We don't come from an ordinary family, mom and dad were beta of the Golden Moon pack but it wasn't enough to deal with the flood of rogues that attacked us that day. Everyone loved them and everyone hated me because they couldn't focus on the attack because of me. I lost everything that day. I lost my parents, I lost my brother, my social status, my friends, my home ... absolutely everything. Although I have beta blood, I have the status of a rogue in the middle of the pack. Nobody considers me part of the pack, they only tolerate me to do the work necessary to maintain the pack house. I clean, I cook, I iron, I work in the garden ... I do everything I am asked, to not to be permanently expelled from this place. Sometimes I don't even know what's better. I hoped that when I turned 18 my life would change. But everything got worse. At the age of 18, every werewolf knows his wolf. My wolf did not appear. In the last year I was simply wolfless. Everyone laughs at me, some say this is the punishment for the misfortune I have inflicted on my family . Brandon is the future alpha of our pack, he is also my mate. He rejected me as soon as he informed me that he would never accept such a lowly and useless being to occupy the position of the luna of the pack with him. He beat me in front of his friends and in the last year he forced me every day to see him lining up woman after woman in his bedroom. I do not have a wolf so I cannot reject him because I do not feel the connection between us as he felt it. I feel the pain of rejection instead. I feel a special rage about him because I know that he opposed the happiness that was predestined tome by the Moon Goddess . His mother hates me because my mother was her best friend, Alfa Taylor ignored me. I don't know if he hates me, he is one of the few in the pack who didn't touch and didn't directly offend me, but I hate him because it's in his power to stop all the injustice that is done to me and yet he didn't do anything. "Stupid head! Get up!" Brandon kicks me, "We're celebrating!" and he grabbed me by the hair and pulled me out of the small room where I slept in the basement of my parents' house. Michael looks at me amused and stands with his hands on his breasts: "We have a surprise for you" I know what surprise means in Michael's dictionary. It means I'm screwed. Pulling my hair he brings me to the living room where Jacob and Jake Sullivan, gamma Sullivan twins, are waiting for him. Together they are the four musketeers of the pack as they like to call themselves. "Undress!" I hear Alpha Brandon say. "No, I beg you ..." I say in a muffled voice. "I told you to undress!" he says, slapping me on the face, "I don't have all day!" I'm not moving. I look him in the eye but I know I can't change anything he has in mind. I look into my brother's eyes. "Michael ... please" but Michael doesn't say anything he looks at me seriously. I don't know what's on his mind right now. "Grab her and undress her," Brandon tells the twins, who immediately grab me and tear my clothes and then throw me to the ground and holds me there while I'm struggling. "Leave me alone! Leave me alone! I have never hurt you! Leave me alone!" "So?" Jacob asks. "Who's first?" I look into Michael's eyes. He can't do that ... no matter how much he hates me, he's my brother. He can't hate me in such a way. Brandon unzips his pants as the twins hold me tighter and tighter glued to the floor. I feel him sit between my legs. If they manage to do what they set out to do, my life is over. The only thing I have for myself that I am proud of is the fact that so far I have kept myself for my mate. I believe in a second chance mate. I believe that everything that happens follows a plan and I believe that beyond misfortune there is happiness. I stare into Michael's eyes. "I hate you!" I tell him angrily, "I'm not calling you my brother from today on!" and I turn my head and close my eyes as I feel Brandon slip into me. Pain, anger, deep hatred. That is what I feel. After two in and out moves , in a split second I feel my body begin to tremble. It's something involuntary. The anger I feel seems to come out of every pore of my skin. Brandon stops and looks at me in panic. "What the fuck is happening?" I hear him panicking, "Michael, what's wrong with your sister?" With a force I never knew I possessed, I kick Alpha Brandon with my feet, making him fly almost two meters away from me, hitting the dinning table. I see him trying to get up but moaning in pain. At how hard I hit him I probably broke his ribs. The twins panic but I immediately get to my feet and punch them so hard that Jacob faints and Jake has a broken nose. Michael rushes towards me to stop me but as soon as we cross our eyes he stops. I bend down and gather my torn clothes and try to wrap myself in them. "There's nothing left" ... I tell him in a low voice as he stands and looks at me in shock. "There's nothing left here," I tell him, showing him my heart, "It's empty..nothing for you ... nothing for me ... Today you took the last piece of me. I hope you're happy, Michael. I hope you got the revenge you wanted. " I see him swallowing dry "Help me, Michael," I hear Alpha Brandon saying. "You better help him, I don't think the doctors want to find him in the naked ass." I manage to partially cover myself with torn clothes and return to my room. I hear noise in the living room. I'm not even interested in them coming down after me. I'm not interested in anything. Brandon Taylor took everything that was left of mine in this world. "Elle..." I hear a faint woman's voice. I panic look behind but no one is around. "Who are you?" ..."Where are you?" I ask in panic. "I'm Athena ... your wolf." says the voice. "My wolf? I don't have a wolf ..." I say resignedly. I think I'm going crazy. I think I hit my head very hard earlier and I didn't realize it until now. "You have a wolf from this day, Elle. I'm with you and I'm not leaving you. I'm not leaving you alone. It's not my time yet to show up but I will be a friend to talk to. " "Athena ... Brandon ..." I say, bursting into tears. "I know, Elle. It's time for you to take it easy with this painfull life, as it's time for me to be right next to you." "Athena ... I want to leave this place, there is nothing for me here. I'm afraid that if I stay here I can only let them kill me." "Do you want to leave the Golden Moon pack?" she asks in shock. "I want to get as far away from this place as I can. I want to be alone, I don't want to see anyone around me anymore." Athena says nothing. I would like to say something, but for minutes she says nothing. I stand in front of the mirror and look at myself. My blue eyes are shining. It must be because of Athena's appearance. I have broken lips and a serious scratch on my right temple. My brown hair is soaked with blood Partly mine ... partly is the blood of the twins. My limp body is full of bruises . This is the gift of the pack for my birthday. I pack my few clothes and put them in a backpack. "Elle ..." I hear Athena after a while, "Let's go!"