Chapter 3 Bailey

• Three Years Later
• I drove the long road down to the pack. I wouldn't say I liked this drive. It was like returning to hell for me. Lotus Shadow Pack. My very own version of hell. Though three years away, studying had been truly amazing. Transforming myself into the woman I should always have been. Confident. Self-assured. Brave. Just me. And now a fully qualified teacher.
• As a she-wolf, you spend many years of your life being told your focus is finding your fated mate, settling down with them, and creating a strong mate bond. A love. A family.
• Once I had come to accept that my naïve teenage dreams would never surface, thanks to the moon goddess pairing me with a mate so incapable of loving anyone other than himself, I decided that my focus would be my career.
• My education had always been something I took great pride in. I loved to learn, and I had decided that I wanted to pass that gift along. I no longer cared what others thought of me. And, while at university, it felt so wonderful to be surrounded by others who felt the same way. I finally felt like I fit in somewhere.
• And that allowed me to become the person I was meant to be. However, I had to return to my pack at their orders. The agreement was that I would return home once I had completed my degree. Unless, of course, I had found my fated mate. But I knew within my heart that was never to happen.
• For, my fated mate sat at home. Lording it over our pack. Acting like he was the best thing. Sleeping with any she-wolf that came near him, from what I heard, having rejected me.
• I pulled up at our guarded pack gates. Harley, one of our pack warriors on guard duty, stepped forward to my car window. “ID” he ordered.
• I frowned at him. I have not been asked for ID before when returning home, even in all the times I have visited home, though, in all fairness, those visits have been few and far between. My visits were only when they were required of me. I had grown to loathe this place, and returning had become less of a priority when I was away.
• “Harley, it is me. Bailey.” I explained, trying not to smile at his mistake.
• Harley looked at me closer. “Shit. Sorry, Bailey, I didn’t recognize you there. You changed your hair. And you aren’t wearing your glasses. You look good,” he says with a shrug, quickly looking away, clearly embarrassed by his faux pas.
• I smirk at his response. Yes, my hair is somewhat tamer than it used to be. The curls straightened out, and my hair was now neat and sleek down my back. The glasses I had worn for reading had been long gone. I was having my eyes fixed with laser eye surgery while away. Plus, I now wore a little simple make-up to accentuate my features. It's nice to know somebody has noticed a difference.
• “No problem. You still need ID?” I asked him.
• He grins at me. “I think I know who you are. Nice to see you,” he nods at me in acknowledgment as the gate opens for me. “Maybe I can catch you around while you are back,” he adds as I begin to drive away.
• I smiled in response; nothing would stop me from catching up with any guy I wanted to know. Not that I was bothered right now, but it was not like I had a fated mate to wait for any longer. And it wasn’t like Miles was making a point of staying single.
• Every time I had returned home, he had had a different she-wolf on his arm. Parading them through the pack like a prized possession, only to have traded her in by the time I returned on my next visit. He was turning into quite the lothario. And quite a joke in my eyes.
• I set off along our sweet old pack's quiet, familiar roads. The evening sun was settling in the sky as I moved my car down the route to my family home. No doubt my mom would be there waiting for me, perhaps my dad, if he was in from work by now.
• My brother and sister, I was unsure. They still lived at home with my parents but were back and forth to friends' houses, and my brother was looking to move into the Beta suite in the packhouse soon enough in preparation for taking on the role of my father when the time came. Either way, they rarely rushed home to see me when they knew I was returning. I don’t think seeing me was at the top of their priority list.
• I pulled my car up on the street before my familiar family home. I could not believe I was home. I was stuck back here. The dread within my stomach churned heavily at the prospect of many years stuck here.
• Miserable, with no way out, now my fated mate had rejected me. Not that anyone other than Miles and I knew of that. No. He had decided he would be considered weak if others knew an Alpha had gone against the powerful Moon Goddess’s choice. So, this was our secret. Or he would make me pay in ways I did not want to imagine.
• And, in all honesty, I did not want to think of it. He had allowed me to go away to do my degree. I was doing the final bit of convincing when my uncle, the current Alpha, Miles’s father, and my parents were on the fence. Or, so he said. How true that was. I would never likely know the truth, but it had been for that reason, and I had chosen to do as he had asked.
• If he had done the things he said, he would have allowed me to fulfil my dream of gaining my teaching degree away from the pack. To enable me to be just me, not the daughter of the pack Beta. And I have thrived because of it. But now, I had to return to where I belonged. And, while I may have gained my degree, I had no real prospects. I was likely stuck here.
• I stepped from the car, determined more than ever to find work, as I heard my mom’s voice. “Bailey!” she greeted me from the porch steps with a big smile. “You look beautiful, sweetheart.”
• I smiled back at her as I moved toward the front door. Only to see Miles leaving the house next door to ours.
• Could I have timed my arrival any worse?
• His eyes met mine, giving me a dark stare before looking at my mom. “Hi Aunt Brianna. You didn’t say she was home today.”
• Mom smiled at Miles like she thought the world of him, though most of the time, she generally did. “Ah, I think it slipped my mind. Bailey is home for good now, Miles. How wonderful is that?”
• Once more, Miles gave me a dark stare. “Hmmm. Truly wonderful,” he said with some serious contempt in his voice.
• ‘You understand, you stay out of my way unless I say otherwise?’ Mile's mind links me as he moves toward his car.
• “Are you not going to speak to him Bai?” Mom tries. “He will be Alpha this time next year, you know?”
• “Oh, it doesn’t matter, Aunt Brianna. Bailey will be excused this time. I am sure she is tired from her drive back home. But no doubt I will be seeing her around. And yes, she will have to get used to me as her senior. Her Alpha,” he says with a sneer, and my stomach twists into knots at his words. I don’t think I can stay here. I need to find work away from my pack so I can move away from my psychotic Alpha and ex-mate!