Big girls don't cry

Aleida’s POV

I don’t feel like showering or shift back, for that matter. I feel so carefree as a wolf; maybe I should stay like this. When I see the couch, I jump up on it and curl myself together like a dog. My mates, brothers, and friends walk through the front door, but I choose to ignore them.

“Aleida, not on the white couch!” Kian exclaims with a horrific face that makes me laugh on the inside; I don’t look at them or acknowledge them; I want to be left alone.

“Are you not going to talk to either one of us?” Miliano asks me.

I continue to ignore them. Which makes my big brother Nathan growl at me. I lift my head and growl back, which makes him smile.

“So you’re listening to your surroundings at least.”

Kian and Miliano crouch before me with sad looks on their beautiful faces.

“Please, Aleida, can’t you talk to us?”

I growl low as an answer.

“Okay, you don’t have to talk. But can you at least answer some questions?”

Grunt.

“That’s as good as it gets then. Can you please get down from the couch?” Kian asks.

Growl.

“No, okay... Can we get you some food?”

Growl.

“Can you at least shift back?”

Growl.

“Can you go and get a shower?”

Growl.

“Do you allow us to wash you in the backyard?”

I raise my head and look at them with confusion; my head tilts to the side.

“You have blood all over your fur...” Kian trails off.

Come on, Aleida, don’t be difficult. Just agree, we stink!

I jump down from the couch with a snort and push them towards the backdoor; I sit down like a good doggie at the grass and wait for them. Miliano brings out the garden hose and waits for the right temperature. Kian walks out of the house with soap and a pile of towels. My wolf is giant, more than a usual alpha, and very bulky with muscles.

“I’m going to start washing off the worst dirt and blood from your back now. Okay?” Miliano asks, and I just look at him, unmoving.

He sighs and cleans my back. The smell of wet dog spreads through the wind. My whole body is wet when Kian walks up to me with the soap and begins to clean me. Miliano rubs behind my ear and smiles when my tongue falls out of the side of my mouth, like some dog.

What are we, Lisa? A dog or a wolf?

She just snorts at me for being disrespectful towards her instincts. Miliano smiles down at me when I begin to purr from the rubbing.

“You’re such a good girl,” he coos at me.

Kian begins to rinse my body from the soap. The water isn’t cold but not warm; it cools my warm wolf body without making me freeze.

“Guys!” Miliano yells.

Henry, Killian, Jason, and Nathan come out of the house. They look towards us, confused as to why they’re outside.

“Grab a towel and start helping!” Kian commands.

They all walk towards me and start to dry my wet fur. I shake my body like a dog, and all of them get wet.

“Hey, what did you do that for!?” Jason snarls at me; I just give him a wolf grin.

“Damn, you’re one big wolf, little sister,” Nathan says, which earns him a growl and a kick to the stomach from my hind leg.

“I didn’t mean it that way!” he exclaims and clutch his stomach while the others snicker at him.

One hour and probably the whole towel supply later, I’m still not dry. The men around me look exhausted from working in the heat. Kian slumps down on the ground beside me.

“Okay, lepa, you’re going to have to air dry the rest of the moisture off your fur. You have to stay out here before you can walk into the house; everything will get wet,” Kian says, and I whimper from the thought of them leaving me, which is ironic considering I was about to do the same thing before, resulting in them both chuckling at me.

“We’re not leaving you, dummy. In fact, I was thinking about a barbeque; what do you say?” Miliano asks me and rubs my ear; I lick his hand as an answer.

“I guess that you appreciate the idea,” Kian smiles at me.

The boys lits the grill and open cold beers. Without them noticing, I walk back into the house and shift in my bedroom. I’m not going to catch a cold just because I’m stubborn; enough is enough. I change into a white sundress and walk down to the kitchen. With earphones in my ears, I start cooking homemade potato cloves with garlic and spices, a large bowl of fresh crispy salad, homemade dressing and sauces to the meat, and a smudge cake for dessert with whipped cream. I put the dessert in the refrigerator, and the rest of the food on a large tray, together with glasses, a pitcher of cold lemonade, cutlery, and plates. With the tray in my hands, I walk towards the back door. It’s not until all the food and tableware are on the table that I notice them looking at me in the corner of my eye. Kian walks up to me and takes out one of my headphones.

“Hey, lepa, you didn’t have to do this,” he says, and I shrug my shoulders.

“I can throw it all away if that’s better,” I say and move towards the food.

“No!” they all yell at the same time; I look at them with a raised eyebrow, and they all look embarrassed.

“Now that you have shifted back, can we talk?” Miliano asks with a hopeful voice, making me sigh, walk back inside, take off my dress, and shift before walking outside again. “I guess not...” he says disappointedly.

Something is gracing my tail, which makes me turn around fast and growl. Jason looks at me apologetically.

“Sorry, I just wanted to try the lemonade you made.”

I give him a wolfy grin and roll into a ball of fur under the table. Again, nobody notices me.

“Where’s Aleida?” Nathan asks after some time.

“I don’t know; maybe she went inside. She’ll come out again when she feels like it.”

They sit down at the table and freeze when they feel me. Everyone looks under the table, and I tilt my head in innocence.

“You are adorable, baby girl,” Miliano says, laughing before he starts eating.

Some time goes by before I wake up from my slumber by my stomach; no one feeds me. I rise and sit beside Kian on the ground. He turns to me with a confused look. I whine like a dog and look at his plate. He laughs and throws a piece of meat in the air, which I jump and catch without a problem. They keep throwing food at me until I’m full. The plates on the table are empty, which makes me happy; my family likes my food. I walk back into the house, and somehow I manage to get the tray with the cake and whipped cream out without dropping it. With the tray in my mouth, I walk out again and put the tray in Kian’s lap. He looks at me dumbfounded before scratching my ears and put the tray on the table.

“Damn, woman, how did you have time and knowledge to do all of this?” Henry asks.

I laugh inside my head. It’s time to shift back. Well, behind the tree, I transform and put on the clothes I have nearby. Without a word, I walk to the table and sit between my mates; nobody says anything. They probably find it weird that I shift back and forth without commenting on it, that I just pretend that nothing has happened. As if my pain and the feeling of betrayal had never arisen from the beginning. They can’t be more wrong. I guess I feel mostly just that there’s no point in showing my feelings outwardly when it’s so apparent that my mates can sense it.

“Aleida, where your marks?” Killian asks me, surprised.

“They’re not there?” I ask, dumbfounded.

“No, they ain’t!”

“Huh, I guess I’m up for grabs then,” I say just for the hell of it, and my mates growl. “Oh, don’t growl at me, you fuckers! You put me through hell; the least you can do is be happy that I actually can move on.”

“Why are you twisting the knife that you already punctuated our hearts with!?” Kian growls.

“You should be happy that I haven’t ripped it out yet, boy. Don’t try me; I mean it, Kian,” I growl back.

The mood around the table is both tense and embarrassing. Not that it matters to me. I just sit down at the table to be able to drink the lemonade I made earlier. It’s not very easy to drink lemonade from a glass without help if you’re a wolf. I swallow down the last of my lemonade and rise.

“And don’t you dare say that these problems are my fault. I wasn’t the one who couldn’t keep my dick in control. It wasn’t me who hurt my mate deeper than anyone has ever done before. I’ve spent my whole life alone. What’s the difference now? I’m used to being alone, and I plan to continue with that. So if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen.”

With those words, I walk away from there, up to my room. I don’t want to see them right now. A sob gets out of me before I have time to react to what’s going on; my heart hurts me. The feeling of what they’ve done accompanies me everywhere and all the time. I’ll be fine alone. I have to; this doesn’t work because they don’t feel comfortable enough with their mate to tell the truth. In addition to that, I need answers to my more critical questions, like what truly happened to my parents. I have to figure out what to do with alpha Jonathan; I know that the pack members aren’t evil people; they only follow orders. It’s my job as an alpha to protect my members and my pack from danger. At the moment, that threat comes from within, and I must therefore also eliminate that very same threat. The Rose Moon pack is mine, no matter what anyone else says. I’m the rightful descendant of the group because I’m my parents’ firstborn and only child. Jonathan won’t get to ruin my pack, over my dead body. He and his bitch for a luna have already destroyed the majority of it, which is why it’s time for me to save them from the life they all live. I know how Jonathan controls people; with violence, fear, and threats. My former alpha lives to make others obey. You can call him a sadist because that’s what he is. I can’t and won’t allow him to continue as he does. Now I just have to figure out a plan.