It’s been almost a week since fate had decided to play on her nerves. Although the pills were doing a good job in suppressing her heat, even if her wolf wasn’t thrilled about it now that they had found their mate, she still didn’t feel secure, and so she decided to stay low for the time being. That meant she had to take two weeks off work, but she told her supervisor (and also Brad who was very disappointed and worried about her) that it was all because of a very contagious form of flu. Of course, Liz also had to play her part by giving her medical statement about the matter. It wasn’t hard to get it from her after Gabi willingly went to her house and told her everything on the next morning.

Right now, she was curled up on her couch surrounded by every pillow and blanket she could find, feeling contented and almost happy. Slow, delicate music was playing through speakers to ease her mind and help her get through this hard time. She closed the curtains and dimmed the lights, wanting the space around her to feel cozy and safe. She stayed like that for the past few days and planned on not going anywhere for another week. Her living room became her safe zone, her nest.

Every she-wolf sooner or later had her first heat, which then occurred annually. It was a time when the only thing their bodies and minds wanted was to mate and make pups. Of course, they could do it also on any other day of the year, but during this two-week period their bodies were at their best, as to ensure that the children were strong and healthy. That was also why they released so many pheromones, as to find their mate and procreate with them.

If a she-wolf was not mated yet, the heat wasn’t so bad on her. The pills in most cases were sufficient in suppressing her urges. But in cases of werewolves who found their mate, even if they didn’t link before, the heat became almost unbearable. For the first few days Gabi’s heat wasn’t really that bad, and she even wondered if it really was a good idea to hide at home. But when the fourth day came, she thought she was going to die. Everything ignited sparks in her, and every time she closed her eyes she saw those gorgeous eyes and smelled the hypnotizing scent of her mate. It was driving her nuts, as her wolf started to whimper in longing every time the pills became a little bit weaker. That’s why she built her fortress and turned off every electronic device in her home, not wanting for anything to disturb her peace, including her phone.

She snuggled more into the blankets, planning to take a nap because the yapping of her wolf was becoming gradually louder, when she heard knocking on her door. She stilled in fear, suddenly very aware of her surroundings. Her wolf became crazy, yipping and pushing one word into her mind constantly: “Mate! Mate! Mate!”. She hissed at the sensation and quickly pushed the words aside, slowly making her way to the door. Gabi looked carefully on the other side, and upon seeing Liz tapping her foot nervously she sighed with relief. Her wolf started crying again but she chose to ignore it.

Gabi opened the door with intent of telling Liz to go away and not come back for at least one more week, but seeing her distressed face she let her in. She passed her quickly and Gabi couldn’t stop thinking that she looked too lively for her likening.

In the next moment though she heard a loud yelp and sounds of various things crashing. She sighed, feeling too exhausted to even be angry with her clumsy friend. When she entered her living room she saw Liz sprawled on the floor right beside some empty old cups she left some time ago on the floor, not feeling the need to clean at that moment. The brunette moaned in pain and slowly rose to her feet, massaging her scalp.

“Why do you sit in darkness when it’s morning outside?! I can’t see a damn thing in here!” Gabi for a moment thought about whether she had enough strength in her to answer the question.

“It helps me with my heat. You should see with no problem, you’re a werewolf” she finally decided to voice out with a quiet and hoarse voice. Liz sighed frustrated and gave up on her way to open the curtains.

“You know Gabi, I may be a werewolf, but I’m a freaking domestic werewolf living in a city, and so when I can’t see a thing, I just switch on the lights!” she exclaimed, but when no ironic remark came from her friend, she looked at her with worry in her eyes.

“Do you take the pills I gave you?” Gabi nodded to “yes”.

“Do they help you?”

“A little bit for about three hours.” Liz cursed under her breath.

“It’s your mates’ fault.”

“Yes.”

“You should find him and talk to him.”

“Don’t wanna.”

“Why?” the conversation started to irritate her.

“Because he’s a fucking Alpha and I’m not only a runner, but I’m also a weak she-wolf who just wants to live her life in peace, not disturbed and definitely not stripped of her freedom!” it was the longest speech she had for the last week and she felt like fainting any time now. She was done for today and hoped that Liz saw it – she just wanted to forget, but each and every thing or person she encountered just had to step on her tail and remind her about him. It was so infuriating she felt like screaming.

Liz sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. She felt a migraine coming.

“Gabi, come here and sit with me for a bit.” They sat on the couch, where Gabi with a pout on her face almost instantly curled up in a ball so that the cramps in her lower abdomen were less painful.

“I hope you are aware that the longer you wait, the harder it will become? Your body knows now what it wants and it screams for it with every cell. I’m afraid that your next heats will be even worse than this one, they can drive you mad Gabi” she talked to her in a quiet and peaceful manner, but there were sparks of worry still visible in her eyes. Her best friend only curled up in a ball more, hiding her face in her shoulders and in her long hair. She was aware that she was digging her own grave right now. But what choice did she have? Her freedom was the only thing left that was precious to her apart from her parents. Without it she would be no one, just a sex toy and a machine to produce children.

Werewolf world was a lot crueler than that of humans, and often she wished she wasn’t a part of it.

“So, what do you think I should do?” she whispered, but her friend heard her loud and clear.

“I think you should find him and try to talk to him. If you are afraid of him, try to know something more about him before you approach him.”

“Don’t you think it will be hard to look for information about him when he’s a fricking Alpha? I bet he has his own pack that guards him all the time and eliminates all of the outsiders.”

“Maybe. But do you want to spend the rest of your life in such a miserable state like now, or die in a few years of loneliness and your wolf going crazy?” Liz huffed, feeling more frustrated with each passing minute. She knew how down-to-earth was Gabi and that she hated risk, but in her eyes what she was doing now was as dangerous if not more dangerous than trying to deal with this situation. Maybe he wasn’t so bad, maybe he would accept her. If she won’t try, she won’t know, but surely without any action she will die soon.

For a few minutes heavy silence lingered in the air between them, when finally Gabi decided to answer her friend.

“I promise I will think about it” she screeched out at the end, feeling another big cramp coming at her. Liz came closer to her and started massaging her lower back with precision, knowing where to touch for the muscles to relax.

After some time, Gabriella’s body slowly relaxed to a more comfortable position, and she send her friend a weary smile.

“Ok Gabi. I won’t pester you about it anymore, for now.” Liz said standing up and heading to the door. “If you need anything just call me.”

“Could you do one thing for me now?” she asked with hope in her exhausted eyes.

“Sure.”

“Order me some goddamn Chinese.”

Matteo Russo was close to a mental breakdown. By the orders of his Alpha for the last two and a half weeks he didn’t get much sleep if close to none. And it all started when they arrived to the charity event in their company’s building, Moretti Technologies. Everything looked normal to him until they got inside and away from the prying eyes of bystanders and paparazzi. His Alpha, Dante Moretti stopped dead in his tracks and turned around to him with a low, dangerous growl forming in his throat and eyes molten with anger and desire.

Although he was his Beta, Matteo could not withstand his stare and he bowed his head to his leader, hoping he would voice out what angered him so much. After a few long seconds a low, hoarse voice of his Alpha could be heard:

“There was a woman outside, a she-wolf. She smelled like oranges, cinnamon and mint. Find her.” He stated darkly still looking at his Beta with a fiery gaze, looking like he was ready to attack at any moment.

Matteo’s eyes widened in shock, but he didn’t have the courage to look at his boss.

“Do you maybe know what she looked like, Alpha Dante?” he didn’t even end the question when a hand grabbed him by the neck and lifted up his feet. He tried to pry away his Alpha’s hands from his neck but to no avail and he couldn’t help but look him in the eyes.

Furious crimson orbs were staring at him back, and a loud snarl escaped Dante’s mouth, showing how his fangs lengthened. His wolf was ready to come out.

“Oranges, cinnamon and mint. Find her and bring her to me.” he growled once again and finally let his hand go. Matteo felt like his legs give up under him from lack of oxygen, but he didn’t let them fall. It was forbidden to show weakness in the presence of Alpha. “Until you find her this is your only duty.” He said and without waiting he went further into the building. Although Matteo knew they had a few urgent matters to attend to before the evening’s main event, he knew if he appeared there without the woman, he would get a beating. Another thing he was sure of was that his Alpha finally found his mate, but Matteo didn’t feel happiness – he felt sorry for the little thing.

Through his two and a half weeks search his feelings didn’t change, but were eventually joined by frustration and fear of not finding her. He knew his Alpha. If he would have any doubts, he wouldn’t even voice his order as he generally wasn’t interested in women, or a mate in that matter. This man was cold and ruthless as a stone.

But now he was already fed up and he just wanted to find the girl and have it over with. He scouted a few members of their pack to help him search, but of course they didn’t know exactly what they were looking for – they just knew they had to find and bring back a she-wolf with a specific scent. But after checking CCTV around the building, finding information about almost two hundred women crowded at that time in the place and checking them personally one by one, he felt defeated. None of them was even a werewolf. It was a wild-goose chase to begin with. Matteo slowly stopped believing she even existed.

When he heard footsteps outside his room, he rose to his feet suddenly full of hope. When Luca, his best friend entered the room and shook his head at “no”, he cursed under his breath and slumped to his chair. Alpha was becoming restless, and if they don’t find her soon, he felt he might not live through it.

“Don’t worry my friend, we will find her” Luca patted him on the shoulder and send him his exhausted smile. He was the only one Matteo told about what they were searching for, as they were childhood friends and Luca was his right hand. He hid his face in his hands, but after a moment decided to get a grip of himself.

“Okay, let’s run through the CCTV once more Luca.” He said opening his laptop with a loud sigh.

“Okay bro, but let’s try something new. I was thinking about it for some time now, and seeing that we didn’t find her until now, maybe I’m right.”

“Talk. At this point we have to try everything.”

“So, we know she was there, right? But we assumed she was in the closest area of about 50 meters, and looked only through the closest cameras, right?” his eyes started to sparkle when his stance lost its weary look when he talked to Matteo.

“Yes, because in such densely populated city it’s impossible to distinguish in such detail scents of others, even if it’s your mate.” He said with a monotony in his voice, because they were going through it for the hundredth time already and he didn’t see sense in this conversation.

“But we didn’t take one thing into consideration. That day, September the 1st, the wind was pretty strong, blowing from mainly west to east as according to weather station.” Luca smiled at him as his train of thought dawned on Matteo.

“If the wind was strong, she could be 100, even 150 meters away and an Alpha could sense her.” The realization that maybe he wasn’t done for hit him. “If the wind was blowing from west to east, it had to take her scent with it. We have to search once more, help me check all of the cameras on the left side of the building.” He felt adrenaline once more in his veins, feeling that this might be it.

Luca seemed very pleased with himself, when with new energy they started searching through the footage. After about an hour or so, something caught his attention in the corner of his eye.

“Beta Matteo, stop the footage here.” They looked at the still from the CCTV, and after a few seconds Luca pointed in one direction. “Here, look at her. She’s acting weird.” Matteo once more hit play and concentrated on a small woman with long straight hair. The footage was all in white and black, but he could still see irritation and distress on her face. She said something to a man that was with her, and then she stopped in her tracks. Her face was half covered with her hair, but a look of pure fear in her eyes was still visible. She sniffed her nose in a discreet way and looked around her frantically, gaining weird looks from her friend. Then she looked straight at the entrance to the building, and Matteo froze along with her, feeling how his heart was ready to burst out of his ribcage.

In a matter of seconds, without turning to look back, she almost ran out of the camera’s reach, and Matteo just knew it had to be her. Not only was she the only one to behave in a weird way, she also sniffed the air… only a werewolf would do that.

“How many we have left on the list?” he asked Luca not turning his eyes away from the woman.

“About four.”

“Tell the boys to check them. Tell them also to look at cameras on other buildings. I want to know where she came from and where did she go. You and I will go and check this one out.”

Finally, it was Friday. It was the end of her first week of work after her being “sick”, and she still felt worn out. Liz said this might change in a week or two, all because her body and mind were straining for so long because of her heat and needed more time to regenerate.

She finally sent the last child home and closed her classroom, wishing she was already in bed with hot tea and some good book in hands. Fortunately for Gabi, today Brad had a day off and so she didn’t have to worry about him (of course he made sure to tell her this was strictly a family matter and not some other girl, but she of course shrugged this information off not giving him any sign in return). Slowly she made her way down the stairs and with no hurry left the kindergarten grounds. Suddenly she felt watched. With a swift look she scanned the area but nothing really aroused her suspicion. About 50 meters away from the entrance to the kindergarten two men in casual clothing were talking feverously about the car they were standing beside. They were wearing sunglasses, but it wasn’t something out of ordinary – the sun was shining really hard today, so most people wore them for their comfort. She quickly scanned the car that had a company name plastered on its side. “Moretti Technologies”. Gabi didn’t know the name but it didn’t bother her – the car looked like only a mere technician could drive it, and she concluded from what she saw that one of the men was given a job at Moretti’s and now was complaining to the other one about the service car he was given.

Not giving the situation any more thoughts she made her way home. For the last week she felt very sensitive and watched almost everywhere even if it was not true, and she decided that this time was the same.

When she reached home, she spotted an unusual guest at her apartment’s door.

“What’s up Liz?” she asked in a relaxed tone but in reality, she started to tense up, sensing something bad coming at her.

“Hi Gabi, I’ve got something important to show you.” Was the only thing she said. She seemed concerned about something and Gabi didn’t like it a little bit.

Without further ado she opened the door and turned the key when they entered. Liz in silence went to her bedroom for her laptop and brought it to the kitchen, where Gabi was waiting for the water to boil. She felt she will need coffee in a few minutes.

“I’m sorry I’m going back to your mate so quickly, but after you told me everything something didn’t exactly click for me.” Gabi looked at her in confusion.

“Well, you said he was one of the VIPs, like he’s some kind of celebrity. I checked all of the stars that were attending that event because you know, I like to know the newest trends” she trailed off a bit, but seeing Gabi’s face went back straight to business “The thing is, your lover boy wasn’t on the list. But I doubted you would lie to me, and so I searched some more. There was another person that attended this event; he is pretty new to the tabloids and media, but soon all of the world will know him, because his company is expanding like crazy. They were the host of this charity event, you know.” A trickle of sweat passed between her shoulder blades as Gabi felt her knees weaken with every second, when she saw a familiar name in the Google search. Oblivious to her state, Liz continued “The only man from this company that corresponded to your description is him – the CEO of Moretti Technologies, Dante Moretti”. Upon seeing the familiar face on her laptop, she felt like puking her heart out.

“Fuck” she only said as million thoughts passed through her brain, the newest one of two men beside the car with “Moretti Technologies” on its side.

They froze in place when they heard a loud, steady knock on the door. At that point Gabi felt like dying. She looked at her shocked friend and mouthed only one word.

“Run.”