"Where is she? Is she ok?" Xavier yelled through the house.

"Kitchen," Ivy called back.

The next thing we all heard was the sound of three separate pairs of footsteps running across the hardwood floor.

"Addison? Addison? Oh thank god you're ok," Xavier breathed a sigh of relief once he saw me sitting at the counter completely unharmed.

Xavier quickly wrapped his arms around my waist, stepping in between my open legs and barring his face into the crook of my neck. Was he sniffing me?

"Um-" I tried to say something, anything. But Xavier's worried voice cut me off.

"I was so worried that you were going to get hurt. And then I saw him lounging towards you and all I saw was red," Xavier tightened his grip around me as he spoke. "I can't believe I let you go to the creek with everything happening lately, I mean the Blue Moon pack just got attacked yesterday, but I never thought that it would happen to us."

Xavier pulled back just enough to look me in the eyes and kiss my forehead before the front door opened again and Cecelia's voice rang out.

"Hunter just told me that you got all the rouges but didn't tell me if Addison was hurt," Cecelia said walking into the kitchen with an equally worried look on her face.

I was able to pull back far enough away from Xavier to scan the room. Grayson was standing behind Ivy with arms wrapped around her wait, Brad and Audrey were sitting at the barstool at the far end of the counter holding hands, and Cecelia looked like she was about to cry.

"I'm fine," I said softly. "I'm not hurt."

"How did they even get in here without being noticed?" Cecelia asked once she pushed Xaver away from me and enveloped me in her own bone-crushing hug.

"Jackson's figuring that out now and we're waiting to hear back from Blue Moon about their status," Grayson spoke up.

"Does anyone want to fill me in maybe?" I half-shouted at everyone in the room. I tried to push myself away from Xavier and stand up, but he only held on tighter.

"Do you remember when Mr. Davis was talking about folklore that day in History? About werewolves?" Ivy took a step closer to me.

"What does that have to do with anything?" I asked her annoyed.

"Xavier this one is all on you," Brad piped up.

Xavier looked me in the eyes before saying, "We're all werewolves, Addison"

I gave Xavier a blank stare that basically said 'how stupid do you think I am?'

"I'm telling the truth, Addison," he went on. "Grayson, Brad, Ivy, Audrey, Cecelia, and I are all werewolves. Those wolves you saw fighting outside were us. And the one that tried to attack you was a rouge, he doesn't have a pack like us he-"

"Seriously you expect me to believe this?" I cut Xavier off. I managed to push myself far enough away so I could hop off the barstool and scramble to the other side of the room, away from everyone else.

"I would never lie to you, Addison."

"Prove it," I said.

"Let's go to the backyard, we can all show you there," Xavier said turning on his heel and walking to the deck.

Everyone followed him in suit, with me of course being the last one. When I got outside everything else was already standing on the lawn and Xavier and Brad were starting to take off their shirts and pants.

"I didn't say give me a striptease!" I squealed covering my eyes.

"Open your eyes, Addison. You need to watch this," Xavier commanded me.

I slowly pulled my fingers away from my eyes to watch Xavier and Brad, they stripped down to just their underwear and then started to transform. Their bones and skin started to move and before I could even understand what I was seeing two huge wolves stood in the boy's places. A large brown and white wolf stood in Brad's place, and a slightly larger pure black wolf stood in Xavier's.

The brown wolf stood still in its place, while the black wolf took a few small steps closer to me. Which made me immediately take a few steps back from it.

"It's ok," Ivy soothed me. She was standing near the edge of the deck. "He won't hurt you."

"How do I know that he won't? I saw the way he attacked those other wolves," I told her scared.

"You're his mate, Addison," Ivy said softly. "He couldn't even hurt you if he tried, none of us would ever hurt you. You mean a lot to us."

"What the heck is a mate? and why do I mean so much to all of you? I just moved here," my voice was starting to shake and I could feel tears start to well up in the corners of my eyes.

"Xavier, Brad change back," Ivy called to the wolves- I mean Xavier and Brad.

Both of them quickly ran behind a nearby tree and came back a second later wearing a pair of shorts and no shirt. Why did Xavier have to be so damn hot? If I wasn't so mad and confused right now I'd be drooling. Brad walked over to Audrey and Xavier made his way over to me.

"Addison," he said reaching his hand out to me, but instead I flinched back. Afraid of what he might do. "No one's going to hurt you."

"Why?"

"Wolves live in packs, and our pack is called the Midnight Moon pack. Every pack has a hierarchy, the top of a pack is called the alpha, that's me. The next is called the beta and the beta female, that's Grayson and Ivy. If anything happens to me they're in charge. Brad is the pack gamma, the third in command and Audrey is the gamma female," Xavier spoke slowly to me.

"What's a mate?" I asked Xavier.

Xavier let out a big sign and a small smile crept up on his face as he spoke. "Mate is short for a soulmate, they're our other halves. The Moon Goddes gives each wolf one and when we turn 16 we're able to find them."

"How do you know?"

"You can smell them. Just like real wolves we also have a heightened sense of smell."

"Has everyone found their soulmate ?" I asked looking around.

"Grayson and I are mates," Ivy spoke up grabbing his hand. "So are Brad and Audrey, and Cecelia and Hunter, and-"

"Addison, you're my soulmate." Xavier finished. "You're my other half that I've been searching for since I turned 16. I was starting to lose hope until I found you sitting at the table with Ivy your first day here."

I had no idea what to say.