Becoming Alpha

She leaned close to me and sniffed and then crinkled her nose. “They must not have washed the stuff they put in the infirmary with you. Reeks of dryer sheets. Norms.” She rolled her eyes.



Norms?



She dragged me into the bathroom. “Freshen up and I’ll get you some clothes.”



The bathroom vanity had two sinks. White subway tiles covered the bottom half of the walls and lined the shower. The white granite counter had plenty of room for two girls to spread out. The mirror opened in panels with enough shelves to make my inner organizer happy.



I splashed some cold water on my face, and stared into the mirror. Something was different. My hair shined. The highlights and lowlights gave the brown more depth than I’d ever had before. It looked shampoo commercial good. But the thing that stuck out the most to me was my 100% zit-free face. I always had some sort of blemish lurking here or there. Not even the tiniest red splotch marked my skin now.



They must have given me a few shots of super vitamins or antibiotics or something. Maybe a super vitamin E? Dr. Needle-happy might not be so bad after all.



I rummaged through my makeup bag that sat on the counter. Half of it wasn’t necessary with my complexion being so clear. A quick swipe of gloss would be enough. I wasn’t trying to impress anyone. It only had a hint of chemically smell, so I put it on.



Meredith was still digging through my clothes when I walked back into my room. “You’ve got some cute stuff.” She pulled out a black mini. “Love this.”



I laughed. “With your body, it’ll probably look better on you than me.”



“Yeah, ‘cause you’re such a cow.” She rolled her eyes. “I threw some jeans and a tank on the bed. Change. I’ll wait.” She moved over to look through my books.



I moved to the bed and picked up the tank top. It was one of my staples, black ribbed with black lace edging. But something was different with it. Something about it made me want to spend the night rubbing my face in it. I took a wiff of it, and smelled wood and something manly.



Totally weird. “My clothes smell—”



“Like Dastien!” She jumped in place. “Doesn’t he smell like soooo yummy?”



Damn it. I didn’t want to like her, but I couldn’t help smiling with her. “I hadn’t noticed before. I guess he does. So uuh, dare I ask why they smell like him?”



She waved me off and went back to the books. “He helped move your stuff in. I think it was part of his ongoing punishment.”



“Punishment?”



She looked back at me. “For biting you.”



“Is that his only punishment?”



She shook her head slowly. “No. Not even close.”



I sat hard on the bed. This didn’t sound good. “Is he going to be okay?”



“I don’t know.” She sat next to me. “I wouldn’t worry about him. There might be a trial or something, but he’ll probably be okay.”



I took a deep breath with my face in the tank. I couldn’t believe I was torn between being repulsed and happy that it smelled like him. That guy had seriously messed with my head. And I really shouldn’t care what might happen to him, but the “he’ll probably be okay” thing was bothering me. “What kind of punishment could he get?”



“No one really knows, although everyone is talking about it. It’s a huge deal that he bit you. I mean, it’s against our Law. We’re not like humans. The consequences are…” She got up and started looking through the stuff on my desk. “We just don’t break our Law. So, Dastien’s been keeping to himself and spending a lot of time as a wolf. And I’m sure we’ll have a visit from the Seven before too long.”



Was she purposely trying to not give me all the info? “The Seven?” It sounded a little sharp, even to me.



“Oh, sorry. We’ve never had a bitten wolf here.”



I made a mental note to ask about that later.



“They’re like our president, but more like a governing council made up of seven really old Alpha werewolves.”



“So what’s the worst case scenario?”



She made a face, scrunching up her nose. “I don’t want to freak you out. It probably won’t even happen.”



“Okay, then don’t say things like ‘I don’t want to freak you out.’ Because first thing I do is start to freak out!”



She replaced the book she was holding back where she found it, and let out a breath. “He could get sentenced to death.”



What! “Death?”