Chapter 2

Vanessa POV

I woke up with my wrist in a cast. I knew I was in a hospital. There were IVs in my arm. The last thing I remember was someone yelling, mate. Then someone said there was no chance that I was going to get hurt again. A man was lying at the end of the bed. He had muscles that went on for days. He was half naked. I could see his nipples. They were dark brown, and across his chest was a tattoo in the shape of a wolf. On his right arm, he had a full sleeve of tattoos. He had a scar on his cheek.

He had dark brown hair. It was about shoulder-length, from what I could tell from the way he was lying on the bed. He had his hand on my foot. Where he was touching was sending sparks all over my body. I knew that this was my mate. But why was he here? He was probably here to reject me. No man wants a mate that can't talk or can't shift. I did have a wolf, but I was unable to shift. I watched him sleep, wondering what he was still doing here.

I had to go to the bathroom. I tried to move without waking him up. But that was a failure. He jumped up.

" Are you OK?"

I nodded my head yes.

"That's good."

" What do you need?"

I crossed my legs. He smiled and then left the room. A few minutes later, a nurse came in, and so did he.

" Alpha Alfred will you step out of the room."

" I will not leave you alone with my mate."

Wait, Alpha Alfred, the Shadow Clans Alpha. I fainted. When I came to again, he was holding me. I tried to wiggle out of his arms, but he would not let me. I started to hyperventilate.

" Calm down, baby."

" I'm not going to hurt you."

He started to stroke my hair, which was very comforting. The rumors about him are that he is mean and takes what he wants, but he is really gentle. Then my father burst into the room.

" I have been looking all over for you."

I started to try to scream and climb over Alfred to get behind him.

" Woohoo baby, it's OK."

" I won't let him hurt you."

He then turned towards my father.

" You need to leave."

" But she is my daughter."

" I don't care. She is my mate, and you will leave."

I was behind him, crying and clingy to him like my life depended on it. He had one arm wrapped around me, pushing me to his back. It hurt where his hand was sitting because he was pressing against my back. At that point, I did not care. I wanted to crawl inside him. I knew that was impossible. But, oddly, I felt safe. Also, where he was touching me was sending sparks all over my body, and I knew that I was safe. That was all I cared about.

" Vanessa, if you do not come with me right now, you will be in big trouble."

" She is not going anywhere with you."

" How dare you threaten my Luna."

He then got up from bed. He gently pushed me back onto the bed, and the nurse ran over.

" I will be back shortly, baby."

The nurse was holding me. Alfred and my father left the room. I started crying.

" Vanessa, you are safe."

" Alpha Alfred will not let anything happen to you."

She held me while I cried. I must have cried myself to sleep. When I woke up again, Alfred was holding my hand.

" Baby, I know you are mute."

" That is fine."

I started to cry again.

" No, no baby, don't do that."

But I could not help it. The heart monitor was going crazy as my heartbeat was going faster than the nurse rushed in.

" What did you do?"

" Nothing."

"I told her I knew she was mute, and that was fine."

She smiled and then walked over to me. She stood there, telling me to take some deep breaths and to try to calm down, which I started to do. I started to calm down. She then handed me a dry-erase board.

I wrote

" Where am I."

I knew that I was in the hospital, but where in my clan's territory or his?

" You are still in your clan's territory."

" We will be leaving tomorrow morning."

That was a relief. I will gladly leave this place and be away from my parents. Sometimes, I think that they are not my parents. They act like they aren't. But I look like my sisters. They have to be my parents. Why did the moon goddess decide to give me to them? Also, what did they do to the witch that cursed me and my sisters? At least my sisters could speak. I can not talk, which upsets me. I started to feel dizzy. I laid back on the bed. Alfred rushed to my side.

"What's wrong."

" I think she is dizzy."

The nurse answered for me. Which I was grateful for. The sun was starting to come up. I could not believe that it was already the next day. That meant that I missed my chance to shift. I started bawling.

" Baby, what's wrong now?"

I wrote in big letters.

" I DID NOT SHIFT."

" Oh baby, it's OK."

" There is time for that."

I missed the time for my first shift. The longer I don't shift, the more there is a chance that I will never shift. He climbed on the bed, and I crawled into his lap like a baby. I curled up into a ball and cried. He sat there with me in his lap, crying for a long time. He stroked my hair. The whole time, telling me it was OK. I finally stopped crying. All the things that they said about him had to be wrong. He was gentle and seemed kind. But I did not know him well. I just meant him. Then, it dawned on me that I was sitting in a man's lap that I had never meant before.

Yes, he is my mate, but I don't know him. I felt safe with a stranger. But I was terrified of my family. I'm not going to miss them when I leave her. It is said that when you are a twin or a member of a set of babies, you have a connection, but I have never felt connected to anyone in my family. I was the runt. Viewed as a weakling and destined to die. But my father, being the alpha, wanted to set an example. Even though he was alpha, he wanted not to let them abandon their long.

He has never approved of that practice, for which I am grateful. At least, that was a good thing. He was decent in that aspect. After lying in his lap for a while, he cleared his throat.

" Baby, I need you to move."

" Your elbow is digging into my groin."

I immediately jumped up and hurt myself.

" It's OK, baby; you did not need to move that fast."

I blushed because of where my elbow was. I was still a virgin, but I knew about that subject from being forced to do things that I did not want to. I was deep in thought when Thomas walked into my room. I immediately jumped off the bed ripping the IVs out of my arm and ran into the bathroom. I tried to hide from him. I could hear the commotion going on in my room.