C5 New home –discovery

Seated alone in the dining hall, surrounded by a feast of various dishes, Annabelle sighed and continued to glare at her untouched meal. Over the past two days, she had been hooked up to a drip after collapsing in her room.

She couldn't help but wonder if she had truly been abducted; it didn't feel that way. It seemed more like she was some kind of princess, but what she knew for sure was that she wasn't being treated like a captive.

Eventually, she decided to check if anyone was around. After confirming that the coast was clear, with no sign of the guards who had been at the entrance door when she arrived, she cautiously sneaked back to her room.

Upon switching on the lights, her scream echoed through the room as she discovered a figure sitting on her bed, legs crossed and eyes closed in meditation. She bolted out of the room as if she had seen a ghost.

Spotting a maid in the hallway, she rushed over and began firing questions at her. "Excuse me, do you know me?" Annabelle asked, her voice laced with panic, startling the maid, who scanned their surroundings for potential danger.

"Yes, Luna," the maid turned to her and answered with a subtle bow.

"Good, am I sharing my room with anyone?" Annabelle inquired.

"Actually, Luna, the room you're in belongs to the Alpha. You're sharing it with him," the maid replied with another bow, causing Annabelle's face to fall.

"An Alpha? Who or what is an Alpha? And why am I sharing a room with a guy? A woman can't be referred to as an Alpha, right?" She raised a brow.

"I'm sorry, Luna, but I can't provide you with any more information," the maid replied before bowing and walking away.

Annabelle watched the maid's departure and sighed before walking away herself. She returned to the dining hall and sat there, still glaring at the sumptuous dishes. "Everyone in this mansion is strange," she thought before drifting off to sleep.

...

She felt a tingling sensation on her forehead and tried to massage the spot, but her hand brushed against someone else's, causing her to feel as though she'd been electrocuted. She jumped out of her seat, her bewildered gaze meeting the familiar blue eyes of the strange man.

"You…?" she asked, eyes wide, a glare forming on her face.

"What the heck is wrong with your hands?" she suddenly yelled at him, holding her right hand that had touched his.

Still holding her hand, he sat down on the chair opposite her, scowling at her. Unperturbed by the chills running down her spine, she tried to compose herself. She put on a cold and emotionless expression just like his, scowling back at him.

"Eat!" he said coldly, making her jump out of her seat, startled. She wasn't expecting him to talk all of a sudden.

"So you can talk, huh?" she asked, holding her chest, but received no reply.

"Where were you? Did you just bring me here and disappear into thin air? It's not like I care, but I've been wanting to ask, when will I be going home? It doesn't look like I was abducted, and no one answers my questions," she said before tasting her food.

He stared at her untouched plate of food, about to say something, but his ringing phone distracted him.

"Start eating, and snap out of your strange food aversion," he said before answering his call.

"I've lost my appetite. I can't eat this. Do I look like a vegetarian?" she asked, but he ignored her and continued with his call.

"I'll be on my way," he said before ending the call, and she slammed her palm on the table, gaining his attention, and he turned to her, his baby blue eyes observing her.

"You haven't answered my question, sir. You're not leaving," she said, clenching her hands into tight fists under the table.

"You're already home, Annabelle, so enjoy your stay," he said before leaving the dining hall, leaving her wide-eyed.

"There's no way this is my home," she muttered. "This isn't my home; you took me away from my home. Is this a vacation or something?" She tried to keep up with his pace, trailing behind him.

"This is your new home now," he said without turning back, and finally walked out of the dining hall, while she continued following behind him.

"Stop speaking as though you own me. I am not a possession. You have no right to decide where I'll stay. I want to go home," she ordered, frustrated by his bossy attitude. He wasn't even trying to reason with her; he was just too cold for her liking.

"If you were not my property, do you think you would be here? I own you, Annabelle, and that's why I'm trying to be nice to you."

"That's a lie. I am owned by no one, not even my dad owns me. Besides, you're the opposite of nice!" she retorted with an eye roll.

"Go to your room, now!" he spoke coldly when he suddenly stopped walking, and she almost bumped into him but halted just in time.

"But let me go; I'm not your property. You don't know me," she pleaded, finally dropping her bossy facade and revealing the innocent girl that she was.

"I'm sorry to say this, Annabelle, but I can't let you go," he said and resumed walking.

"Why? Why can't you let me go?"

"It's dangerous; letting you go means putting your life at stake."

"But I was safe before you kidnapped me. It's my life, and I don't like it here. Why did you take me away from my home? My experiments, god! I'll fail my exams. You need to send me back before tomorrow!" she yelled, clenching her hands behind her.

"Forget about your exams. You weren't safe; your life was at the mercy of werewolves in that place you call home. You knew you weren't safe; that's why you frequently argued with your dad about the house and always glared at it as though if it were a human like you, you would have killed it. And now, you're talking as though you loved your home," he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

"You were spying on me, weren't you?" she asked, her eyes widening.

"I was just trying to ensure your safety," he said and shrugged.

"I knew it! I knew someone was watching me, and that someone was you. I'll report you to the cops when I get out of here," she threatened but paused.

"Did you get into my room? I couldn't concentrate and kept making mistakes in my take-home experiment. Were you the lurking silhouette? Did you get into my room?"

"Let's just say I was babysitting a lazy student zoologist. All she knows is how to carry out various experiments and fight."

She gasped, her hand covering her mouth, shocked by the sudden realization. "You were babysitting me?" She seemed shocked but later regained her composure. "Anyway, it's better than being babysat by a ghost. But how did you get in? Were you secretly crushing on me? Or wait," her eyes widened, her face paling, and she crossed her arms over her chest.

"You've seen me nude, haven't you?" She raised a brow at him, but he remained silent. When her question finally sunk in, she became embarrassed, covering her mouth with her hands.

"Nevermind; I don't even want to know. But if I had known earlier that such a hot man was crushing on me, I would have become a blogger. Instead, you were hiding, hindering me from making money in a fun way. Your silhouette always scares me to shit, and your hair... your hair..." she trailed off, watching him intently.

"Do you want me to cut it short?" he asked bluntly, and her eyes widened.

"No, don't cut it; I like it. It just looks beautifully strange. You look strangely unreal and stunning. Wow. Small talk aside, let's get down to business. You said I was at the mercy of werewolves. What does that mean?" she asked, squinting her eyes.

"It means your home isn't safe," he replied, resting on a pillar in the large dining hall.

"No, I mean the werewolves. They don't exist. If they did, I would have loved experimenting on such animals," she said, shaking her head but noticing a flicker of disapproval on his face.

"Who said they don't exist?" he asked, watching her with a bored expression.

"I study animals; I'm a zoologist. We haven't found anything like werewolves. It's just wolves. Or have you found any?" she folded her hands over her chest, leaning against nothing.

"If you haven't found one doesn't mean they don't exist," he replied, his cold gaze turning into a surprised one.

"Werewolves don't exist, and that's final," she said as though she were educating him.

"What do you even know about werewolves? Humans behave as though they know everything, but they're all ignorant creatures," he said, feeling sorry for his ignorant mate. Her face paled after what he had said had sunk in.

"We humans? Humans? Why do you talk as though you're not one of us?"

"Tell me what you know about werewolves," he ignored her question and threw his at her, but she didn't dwell on it too much, though she was suspicious.

"They are mythical creatures, a combination of an animal and a human," she said with pride.

"Then how can you use such a thing as an experiment? Okay, let's start with this: If I say I'm a werewolf, would you believe me?" he asked, awaiting her reaction.

"I wouldn't believe you," she replied simply.

"Why wouldn't you?"

"Because you're human. We're all human, but you're not entirely human; you behave as though you're mentally ill, like a strange type of human. That's what my observation tells me," she answered, studying his appearance and enjoying throwing barbs at him at the same time.

"What if I'm not human?" he asked, not minding how disrespectful she could be.

"You're not a combination of a human and an animal; you are human," she said, studying him and making him smile at her ignorance.

"How do you envision the shape of a werewolf?" he asked further to find out if she really knew anything about werewolves.

"I don't know much, but in the book that a maid brought to me, I read that they were a combination of a human and an animal. So, I think their head is that of an animal, their torso is that of a human, while their hands and legs are a combination of an animal and a human."

She spoke, lost in thought, trying to piece together her idea of a werewolf, which made him frown and narrow his eyes into tiny slits.

"What? I was just guessing," she said, eyeing him when she saw him frowning.

"You guessed so badly. I bet your nerves would be totally frayed when you come in contact with such a beast you've created with your imagination," he scoffed.

"My imagination created it so that it would come for you, the abductor, and you'd be like a scaredy-cat. I bet you on that," she chuckled. "And besides, since you said my home isn't safe, would you mind my dad coming over too? I don't want my imaginary werewolves to visit him."

"Is that what you want?" he asked, and she nodded.

"It's very easy. Just kidnap him like how you did to me," she said, her mood shifting before angrily walking away, while he watched her retreating figure with a lingering smile. She was daring.

...

After finishing dinner, she headed to her room, lying on her bed with her eyes open, patiently waiting for midnight.

As soon as it struck 12 o'clock, she climbed out of bed and walked toward her closet, taking out her clothes, which she had tied together to make a rope. She approached the window and, after confirming that the area was clear, she tied the clothes to the window frame and threw the rest out of the window.

Climbing onto the window frame, she held onto the cloth rope and hastily descended the walls before sprinting into the woods.

Suddenly, she heard a growl and froze in fear as her eyes darted around. Was there a guard dog on the mansion's grounds?

She continued running through the dark woods, lit only by occasional lightning flashes and thunder rumbles.

Annabelle's bare feet splashed through the muddy ground, leaving tracks behind. She hadn't considered the weather when plotting her escape, and now she regretted it. She couldn't run fast; the ground was slippery, and owls hooted at every turn she took.

The sound of a growl made her almost stumble over tree roots, and when she glanced behind her, she was dumbstruck by the sight of a menacing but masculine wolf.

When she took another turn, she then realized that the wolf was chasing her, and her fear escalated.

Exhausted from running for so long, she stumbled over a tree stump and fell to the ground, shivering from the cold rain.

She sat up, but heard a snap behind her and spun around to see the wolf getting closer. Slowly stepping backward with her arms raised in surrender, she stared at the wolf in fear.

"No, no, no," she grumbled while the wolf approached. Gathering her courage and determined not to die as a naive lady, she spun around and ran.

But she hadn't gone far when she felt a force that made her fall roughly on the ground. A large tree branch had fallen on her, trapping her underneath.

"This isn't good. Help, I need help here, anyone!!'' she screamed when she couldn't crawl out from under the tree.

She cried out in pain when she heard a bone-cracking noise and saw the wolf transform into a shirtless, god-like man.

Shivering like a scaredy-cat, she watched as the strange guy, now human, walked toward her. He raised the tree branch for her to crawl out, but fear paralyzed her.

"Get out!" he growled at her, and she crawled away from beneath the branch, her whole body trembling.

"What were you thinking?" he asked, walking toward her as she sat on the muddy floor, soaked by the rain.

"Don't touch me!" she yelled, frightened when he tried to help her up.

"Annabelle, don't be scared of me, okay? I'll explain everything, but let's go home now. It's not safe here," he tried to assure her.

"My nerves are totally frayed," she cried, crawling away from him.

"I know they're supposed to be frayed. Now let's go home," he said, remaining squatted where he was to avoid scaring her.

"Y..ou are a werewolf; you're… you're a big werewolf," she stuttered, shuddering.

"I'm a werewolf, but I won't hurt you, Annabelle. Trust me."

"Why should I trust you? You're a freaking animal!" She yelled, getting ready to run away.

"Annabelle, you'll only get hurt if you try running away. Don't run away again," he said, knowing her intention.

"Try and stop me," she dared before sprinting away. He ran a hand through his hair in frustration before going after her to prevent her from crossing the borders; they were dangerously close to it.