Isabel's Choice

Chapter 9 - Isabel

Place and time: Owen's pack (Southern River Border), while Lars is up North, waiting for Ayn

"You look so pretty, Isabel," Owen's fingers lace themselves around my neck.

I watch his image in the mirror. His golden hair is neatly buzzed as always, perfectly shaped sideburns descending towards an angled jaw. Most females would cream themselves at a compliment coming from such a handsome male.

I just cringe and my muscles tense painfully under his touch. What did I do? What didn't I do? What does he want? Questions shoot through my brain rapidly, leaving bleeding trails behind them. Owen is never kind without motive.

His thumb trails forward along my shoulder, gently pressing on his mark.

Maybe he just wants to mate with me, I sigh, and lean slightly forward, my hands resting on the cold marble edge of the sink.

"Let me take you out for dinner tonight."

Had he pushed himself inside me without warning, I would have been less shocked than I am, hearing his invitation.

I lift my head to hold the reflection of his dark gaze. I have to wonder if he is still high on the blood he spilled last night when he went raiding Goddess knows where.

"Why?"

"Do I need a reason to share a meal with my mate?"

Most shifters wouldn't, but this one has eaten with me alone only once. Kind of. On the way back after claiming me, we stopped at a tank station, he had a slice of pizza and I had the delusion that he would take care of me, as he had promised my mothers.

"No, Alpha," my head drops again slightly, as his hand gently wraps around mine, leading me out of the bathroom.

***

The restaurant he chose is in the southern neighborhood.

It would be a lovely part of our territory if it wouldn't be so close to the swamps that are crawling with the creepiest snakes and the hungriest of mosquitoes.

My mother Astrid didn't speak often about her childhood. She did mention sometimes how the pack had lost all this River Border and the tens of wolves that lived here during one of the most terrible storms and floods the Land had ever seen.

The River went back after a while, leaving behind it a swamp filled with shifter bones.

Her father Albert never rebuilt the dams that broke, and Astrid suspected that a part of him didn't want to. Looking over the wild marshes was his way of punishing himself for the failure to protect his pack.

Owen had mentioned sometimes his thoughts about taking back this ground from the River, but our financial options were limited. Due to my disappointing budget management among others.

„We'll have the surprise menu," Owen tells the waiter, and I raise my eyebrows hearing the Alpha ordering an unknown selection of food. The same Alpha who wants to see my menu plans for the whole week, who provides detailed input on the match between the main course and the desert, and who then approves them formally, with V scribbled in the corner.

"Oh, it's only a surprise for you," he replies with a grin to my puzzled look. „I have obviously asked before what it contains."

Obviously. I can take a sip of my water, with the knowledge that the world is in order, he is still the same control freak I know.

"This wine is really good. Are you sure you don't want to try it? It is from Finn's territory."

The lure in his voice is hard to resist - a taste of my home.