Coldsnap: The Billionaire Alpha's Fated Pregnant Princess (GL)-Chapter 406 - [V] Red-Head Redemption?

Chapter 406: Chapter 406 - [V] Red-Head Redemption?
***[POV: Socially-Bottomed Whitecrest]***
Waiting near the stairwell where I could observe without being conspicuous is humiliating. Staying far enough to escape notice. Close enough to be a part of it.
This whole month has been the most demeaning of my whole life.
Two weeks of schoolyard level invisibility and snubs after what Kyrie did to me had turned into two weeks of being a punching bag once she was no longer around. The person that made me an outcast was the only one protecting me.
I had to realize that after the third time of being shoved down in the hallway. I’ve had to learn the value of positioning myself in shadows instead of the strategy of approaching any social situation boldly.
So now, with our pack clustered in small to large cliques I used to dance between as I wanted, the lobby area of Lunarizon tower was as nervous as I was. Everyone knew the Alpha was returning soon.
Everyone had heard something about what she was bringing back. Who. Why.
Though not really how. Of course they have theories, but I doubt any of them are right. Unless that human sitting behind her computer wanted them to know.
Rumors that I would have pushed to other groups until everyone knew everything important are now all in her hand and not in mine. I don’t even know half of what the people that used to listen to me do.
The bottom rung of the social ladder is lonely. Frustrating. Somehow a place that echoes quietly with its emptiness. And makes a person read and recite poetry to deal with it.
I feel like a thirteen year old girl still waiting for her spirit again.
"Excuse me. You’re blocking the way."
Instincts that were beaten into me these days made me quickly slide against the wall. Claire Thomsson pushed past me, tablet clutched to her chest. Messy looking hair, bags under her eyes.
< Smelling like Luca. >
My fingers scratch on the interior wall, trying not to do anything stupid again. She’d been the one holding everything together while Kyrie... *searched*.
The one who’d had to make decisions for our Beta to approve. Allocating resources and managing all the details of the crisis upon us.
I’m not stupid - I know she never waited for his go ahead. No matter what the provided s keep telling everyone.
An Alpha abandoning her pack during what they are calling a literal apocalypse, letting us be be ruled by a human proxy. It’s infuriating. No matter how competent she is.
Even more because she is also the one who’d had to *deal with me* after the show in the arena. Sent Dr. Lang in... supposedly against our Alpha’s wishes.
I don’t know if I believe that, but I don’t know why the lie. Why she of all people would care. Why she took the time to set up a video conference and go over all the details.
I just know everyone keeps lying. About something or other. And I hate it.
I hate that I’m the one who had to be made an example of when they were the ones who met the rumors I spread without the truth that needed to be told.
A shuddering breath accompanied that hand on my throat. Where Kyrie’s claws had pressed. Ready and wanting to kill me. Really, really wanting to.
The words had been seared into my memory with that sensation and fear. Citra Lomdi, formerly Helene Duskpaw, is her Fated Mate - and is never to be harmed.
Those words still haunt me. I’d been interfering with that the entire time, if she is to be trusted...
A bond every young she-wolf dreamed of finding, like a human girl’s prince on a white horse. Sacred connection. Blessed personally by the Lunar Goddess herself.
What a beautiful rarity in a world like this.
Where the person you love can choose to want nothing to do with you.
When a male wolf can just get you to settle and convince you that waiting for perfection isn’t living... isn’t helping the pack. Like our grandfather keeps pressing me for.
I’d gotten in the way of it for them, all because no one would just come out and say it. All because I never even thought...
At first, I’d been too angry. A worthless, pregnant rogue had come in and everything went to hell.
Then too crushed to process it. That a woman could be paired with another woman. It isn’t helping the pack at all that way, right?
"One minute out. Get ready."
Her assistant’s voice came out over the speaker system and created a ripple of movement. The groups started to spread out more before the security members forced them apart.
I recognized the fear in their eyes. It was the same kind I held. Kyrie Voss has been... successful in so much. What it meant that she’d stayed gone so long was anyone’s guess.
In a world that had already changed too much, an Alpha that hasn’t been acting like herself for three months now... is a scary thing.
The sealed doors opened with hybrids ready on either side of it. Cold air began to billow in. And I learned how right we all were to fear.
Black fur from the largest wolf I’ve ever seen entered in at high speed. With eyes an unnatural... pinkish-purple that I don’t recognize from any pack structure in the Pacific Northwest.
On its back *rode* a white haired woman emitting the familiar dominating scent of our pack leader. With one arm held around something strapped to her chest. While wearing...
Wearing that rogue’s coat. That one I’m sure she got at one of our winter charity events!
This unknown wolf slowed on the tile with so much grace despite its size. The same kind of polished surface I’ve seen new spirit bearers of ours slip and slide on at night. Tumbling like idiots.
Kyrie slid down from it like someone who had done this more than once. She looked a bit exhausted, a little gaunt in the face. But her eyes... they burned with something that made my throat feel constricted again.
"This-"
I’d seen hundreds of wolves transform in my life. Our Alpha was the second fastest of them. But now she was the third... and certainly neither of them steamed like their whole form was made of mist.
The scent hit me. That disgusting wildness... strangely irritating mint. And underneath it all, the unmistakable scent of werewolf milk.
In seconds, a woman I recognized was standing up. Shorter than our Alpha. Black, thick, straight hair. She didn’t seem to care where she was.
Or how much her show of nudity was clearly angering the one she came in with.
"-is Citra. My mate."
Gray eyes swept the room full of werewolves, her posture radiating that undeserved haughtiness of hers. The kind that always irked me. Due to how it *looked* earned rather than practiced in a mirror.
She raised a hand toward nothing and... suddenly twenty feet of industrial steel and glowing purple crystal simply was there. Several pack members scrambled backward into each other.
Someone yelped. A small fight almost broke out. Citra ignored it all.
Just yanked open one of the doors to disappear inside briefly. Emerged with a robe in one hand. Didn’t even stop to put it on, the slut!
It might not be uncommon for us to transform back and forth in front of each other, but only Kyrie Voss has ever proven directly to all others not to ogle her.
It’s understood that everyone else is fair game. She almost has to understand it too. Which only makes me dislike her more.
"Please. Continue your little theater for my introduction, which I was left completely unwarned of. I’ll be back when you’re done... posturing."
Our... our leader, took the clothing from her and quickly wrapped it around her shoulders - to hide the stupid, *unmarked* ass of her... her so-called mate, from drawing so many looks.
In the middle of that, the Duskpaw rogue unlatched the pouch on Kyrie. The held it to her own chest while turning away.
"Sorry... I’ll be quick."
Not even responding to the concession given by the white haired terror, she walked past all of us with eyes that flickered like lilac lightning any time anyone moved.
Toward Claire. Toward the private elevator.
And hundreds of orange glowing eyes watched her go. Watched the whispering human and the nodding *unknown* use the rationed power.
Limitations that had all of *us* walking the stairs.