Page 6 of Alpha Mates

Julian Heil. JulianfuckingHeil.

Goddess, Ihatehim. I hate a lot of people—too many to count—but at the top of that list is, and always will be, Julian Heil. That guy—that guy—takes first place every fucking time.

There isn’t a redeemable thing about him, not one, but it’s the way he looks down on everyone that really grates.

So he has a white wolf and reads the dictionary every night under his covers, big whoop. It doesn’t give him the right to act like a grade-A jackass every fucking day. But that’s exactly what he is—a condescending prick who’s long overdue for a lesson. And I can’t wait to give him one.

Seething, I walk through the halls without a destination, just a mind to get away from the annoying bastard before I turn around and make good on my promise.

Two more days. Just two.

I turn a corner and stifle a curse as I bump straight into someone rushing from the other side, but Goddess must be feeling generous because it’s not just anybody.

“What the hell!” Emitt swears, stumbling back and landing on his ass with a thud that makes me grimace. I wince as my best friend and soon-to-be beta glares up at me.

“Sorry, man,” I say, offering a hand. Emitt takes it without a fuss, letting me pull him to his feet before he dusts himself off. “I just finished dealingwith a certain shithead, and I wasn’t watching where I was going.”

“Let me guess—Julian?”

A growl slips past my teeth, and Emitt immediately lifts his hands in surrender.

“Okay, how about we forget about him and head to class, hm? We’ve got bio next.”

“I hate biology,” I grumble as he eases around me to push me towards the labs.

“If you hate it so much, why is it the only subject you get straight A’s in?”

“Divine intervention,” I say, and he snorts.

In truth, I love the sciences. Out of all the subjects that have been shovelled down my throat since I started here at fourteen, they’ve come the easiest. It’s the rooms they’re taught in that I have a problem with.

Even after years of this shit, the chemicals in the labs are still torture to our noses, and enduring them on a Monday isn’t exactly what I call a good time.

“It’s not for long, though,” I say as I move aside so we’re walking side by side. “Pretty soon we’ll be done with this shit. The coronation’s in a few days!” I give Emitt a shove that sends him stumbling. I catch him by the shoulders, but only so I can shake him again. “It’s going to be amazing.”

“Yeah, yeah. Cool down, Incredible Hulk.” He shrugs me off. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m looking forward to it too. But right now I’m more worried about the bloodshed that’ll come after.”

My mood plummets. “I thought we weren’t talking about him.”

“You’re the one who brought up the coronation,” Emitt says, giving me a pointed look. “You know—thejointone?”

“I don’t need the reminder,” I grumble as we slip into our empty biology lab.

Of all the things my parents have demanded of me, the joint coronation has to be the worst. They couldn’t just let me have this one thing—this one fucking thing that could’ve been mine. No, they were too concerned with appearances, and a joint ceremony was the perfect stage to show everyone howperfectwe are.

“I’m just saying,” Emitt continues dryly, “you and Julian together on a day like that …” He shudders. “It’s got catastrophic written all over it.”

“Now you’re just being dramatic,” I reply as I fall into my usual seat near the back.

Emitt makes a show of dropping into his chair beside me as he sighs and stares wistfully into the distance. “I can’t believe after all my hard work, I’ll be spending my first day as a beta drowning in your blood.”

“You’ve got a real talent for theatrics, you know that?”

His lips split into a grin as he cuts the act. “Maybe I’ll switch careers before then. Goddess knows it’ll make a lot of people happy.”

Nothing about Emitt Smith screams beta, at least not on the surface. He’s five-foot-five with barely any muscle or fat, which is why most of the older wolves in our pack, my parents included, think he’s the wrong fit.

They’re wrong though, and blindly so.