Page 5 of Beginning Fate (ARC Next Class #1)

Denny

Watching her leave was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. I just prayed it also wasn't the dumbest.

Everything within me screamed to go after her, but I'd just promised I'd watch out for Kylie, and something told me that if I wanted to get in my mate's good graces then I was going to do it through her sister. Luckily for me, I didn't mind that at all. She was a great kid, and I'd already felt protective of her before I had sensed Lauren.

Forcing my legs to move, I walked back into the house. I'd had my fair share of screwups before, but this couldn't be one of them. And I had a feeling I'd already made my first mistake by ignoring her during the tour. What else was I supposed to do?

I knew she was just as shocked as I was, but I felt like we'd managed a civil first conversation, even if it did end with her walking away.

Now I just needed a plan.

Step one: Learn everything I could about my mate.

And I had the perfect inside source for it.

I smiled and gave a little wave to Kylie across the room. She smiled back at me.

“ Are you okay? ” I signed.

“ Yes. Where is my sister? ”

“ She left. ”

Her smile waivered like she hadn't expected me to say that.

“ Is she okay? ” she finally signed back to me.

I nodded. “ Tired. ”

“What is he doing?” Monte asked.

“He's talking to the deaf girl from across the room,” Kevin explained.

“Wow. Denny's upped his game,” Remy teased. “Flirting in sign language is a new level, my man. Am I right?”

He held out his fist like he expected me to pound it. Instead, what I really wanted to do was pound his face for even making that sort of insinuation.

Before it even got awkward, they'd all moved on to other things.

When I looked back towards Kylie, she wasn't where I last saw her and it took me a minute to realize she was dancing in the center of the room with the other freshmen. Someone had cranked up the music and from the looks of it, she could feel the vibrations as she danced along with the others. It was magical to watch. She looked so carefree.

As I studied her more closely, I realized she looked a bit like Lauren, or at least they had the same light green eyes.

My mate may have thought I was ignoring her, but every time I so much as glanced her way, I committed every inch of her that I could to memory.

“Wow, he's like transfixed by her. What the hell are you doing sitting here just watching, Denny? Get out there and do your thing?” Braxton advised.

I stared at him in confusion. “What’s my thing?”

“You know. Go schmooze her up and take her to bed.”

“She's a freshman.”

“When has that ever stopped you?” Monte laughed.

The others agreed.

“I'm a fifth year. I'm not going to bed with a freshman, especially not that one.”

“What's wrong with that one?” Remy asked.

“Dude, she's deaf,” Braxton reminded him.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I snapped.

“What? Nothing. I'm just saying that clearly you’re not into deaf girls.”

A noise from the center of the room caught my attention and I turned to see Kylie standing there watching us. The look on her face told me she had been reading our lips throughout the conversation.

Tears pricked her eyes, and she turned and ran from the room.

“Shit!”

I jumped up and ran after her. By the time I reached the front door, she'd already left the house.

Seeing her up ahead as she headed for the trees, my instinct was to call out to her.

“Kylie! Kylie, stop!”

Then it dawned on me . . . she couldn't hear a word I was saying.

“Idiot!” I chastised myself.

My feet pounded harder as I picked up speed to close the gap between us. I was going to have to catch up to her. It took longer than expected but when I finally did, I reached my arm out and grabbed her by the shoulder.

She didn't scream exactly, but she did begin to make some sounds as she flailed her arms around trying to escape me.

By the time she realized it was me, I was ready to kick my own ass.

She looked terrified.

I held my hands up in the air and took a step back.

“ K-Y-L-I-E, sorry, ” I signed.

We stood there a moment as she tried to calm down. I didn't reach out to her again, but she also didn't try to run away.

“ I thought you liked me, ” she finally signed.

I had to channel my wolf vision to help me see it more clearly. I wasn't even sure where we were, just somewhere in the woods around the lake.

“ I do like you. You're great, ” I tried to explain to her.

“ But you don't want to flirt with me and take me to bed. ”

I growled and it must have shone on my face as she took a step back in surprise.

“ I thought you liked me,” she said again.

“ I do like you, just not like that. ”

“ You were nice. You know A-S-L. ”

“ Yes. But I also have a M-A-T-E. ”

I spelled it out, not wanting her to confuse my words.

“ You do? They sounded like you are a . . . ”

I wasn't sure what the last thing she signed was, so I had to ask her to repeat. When she did, I still didn't understand.

She huffed. “ P-L-A-Y-B-O-Y. ”

I rolled my eyes. “ No .”

She looked confused. “ But . . . ”

“ No, ” I sighed again, aggressively snapping my first two fingers against my thumb.

This was Lauren's little sister. I didn't think it was my place to tell her about us, but I also couldn’t have her thinking I was a male slut either. Because I wasn't. Sure, I liked to flirt, but I was very picky when it came to sexual partners.”

“ But they said . . . ”

“ K-Y-L-I-E, no. ”

“ You really have a M-A-T-E? ” she signed, changing the subject on me.

I nodded. “ Yes. It's new. They don't know yet. ”

She nodded to let me know she understood but didn't press me on it. I was thankful for that.

“ I'm sorry, ” she signed instead.

“ You have nothing to be sorry for. ”

She still looked embarrassed, so this time I changed the subject for us.

“ Should we go back to the house? ”

“ No. ”

“ No? ”

The signs were exactly the same, but I knew the look on my face let her know I was asking a question and not just confirming her answer.

I learned that about ASL in class, but it was cool to be able to use it to actually communicate with her. Expressions and motions spoke just as much as the actual signs.

I noticed when she was excitedly signing to Lauren that her face lit up and her arms sort of over-exaggerated her signs, making everything bigger and more dramatic. And when the two of them argued, it looked similar, yet the expressions on their faces told me clearly that they were not happy.

It was those little nuances that made my knowledge of ASL so different from this ASL experience today with Kylie. We weren't just signing the right words and sentences, but we were truly connecting and communicating with each other. It was the coolest thing I'd ever experienced.

Well, almost, I thought as a picture of Lauren flashed through my mind.

“ I was embarrassed, ” she signed.

“ What? Why? ”

“ They thought you liked me, too. You were watching me. ”

I gave her a guilty look. “ I told your sister I'd look after you. ”

A soft growl rumbled through her.

“ L-A-U-R-E-N told you to babysit me? ”

“ No. I V-O-L-U-N-T-E-E-R-E-D.”

There were still random words I didn't fully know how to communicate and had to resort to spelling out for her.

“ Why? ”

“ Because she was very tired, and I thought she'd relax better if she knew someone was looking after you. ”

Tears welled up in her eyes and I wanted to kick my own ass for saying it.

“ She doesn't think I can do this. I never wanted to come here. I wanted to go to deaf university. ”

“ Why didn't you? ”

“ L-A-U-R-E-N. ”

I supposed she thought that somehow made perfect sense, but I really wasn't understanding.

“ She worries. Thinks I need to spend more time with our kind. ”

“ You mean S-H-I-F-T-E-R-S? ”

She nodded. “ Yes. Not my kind. Deaf people. But she worries, and now I'm stuck here. ”

“ On the opposite side of the country, ” I guessed.

She nodded and wiped tears from her eyes. “ It's too far. But I can't ask her to stay. I have to prove I can do this. ”

But I can, I thought. I'll get down on my hands and knees and beg her to stay.

And that had nothing to do with Kylie. Because the moment she mentioned Lauren leaving, a stabbing pain sliced through my heart.

“ Tell me about her, ” I signed, hoping it came across casual like I was trying to help her or something.

“ She has no life of her own. She's always up in mine. She means well, but it's suffocating at times. I don't think she believes I can do this. ”

“ But you said she pushed you into coming here and not a deaf school. She must think you can do it. ”

“ Maybe. I want her to leave, but I'm also terrified she will. ”

“ Don't worry. It'll all work out. ”

Because there is no way in hell I'm letting Lauren leave here without me.

I led her back to the house in silence. When I got there the party vibe had already died down and it was just the brothers in town and my little group of freshmen hanging out with a stack of pizzas someone ordered.

“Damon bought pizza. We didn't wait for you to get back, but there's plenty left,” Kevin said.

“Thanks man,” I said, nodding to Damon.

I helped myself to several slices and made sure Kylie got some too before she went back to Autumn and her friends. I liked that they seemed to take her in so quickly. They didn't know sign language but seemed to be finding their own way to communicate with her.

“We should all see if we can add ASL to our schedule this year or see if they can open a bonus class one evening a week to help us actually learn this,” Oscar said after a candid round of charades trying to explain they wanted to watch a movie this evening before retiring for the night.

That kid may be unsure about becoming a D.O.G. but everything about him showed he was comfortable here. Whether he believed it yet or not, this was exactly where he belonged.

“They seem like a good batch of kids this year,” Damon said.

“Yeah. No complaints here. This crew looks like they're just going to move in without rushing at this rate,” I teased, though I really didn't mind.

He laughed. “Hope they like to clean. I think you pansies have gone soft. This place is always spotless and doesn't have that fraternity stench in the air anymore. Hell, it doesn't even feel like home anymore.”

“You're just jealous. You pigs were disgusting. We aspire for a higher level of living now.”

He shook his head. “It's not the same around here as it used to be.”

“That doesn't make it bad,” Karis chimed in.

“I didn't say it did, just different. It's crazy. We haven't been gone that long. It feels like only yesterday we were ruling this school. Now, it's just all different. It even smells different.”

“That's because we've moved on,” his mate insisted.

He turned and kissed her as she nestled into his side on the couch. They were disgustingly cute.

“How is life as the new Alpha and Pack Mother?”

“It's good. Surprisingly, I've settled easily into my new role. I officially gave allegiance before Tulok stepped down. He and Amka are enjoying retirement. It's nice to have their guidance during this transition. Not all Alphas have that luxury.”

“Because a lot of them fight for that position. It's rarely just handed off to them,” I reminded him.

“That's not true. The biggest of the Packs pass the title down by bloodline as long as there's an heir. And it's becoming more common for the elder Alpha to step down and pass the role to the next in line instead of waiting on death to do it for him. It's much more peaceful this way. I can't even imagine Upa dying and then having to deal with the transition while mourning. How awful that must have been,” Karis said.

“Fortunately, we'll never know. There's certainly some trials having the former Alpha so very present, but we're working through it.”

“Our Pack adores you.”

He gave a look that told me things probably weren't going as smoothly as rumors have told.

It's only been in our generation that two Alphas could even exist in one Pack. Before that it was kill or be killed, or an heir simply waited for the death of their predecessor. The first I knew of this change was Jason Westin. He'd basically died, and in that moment his power had transferred to his heir, Kyle. But then they were able to resuscitate him and instead of fighting his son to the death to regain his Pack position, he'd stepped aside and taken on a more administrative role while allowing his heir to rise within his lifetime.

Since then, the former Alpha of Collier had willingly stepped aside in order to mentor his heir as well. I still couldn't fully comprehend how that could possibly work, but supposedly Thomas Collier's wolf was growing stronger quickly and would have inevitably tried to fight his father's for Alpha before his time. This way, neither of them allowed it to go that far. And it seemed to work for them.

Most Alphas were too self-centered and dominant to ever allow that to happen. Or maybe wolves in general were evolving over time and our more logical human natures were growing stronger and better able to control our animal instincts. I wasn't sure, but Damon was the third Alpha that I knew who was reigning over his former Pack Alpha.

“It's still hard to believe you're an Alpha. The tales of Damon Rossi are legendary here and definitely not very Alpha-y.”

“Alpha-y? That's not even a word.” Damon chuckled. “I certainly had my moments here, but the love of one perfect woman changes everything.”

He nuzzled his mate's neck as she sighed.

“I'm far from perfect,” Karis said.

“Maybe, but you're perfect for me.”

The longing to feel that closeness and connection to a mate hit me hard.

Lauren.

An image of her was vivid in my mind and I couldn't help but smile.

Involuntarily, I looked over at the kids laughing and talking over the movie they had put on. Kylie was right there in the middle of it, and she looked happy and content. I didn't want to take that away from her, but I also desperately needed her sister to stay.

“The deaf girl?” Damon asked. “Is there something going on between you?”

I gave him a horrified look. “What? No. Why would you even say that?”

“Sorry, it's just . . .” his voice trailed off.

Karis rolled her eyes. “It's just that we thought you seemed a little off today during the tour. Like, distracted off.”

I frowned. I'd tried so hard not to react to my mate's presence.

“Dude, you kind of gave off mating vibes. Not totally, but like early stages. I know you've found your mate,” Damon said.

“You can't possibly know that,” I blurted out.

“Actually, he can. Let's just say it's an Alpha thing.”

“What? Is that true?”

Damon nodded. “Yeah. It's pretty cool. It gives Alphas warning about possible unstable males. In a Pack it's actually super hard to tell at times because there are so many other mated or even mating males in the area, so it's not easy to tune into which one right away. But here there's a bunch of pups making it crystal clear who the potential problem could be.”

I stared at him for a minute and then shook my head. “Bullshit. I'm calling bullshit. You're just messing with me.”

“Though you haven't actually denied it,” Karis pointed out. “We’re already sure you've found her. We just haven't been able to determine who. Is it Kylie?”

“No!” I practically yelled, drawing attention from the others hanging out nearby. I lowered my voice. “No, and don't even insinuate that.”

“Seriously? You've been paying her special attention all evening. You even went after her when she left,” Damon pointed out.

“I promised her sister I'd keep an eye on her. That's it.”

“What's her sister's name again?”

“Lauren,” I blurted out without hesitation.

Karis threw her hands up triumphantly. “I told you it was her. Pay up, mister.”

Damon groaned, took out his wallet, and handed his mate a hundred-dollar bill.

“What just happened?” I asked.

“I told him it was the sister. He didn't believe me because you went out of your way to ignore her today.”

“Dumb move, dude,” Damon said.

“I know.”

“You're not going to deny it?”

“What's the point?”

“So you're happy about this?”

I shrugged. “I don't know yet. Maybe. I see how happy you two are together. Why wouldn't I want that for myself?”

They both stared at me and then burst out laughing.

“Oh, this is going to be fun,” Damon said. “I'm sorry we have to head home tomorrow because I would love a front row seat to this mating.”

“I'll be sure to keep you posted,” I grumbled.