Back and Stronger: Alpha's Daughter

“I need to get home,” Sophia said glumly after skimming the sky to determine the time, and having seen that it was definitely around the time the school bus would usually come to pick her up from school. “I should hurry if I want to catch the bus in time.”

“No need, I’ll take you home,” Neil said reassuringly as he kept himself afloat in the water facing her at an arm’s length away.

She realized that she wanted nothing other than to swim across that small space and encircle her arms around his neck. That very neck she was covertly allowing her eyes to feast on, sliding her tentative gaze from his angular jawline to those bulging neck muscles connected to the top of his powerful shoulders on each side.

How they moved as he paddled with his arms in the water, and how they made a dip just above his collarbones with each movement, had her mesmerized for some reason. Maybe because Sophia would so badly have wanted to see the mark of the golden sun there, or maybe the tattoo there was what caught her attention.

It was a medium-sized symbol of some kind, inked right underneath his right collarbone. It was a circle with several skew blades of sorts coming from it. As a matter of fact, it did look like a sun, but one that was rotating fast in one direction, with the flames shooting from its surface leaning to the side with the movement. Or maybe it was a symbol of some kind of vortex?

As though he noticed her staring at it, his eyes darkened disapprovingly. Turning away from her, he started swimming toward the dock. “Come on, let’s get you home,” Neil called over his shoulder as he swam.

Sophia followed, feeling guilty that he had found her staring at his tattoo. Well, one of his tattoos. It must have meant something to him. Something he clearly didn’t want to share with her, which only served to make her more curious.

As she swam behind him, unable to watch those back muscles ripple with the motion of his arms, she realized that they’d been swimming for almost an hour together, and that it had gone by much too fast. They could even have been swimming for ten hours and it still would not have been enough time for her.

She had to push down the urge to ask him if they could swim just a little while longer, for she knew that she would most likely never get this chance again. The chance to be so close to him, talk, play, and laugh with him…

No, she couldn’t risk it. She didn’t exactly need to give her father the excuse to go above and beyond with his beatings again this time, because that would be an inevitable consequence if she got home long after the bus.

“Fuck,” he was hot, Sophia thought as she watched him pull himself up onto the dock. He was like a sculpted statue of what the perfect man should look like. Every single bulge under his olive, sun-kissed skin moved with grace, but only until he jerked around to look at her again.

He was sitting on the dock and looking at her now with astonished amusement. “What did you just say?”

“Nothing.”

“No, I’m pretty sure I just heard you say fuck, Sophia,” Neil said with a humorous smile starting to spread wider and wider on his lips.

“No,” Sophia blushed, her mind trying to come up with some excuse other than her having to explain why her thoughts had been put into one word while looking at him. “I saw a duck over there, so I said duck. You must have misheard me.”

He laughed. “Alright, if you say so. It wouldn’t be a problem if you did, I say fuck a lot too.”

He stuck his hand down toward her as Sophia too reached the dock and pulled her up like she was nothing. Well, she supposed that she kind of was nothing, considering how skinny and small she was, and how ripped and strong Neil was.

He wasn’t too overly muscled and broad, Sophia thought as she watched him appreciatively. His build was something of an in-between, in fact, looking like he could punch someone unconscious with one swing, while also clearly appearing to be light and athletic enough to sprint and easily jump from roof to roof without making too much sound.

The perfect predator. Exuding lethal strength, speed, and agility, all in equal measure.

Out of the blue, Sophia wondered what he would look like in his wolf form, running through the woods, hunting a deer or something. She doubted she would ever get the chance to see him like that, but she imagined that he would be a magnificent sight to behold, not to mention terrifying.

But frankly, she couldn’t tell which outcome would frighten her the most – seeing his wolf side, or not ever getting to see it at all.

Neil’s humor from before, however, vanished within an instant when he had her pulled out of the water and had her standing on the dock in her underwear in front of him again. This time he didn’t let his eyes roam her body like before. He was rather trying to look everywhere else but at her.

Bending down to his pile of clothes, he grabbed a towel from underneath it and handed it over to Sophia without looking at her.

“What about you?” she asked hesitantly, not wanting to make his only towel wet.

“Sophia, just take the damn towel,” he said, with his back to her, but she could hear the frustration in his voice.

Without another moment’s hesitation, she took it from him and threw it over her shoulders, while nervously wondering how he could jump from laughing with her to almost being irritated with her so quickly. One thing was for certain, he confused her. It baffled Sophia how he could go from hot to cold within an instant. Especially in the way he had done with her, without much of a warning each time.

“Sorry,” he said softly, half-turned to her now.

Sophia just nodded in acceptance of his apology, unable to do much else as her lips had suddenly gone frigid, and her teeth were on the verge of chattering. She could feel the goosebumps spreading all over her arms and legs the moment a cold breeze blew over her wet skin.

Neil’s eyes shot over to her mouth as though he could hear it happening already. “You’re cold. Your lips are just as blue as your eyes.”

For some odd reason, this made her giggle. It might also simply have been the effects of the sudden cold too, but mostly she thought that it had been a very strange thing to say.

“Well, your hair is as brown as your eyes,” she teased.

“Are you sure you didn’t swallow too much of that lake water?” he smiled slightly as he came over to her, holding out his black long sleeve t-shirt to her. “Here, you can put this on. It’s quite large, even for me, so it should cover you and keep you warm – and before you can object again, I have a spare for myself in the car.”

Sophia smiled and accepted his shirt. “Thank you.”

Handing him back his towel, she saw him instantly averting his eyes from her and busying himself with drying himself off. By the time Sophia had shimmied her way into his oversized shirt, Neil had loosened his wet hair from the hair tie and was drying it with a towel.

With his head bent forward, he was rubbing the towel roughly against his hair there, and Sophia found herself biting down on her lip when he flipped his head back to make them fall away from his face and down his shoulders.

Damn… Sophia never particularly liked shifter males that had long hair, but Neil pulled the look off perfectly. She couldn’t imagine him any other way, but knew he would inevitably look good with any look.

“Never cut your hair,” she blurted out and felt her heart lurch forward the moment his eyes flew to her as though he had almost forgotten that she was still there.

What was up with her not having a freaking filter today?

“Not planning to,” he assured her with a half-smile, despite his surprise at her words. “I’ll go get the AC started in the car.” Almost too quickly, Neil turned and walked away from her.

Sophia watched for a moment as he paced down the dock. Drinking the sight of him in, and sighed. She knew this had been her once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and cursed the Goddess again for not choosing her and Neil as mates, before she bent down to pick up her clothes and shoes from the dock.

Sure enough, when she finally made her way to his car eventually, and got into the passenger seat, she quickly closed the door to keep the glorious warmth inside. Sophia let out a long breath of pure joy, welcoming the heat into her body, and leaning her head back against the headrest, and closing her eyes.

“I’m glad you approve,” Neil said, chuckling softly to himself as he reached over to shift the car into gear.

Sophia noticed that he had changed out of his swimming trunks and had jeans on with a dark gray t-shirt that hugged him just right to reveal the muscles underneath. As his arm reached over within the space separating them in the car, she noticed a figure in the inked art on his skin there.

Before it had just looked like a confusing labyrinth of tendrils and random shapes, whereas now she was able to see a wolf head in there. It had its mouth open, like it was roaring at the onlooker, its teeth long and sharp. It was beautiful.

Sophia found herself wondering whether his other arm, which she knew was also covered in abstract shapes and patterns, also had a hidden figure or optical illusion within it. But she never got the chance to scrutinize his other arm too much as they drove in silence.

Besides, her stares seemed to make him uncomfortable, so instead, Sophia opted for just allowing herself to marvel in the warmth there, in the car with him, and how safe and happy it made her feel. She knew that this feeling would be over the moment he dropped her off, so she wanted to enjoy every moment of it.

She couldn’t stop thinking about their time together in the lake though. How his eyes had dipped to her shoulders when her bra strap had slipped loose. The way his eyes wandered there as he reached out to slide it back into place. Accompanied by how his fingers had gently grazed there too, sending electrically charged blood sailing under her skin there.

Even the way he had gazed down at her wet see-through underwear earlier, made Sophia blush again. Neil had made it no secret that his eyes wanted to look and take all of her in, but what didn’t add up to Sophia, what confused her frustratingly senseless, was that the occupant behind those eyes pulled away and didn’t seem to be affected by her.

She knew, after all, that she didn’t exactly have the most attractive body, being so skinny and full of marks, but she would have at least wanted to see some kind of spark behind those bronzed eyes. She would have at least wanted to see that he felt the same way she felt for him – even if only a little.

But Sophia had to admit, the way he’d played and laughed with her in the water of the lake had totally made up for his lack of emotion in his expression. He must surely have liked her enough if he wanted to spend time with her. He could easily have ordered her to leave him alone if he hadn’t wanted her there, right?

Sophia then wondered if he had a mate of his own. She so badly wanted to ask him this but knew that it was none of her business. But on the other hand, she wasn’t even sure whether she wanted him to give her an answer to that either. She had no doubt that if he told her that he did have a mate already, it would definitely put a damper on their time together this afternoon.

Even when she was surely going to reminisce about it all tonight, tomorrow, and every single day after that, it would make her memories and thoughts of him less bright. Less happy. Less hot.

“You’re not from Tibald, are you?” Sophia asked, trying to fill the silence as they drove, while also addressing something she’d been wondering about at the back of her mind. “I mean, I’ve never seen you around here before. Not before you started working at the school, anyway.”

Neil glanced over at her for a second, regarding her with an unreadable expression. “I’m from Aolith,” he said in a way that gave Sophia the impression that that was all he was going to say about it, and silence fell again.

“Today was the most I’ve ever heard you talking, and laughing,” Neil said as his eyes left the road momentarily to give her a warm smile. “It was nice. I would like to hear it more often.”

With her startled gaze and rosy cheeks she couldn’t help hiding from him, he seemed to reel back a little. He gave her the impression that he had also just mentally chastised himself for not having a filter before he spoke.

He cleared his throat for like the gazillionth time, shifting uncomfortably in the leather seat of his car and seemed to be scrutinizing the tar road ahead of him. “I’m just saying that it was nice to see you happy.”

She gazed at him for a while, holding back the urge to touch his hand lying in his lap, but his eyes were stuck to the horizon beyond the windshield.

“It was nice to be happy,” Sophia breathed softly as she looked outside her passenger door side window at the trees passing by.

She could feel his eyes on her then, but thought she didn’t want to look back at him only to find him tearing his eyes away from her again, so she let him gaze at her. Which he did. She could almost feel the many questions there that were just burning to come out of him, but he was clearly good at keeping them at bay.

Sophia heard him letting out a breath, as though it could whisk his frustration, uncertainties, and tiredness away. If only things could have been that easy.

“Just drop me off here,” Sophia said, pointing to the side of the road ahead. It was about two blocks away from home but she didn’t want Neil to see where she lived, because as far as she could tell, he didn’t know that she was the Lucian pack Alpha’s ‘murderous’ daughter.

Maybe it was completely unnecessary, as he might not even have known where Alpha lived, but Sophia didn’t want to take any chances. If Neil was ever going to look at her in disgust the moment he found out who she really was, she certainly wouldn’t be able to handle that.

“I don’t mind taking you to your home, Sophia,” he said but stopped the car where she had pointed at earlier.

“Here’s fine,” she said curtly, the same way he had when he didn’t want to talk about something anymore.

Neil seemed to have noticed this, and she could see a small smile in answer there, but that sexy frown was looking at her then, as if he was trying to figure something out.

Sophia felt like she was melting underneath his scrutinizing gaze, and she would have allowed him to keep at it for much longer if she hadn’t seen the yellow school bus passing by ahead.

“I need to go,” Sophia said, already scrambling to open the door and about to get out, but froze instantly when she felt his warm hand grabbing onto hers.

Surprised, she glanced back at him and found his eyes seeming to be unsure and angry about something at the same time. “Sophia…” Neil said her name as though it was a plea, but seemed to struggle to say anything else.

A few times it had looked like he was just about to say something, but then he would stop himself, his eyes just getting darker with each attempt. Sophia waited patiently, desperately wanting him to say it too, but then he just gave a frustrated sigh, which only served to frustrate Sophia as well.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he simply said instead as he released her hand and placed it back on the steering wheel.

Disappointed as hell, Sophia got out of his car with her belongings clutched to her chest, and slammed the door shut once she was outside. Without much of a glance her way, Neil drove off like he couldn’t get away from her fast enough.

Not sure how she was supposed to feel about it, Sophia decided that she wasn’t going to let her thoughts dwell on every small interaction they had that day. She vowed to herself that she wasn’t going to allow her overanalyzing mind to dissect and inspect every single gaze, touch, word, and expression from him, and what each might have meant. She knew how her obsession with those sorts of things could drive her mad, while they might not even have meant anything all along.

So there was no use in lingering on the topic of the unfathomable puzzle that was Neil. Not now, anyway. Especially not when Sophia needed to get home as quickly as possible and think of how she was going to explain to her brother why she hadn’t been on the bus with him for the ride home. Not to mention, he was surely going to have some questions concerning how she had come to wear some guy’s shirt instead of her school uniform…