Entangled Between a Beta and an Alpha and a Rogue

“I can explain everything, Rhiannon. It’s not really what you think it is. Please don’t tell your father!” Beta Homer’s pleading voice greeted my morning like the cold breeze that slapped my cheeks.

I sighed and put a hand on my waist. “What’s more to explain, Homer? You two were caught kissing and touching each other!”

I saw them as soon as I checked the backyard garden, eager to see the roses blooming I planted half a year ago in Homer’s house.

“It was only to make Lazel’s mate jealous!” Homer insisted.

“Yeah, Rhiannon. My mate is...busy with another female Beta. I’m just giving him a taste of his own medicine.”

The audacity of Lazel to speak in between a fighting couple, an Alpha’s daughter and a Beta, is unparalleled.

I eyed her from head to toe. I noted her disheveled hair, the unbuttoned blouse, and wet lips.

“Get out,” I ordered with a whisper. Lazel didn’t move at first. But when I turned to her and matched her furrowed brows with a searing glare, she left.

“Babe...” my boyfriend tried to reach for my hand a minute later, even daring to hug me.

“You’re cheating on me,” I said deliberately, slowly, letting each word find their mark. “You know how I love you Homer yet you betrayed that love. That trust.”

Beta Homer dropped to the ground. He kneeled before me, holding my hand on his lips. “Please. It’s not what you think. It doesn’t have anything to do with love. Lazel is just a friend—”

“It’s nothing in the perspective of men like you who think it’s fine to kiss another female while your girlfriend is away.” I jerked my hand away and crossed my arms. “But in my eyes...it’s cheating nonetheless. I don’t care if you’re making someone jealous.” I scoffed. “If you want to make Lazel’s mate jealous, do you really have to kiss each other?”

“I...We—It was a mistake!” Homer exhaled a long sigh. “My lips slipped. I was just meaning to kiss her on the cheeks!”

I laughed mirthlessly, letting him know that I’m not going to buy whatever he says. “You really expect me to believe that?” I found myself sitting on the outdoor veranda, with a rose garden across us within a hand’s reach. I picked a rose and though its thorn pricked my finger, I ignored it.

“We’re done, Homer. You may be my father’s Beta but I no longer see you as such.” I looked away and smelled the rose. “My respect for you has disappeared along with the love I once devoted to you.”

I shot to my feet but left the rose that pricked my finger on the table. “Consider it as my last gift to you.”

Beta Homer shouted after me, repeatedly calling my name. “Rhiannon! Rhiannon!”

But I heard none of it and let my feet take me back to the packhouse.

***

“You’re not going to punish him?!” I flashed my teeth before my father, stomping on the carpet and crossing my arms.

“No, lest of all banish him.” My father, Alpha Dorian, did not so much as lift his head from his plate. Our dinner was already chaotic enough with the candles illuminating the dining room instead of the fluorescent lights and chandelier.

There has been some electricity maintenance so we’re half drenched in darkness for half of the night.

“But he cheated on me, Father. He—he broke my heart!” I shrieked. I didn’t care that I was crying in front of him like some middle-school girl throwing tantrums. “He broke your daughter’s heart!”

My brother coughed beside me, who was silent in the entire meal we shared. I’m used to my brother’s silence, either because he’s uninterested in the topic or he simply cannot relate.

“Rhiannon,” my father slowly put his utensils down, his expression solemn yet empathetic. “I understand what you feel. We all have been betrayed once but it doesn’t mean we should involve the whole pack in this. Homer and Lazel are still Betas. They still have duties to our pack, never mind the personal and emotional entanglement all three of you are involved in.”

As if uttering their names summoned them, Lazel and Homer strode in the dining room. Homer sat beside my father while Lazel sat beside my brother.

I eyed Lazel, as if to warn her that if she ever touches my brother too, I’ll stab her with a fork.

“Rhiannon, we really meant it. We’re sorry.”

“See,” Father gestured to Homer. “Your boyfriend is sorry, dear.”

“Ex-boyfriend,” I corrected.

My father shrugged.

Beside me, I saw Lazel brushed her hand on my brother’s finger subtly as if she just accidentally did, given she’s slicing her steak and my brother’s slicing his roasted chicken.

I narrowed my eyes on her. The bitch really doesn’t heed warnings.

“Just to remind you again, daughter. Personal things should be kept within one’s personal circle. It shouldn’t interfere with our duties and responsibilities with the pack.”

“I have convinced your father that, Rhiannon,” Lazel chirped from where she’s still terrorizing my brother who kept on dragging his chair farther from her.

“Ah.” I faked a smile. “Is that so?”

“Yes,” Beta Homer replied. His face was void of any expression. But what I’ve learned from three years of dating him and seven years of loving him since I was young, he’s good at masking emotions.

“That is why, given you’re no longer with Beta Homer,” Alpha Dorian uttered his name carefully, tossing him a side-glance, “I am proposing a much bigger responsibility for you. One that can help you recover from this ‘heartbreak’ while also letting our struggling beloved pack benefit from it.”

I blinked, and slowly parted my lips in a gasp. “You want me to be the Alpha?”

Lazel snorted before bursting into laughter. My brother choked on his red wine, spilling some contents on his clothes.

“No, silly girl!” My father chuckled darkly. “I am proposing to hand you over to Alpha Azriel of the Moonborn Pack for marriage.”