Alpha Devotion: Paranormal Romance Collection

by Lola Gabriel

  Ellie had laughed and playfully shoved Sadie’s shoulder with her own, but she had promised that they would never have something as ridiculous as a ‘privacy curtain’.

  “No matter how many doors I have to replace,” she had added. Besides, neither of them thought that would go over well with the faculty, anyway.

  Now Ellie seemed to be nearly smoking with anger, her two bags at her sides. If this had been a cartoon, Sadie wouldn’t have been surprised to see her face go red and smoke whistle out of her ears.

  “I ask for one weekend of peace and quiet,” Ellie began, her voice strangely calm. “One single weekend of ‘how about we don’t treat Ellie like she’s an idiot who got lucky and instead treat her like a member of the pack’. That’s literally the only thing I ask of them. And what do I get?”

  “I’m assuming not that,” Sadie said.

  “None of that!” Ellie yelled, slamming the door behind her, although with considerably less strength than when she had opened it. She grabbed her bags and threw them into her side of the room before she sat down on the edge of the bed opposite Sadie’s. “It’s the same thing every single goddamn weekend! I’m not going to apologize for not being the student with the best grades in the entire school because I still bust my ass and I still get good grades, and the one thing I’m sorry for is that that’s not enough for them!”

  “Did they ask you to apologize?” Sadie wouldn’t put it past Mr. and Mrs. Hanson. She had never been unlucky enough to meet them in person, but she had heard the way they talked to their daughter a few times, either through video calls or from Ellie herself.

  “No, but they didn’t have to,” Ellie answered. She flopped dramatically onto her bed, accompanying it with a long, deep, loud sigh. “Can’t wait until I don’t have to keep going back.”

  “Only four more years,” Sadie mumbled in an attempt to make her friend feel better.

  Two months into the semester, after Ellie had returned from her trip in tears one Sunday, Sadie had asked her why she kept going back, why she put up with her parents’ harassment and awful treatment. They already had enough on their plates as freshmen in the prestigious Elite Magic University to worry about family issues on top of that.

  Ellie had wiped her tears with the collar of her shirt and smiled ruefully.

  “Because I don’t want to get banned from my pack,” she had replied. “I wouldn’t care if they disowned me, but one word from my dad to our alpha, and I’d have to leave. I wouldn’t be able to handle being cast out of my home.”

  Sadie couldn’t even begin to imagine what that must feel like. Her parents weren’t that high in the hierarchy of her own pack back in Wyoming, certainly not high enough to be able to get her banned with one word to the alpha, though they were well accommodated. She didn’t know how Ellie could stand that pressure. She supposed it was because her friend didn’t have many other options.

  “Only four more years,” Ellie repeated quietly. Her fury was apparently diminishing, as she looked calmer and more thoughtful rather than bent on rampaging through their dorm building. Then she pushed herself up to a sitting position, her legs crossed underneath her, and turned to Sadie. “You know what I need? A girls’ night out. Like, right now.”

  Sadie raised an eyebrow. “Right now?”

  “Why not? Give me one reason why we can’t have a girls’ night out.”

  “How about I give you two?” For each of her two reasons, Sadie lifted a finger. “Because it’s Sunday, and therefore we have classes early tomorrow?”

  Ellie made a disgusted face.

  “Ugh, you’re right. And all the places where we could go are probably already closed by now.” She sighed and let herself fall back onto her bed again. “But we should still do that at some point. Probably ASAP.” She gasped so loudly that she made Sadie jump, and then she sat back up again, a manic sort of look in her eyes. “Maybe this Friday! Just go out, let loose a little bit, and have fun!”

  “Don’t you usually leave on Fridays, though?” Sadie pointed out.

  Ellie waved a hand in front of her face like she was trying to swat a bug. “Oh, I can make up some BS excuse about why I need to leave on Saturday. I’ll tell them I’ve got an assignment to finish or something.”

  “You do have an assignment to finish,” Sadie said, at which point Ellie frowned quizzically.

  “What assignment?”

  “Our history assignment?” Sadie reminded her. “You know, the one for Professor Jameson?” When her friend still stared blankly at her, she elaborated. “Pick your favorite era of witchcraft and explain why it was important to the development of modern spells and wiccan practices?”

  Ellie blinked. “The one that’s due in two weeks?”

  “It’s never too early to get a head start on schoolwork.”

  That was Sadie’s philosophy, and it had worked incredibly well for her so far. Yes, she’d had to pull an all-nighter once or twice during exams for particularly difficult subjects, like Wealth Management 101 and Lycanthropy—which was downright pathetic, considering she was a wolf shifter—but otherwise, her system was almost perfect. It left room for last-minute assignments and reports, and she had designed it that way so she would never be caught off-guard. Or so that it only happened in truly dire situations.

  Ellie continued to stare at her, except that the blankness in her expression had changed to a mixture of shock, disbelief, and pity.

  “Sadie,” she said in that flat tone she used when she couldn’t believe the ridiculousness of what she had just heard. “Two weeks is entirely too early to get a head start on schoolwork. Even one week is too early to get a head start on schoolwork!”

  “Yes,” said Sadie, “if you’re someone who likes to pull all-nighters all the time and suffer from sleep deprivation when you’re desperately trying to finish your immortal biology essay while stuffing yourself with junk food.”

  “Okay, first of all, junk food has a bad reputation. I dislike humans as much as the next wolf shifter, but you gotta admit they’ve come up with some amazing stuff to keep you awake.”

  “Well, it’s not like it affects us the same way it affects them,” Sadie said, remembering the time she’d tried an energy drink and wondered how the hell humans didn’t die with only a sip of it. Her right leg hadn’t stopped bouncing for almost three hours.

  “And secondly, that’s what the college experience is all about!” cried Ellie. “Among other things, of course.”

  Sadie rolled her eyes. “Not my college experience, thank you very much.”

  “Like getting a group of people from different species to study for the same exam because you’re all crap at the class,” Ellie added as though Sadie had not spoken. “Or doing your homework at the library and finding a vampire staring blankly at the books on the Nutrition for Immortals sections.”

  “Yeah.” Sadie shuddered. “And that’s one part of the college experience I don’t want to repeat.”

  One night when she and Ellie had gone to the library to finish their respective assignments, since the fae students next door had been making a ruckus and wouldn’t dial it down, they had noticed the vampire, and the way he was standing completely still with a glassy, almost empty look in his eyes had made them pack up their stuff and go back to their dorm, noisy neighbors and their too-loud music be dammed.

  “In his defense,” said Ellie, “I think he was experimenting with the sleep deprivation you’re so against.”

  “Hey, it’s not my fault you don’t like sleeping,” Sadie replied, though she was only joking. If there was one thing she knew about her roommate—besides the fact that she hated going to her parents’ place every weekend and yet was obligated to do so—it was that she loved sleeping, though one wouldn’t think so, with her awful working and studying habits.

  Ellie scowled at her and didn’t dignify her statement with a verbal response.

  “Anyway,” she went on. “I know you usually don’t go out unless it’s strictly necessary—�
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  “That’s not true!” Sadie said. “We went to that screening at the university theater last month.”

  “Yeah, okay, but that’s my point,” Ellie said. “All of our girls’ nights have been here at the school. We watch a movie in the student lounge, or we stay here and order takeout, or something else that doesn’t involve leaving the campus!”

  “So?” asked Sadie, failing to see the problem. She always asked Ellie if she was okay with her ideas for their girls’ nights, and her roommate had never mentioned having any problem with them.

  “So…we’re missing the ‘out’ in girls’ night out.” Ellie gestured to the cracked door of their room with her hands. “We should actually go somewhere that’s not in the area where we already spend like ninety percent of our time!”

  Sadie slumped her shoulders and groaned quietly to herself. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the idea of leaving the campus and going somewhere else for a night. It was just that it wasn’t really her scene. New York was different. There was so much to do. The small town in Wyoming, where she grew up, didn’t have all that many places exclusively for immortals to relax and have some leisure time, and she had always been self-conscious about interacting and mixing with humans too much. Not that she had anything to worry about regarding accidentally revealing herself as a wolf shifter, but she preferred being in an environment where she had some sort of control.

  Ellie seemed to notice her hesitation because she took a deep breath.

  “Just promise me you’ll consider it, okay?” she asked, except it sounded like a plea, and Sadie exhaled through her nose.

  “I promise,” she agreed, which was all Ellie needed to victoriously throw her arms into the air, her fists clenched.

  “Girls’ night out!” she started chanting, like it was already a done deal. “Girls’ night out!”

  Sadie continued reading the article for her history assignment. While she did intend to think about going out somewhere outside campus with Ellie on Friday, she already knew that she would most likely end up deciding not to go. Perhaps Ellie would forget all about it during the week, and then Sadie wouldn’t have to outright say she’d much rather just stay in and watch something on her computer with a bowl of popcorn on her lap. Could she somehow convince Ellie to help her find the best compilation of human failures online? Those always made her friend laugh and were usually pretty good at changing the subject or distracting her from the matter at hand.

  Sadie shook her head. She was worrying too much about something that was still a few days away and not an immediate problem she needed to solve.

  I guess I’ll just have to wait and see what happens, she thought, hoping that this would be the last time she heard about it.

  2

  It was, as luck would have it, not the last time Sadie heard about it.

  Although the winter break at EMU was a little less than a month away, she felt as though it were quickly approaching, and she was relieved to see that a lot of students from all years shared the sentiment; they were already starting to prepare for the final exams, papers, and assignments of the semester. It wasn’t uncommon to spot groups of people from different species all sitting or huddling together, bent over books and notebooks and laptops while they worked or studied or simply talked amongst themselves.

  That was one of the things Sadie liked most about EMU, the fact that she could come across a single group and find wolf shifters, vampires, fae folk, and even an angel or two in the mix. Living in a small town had made her grow up surrounded by mostly immortals like herself—pretty much the entire town was one single pack, so it wasn’t like she had been around strangers—and this was the first time in her life she was able to properly interact with other kinds of immortals.

  It was nerve-wracking and exciting at the same time, and Sadie felt like she couldn’t get enough of it.

  The week went by, and on Friday, after classes had ended for the day, just as Sadie had begun to come up with reasons why she couldn’t join Ellie in their “girls’ night out”, Ellie rushed into their room, packed her two bags in a hurry, and then left not even ten minutes later with a “Have a nice weekend, see you on Sunday, bye!”

  Sadie stared at the closed door her roommate had almost run through and sighed in relief. It appeared that Ellie had forgotten all about her big declaration of an outing the past Sunday, and now Sadie didn’t have to worry about thinking of ways to turn the invitation down.

  When Ellie returned from her weekend trip, she didn’t mention anything about their girls’ night out, and Sadie, not wanting to jinx it, wisely kept her mouth shut and simply listened to her friend ramble and complain about her parents and the continuous pain and suffering her visits to their place entailed.

  After another week went by without Ellie bringing up the subject again, leaving only eleven days until the end of the semester, Sadie was convinced that it had been nothing more than a fleeting idea in her roommate’s mind, and so she had gotten over it or thought better of lying to her parents to go out for a night. Whatever the case, now Sadie could go back to worrying only about finishing her remaining papers and getting to spend some nice time back with her family during the winter break.

  She didn’t know how wrong she was until that Friday, when Ellie stomped inside their room at exactly 5 p.m. with her phone pressed to her ear.

  “I’m terribly sorry, Mother,” she was saying in a tone that told Sadie she wasn’t sorry at all, and she lifted a finger in Sadie’s direction as if to silence her, even though she had not said a word. “I’m afraid that I must delay my departure until tomorrow morning.”

  Sadie pulled her gaze away from her computer and looked at her friend.

  “I did mention that we’re entering the final stretch of the semester, didn’t I?” Ellie went on, and for a moment, it sounded like her voice had grown kind of posh, like she had an accent when talking to her parents, but only then. Perhaps it was just the way rich, important people talked to each other. Most of the conversations Sadie had heard Ellie have with her parents had been Mr. and Mrs. Hanson scolding their daughter for one reason or another, with Ellie interjecting only a few times. Maybe it was even something unconscious.

  Ellie sighed heavily. “Mother, I don’t understand. You want me to get better grades, but when I try to stay so that I can finish my work, you tell me that I’m being unreasonable. What is it that you want me to do?”

  She closed her eyes while she awaited her mother’s response, letting her head fall against her shoulder.

  “Of course I will leave first thing in the morning. I will be home before you wake up, I assure you,” Ellie said, turning to Sadie to mimic gagging. “Yes, Mother, I’ll make up for it. Yes, Mother, I can help Father with whatever he needs my help with.” Her mother said something on the other end of the line that made Ellie grin the widest Sadie had ever seen her do. When she spoke, though, she sounded completely normal, as if she weren’t about to start jumping up and down in excitement.

  “Yes, yes, of course! Oh, Mother dear, you’re wonderful, truly. I don’t know what I did to deserve such an understanding parent. Yes, I will see you tomorrow. Goodbye, Mother.”

  As soon as she hung up the phone, Ellie let out a scream so high-pitched and loud that Sadie thought campus security would rush into their room any second now. She wondered if any dog within a twenty-mile radius had lifted its head in confusion.

  “I take it they’re letting you leave tomorrow?” Sadie asked, though she didn’t expect Ellie to hear her over her overjoyed yelling.

  “You bet your ass they are!” Ellie exclaimed, her voice back to normal. “Jesus, I thought my mom was going to say no for a moment there. WHOO!” She pumped her fists into the air in a sort of victorious dance that made Sadie smile.

  “I’m sorry,” Sadie said after a moment. “Did she ask you to make up for the day that you’re not going to be home?”

  “Technically, she asked me to make up for the half day I’m not going to be hom
e.” Ellie sighed. “It probably won’t be a big deal. My dad, for all the power and status he holds, can’t operate a goddamn cell phone without help, so I doubt I’ll have much trouble with whatever he’s going to ask me to do.”

  Sadie just stared at her, doing her best to hold back her disbelief so it wouldn’t cross into her expression. How could Ellie find that normal, or ‘not a big deal’? Rather than simply being sad because her daughter would be with her one day less, Mrs. Hanson had told Ellie that she had to make up for her absence, as though she was an employee who had to work extra hours because she had asked to leave early so she could go to her child’s recital at school.

  The immortal world had almost none of that—those barbaric practices were mostly human, and Sadie couldn’t believe how such important members of a pack could fall into them as if they were humans rather than eternal beings with quite literally all the time in the world.

  Ellie must have noticed something shift on Sadie’s expression anyway, because she smiled reassuringly.

  “Seriously, I swear it sounds worse than it’ll actually be,” she said. “At this point, I’ll take whatever they throw at me for less time spent talking to them.”

  Well, now that just made Sadie even sadder. When she had moved to New York to attend EMU, she and her parents had agreed that the distance was too big for her to visit every weekend. So, until witches could create some sort of magic transportation system that was faster than airplanes and much more comfortable, Sadie would go back home only during the longer breaks, like the one that would come with the end of the semester next week.

  She kind of wished she could take Ellie with her so that she was surrounded by a loving family for once in her life. Her friend more than deserved it.

  “And whatever they throw at me,” Ellie continued, her smile growing into a grin, “is going to be completely worth having our girls’ night out tonight!”

  Oh. Oh. So she had not forgotten about it then.