ONE
Val's pov

"Val, you have to wake up-" I shot my head up as something hit my face and looked around frantically. My older brother was standing above me, yielding a pillow as if ready to hit me again. I gave him a glare and my wolf forced a growl out of my mouth to warn him not to do it again. He chuckled and rolled his eyes, tossing the pillow to the side of my bed. "Good morning, sleeping beauty, we're going to be late."

I grumbled and rubbed my eyes as I slipped out of bed and went to the bathroom to get changed.

When I came out of the bathroom, Michael had found himself plopped on my bed, already to go out on border patrol. He chuckled at me and I gave him a glare as I tugged my shoes on. "You know we're going to be working with some members of the Aconite Pack, right?"

My glare softened as that realization dawned on me. I forgot that it was today. "At least it won't be the Alpha," I muttered, having heard the horror stories about him.

"Nope, just the Beta and Head Delta," Mikey said and I almost flinched, thinking that if the rumors about the Alpha were true then I'm sure his pack members weren't much different. "Lose the frown, it's just for today but don't forget that they're hosting the Running next week so try not to make a fool out of the pack."

"Shut up," I grumbled before making my way out of my room and I could hear him following behind me. On our way past the kitchen I grabbed an apple and bit into it as we made our way outside. I will be having my breakfast to-go this morning.

"God, if you don't start chewing your food you're going to choke. And I'm not going to help you," he said as we walked towards the pack house. I ignored him and quickly ate the apple before tossing the core to the side.

We made it to the pack house within minutes, seeing Alpha Roman standing at the front of the other pack warriors. Michael and I came to a stop with the rest of the group and bowed towards the Alpha.

"Now that everyone's here," Alpha Roman gave Michael and I a short glare before calling the plan for today. "Everyone to their normal posts, aside from Valerie, Amber, Colton, and An."

Alpha Roman waited for the others to leave and I gave Michael a smirk as he begrudgingly walked off to his normal posts.

"You four will be coming with me to meet the Beta and Delta at the border." Alpha Roman said, eyeing the four of us with a crucial gaze. "You will need to follow strict orders. Do not fall out of line. Do not get in the way of them. Do not provoke them in any way. Do not look at them. Do not speak to them. This is for your own safety, because we do not know how they will react. If you do not know if you can follow those orders, tell me now and I can switch you out."

That last part seemed to be aimed towards me as he eyed me warily. I held my hands up in defense. "You don't have to tell me twice. I've heard the rumors," I grumbled, nodding my head to him. I guess I was known to speak my mind - maybe a little too much. However, for today, my lips would be under lock and key.

"Good, now follow me," Alpha Roman said as he began to walk towards the East border. We followed in a formation that we had practiced over a hundred times. Two of us were on each side of the Alpha, following closely behind. I marched a few steps behind Colton.

The walk was maybe five minutes before the Alpha came to a halt at a clearing just outside of the Eastern border. We each were looking out for the Beta and Delta, along with any possible rogue attacks that could possibly happen.

'You don't have to worry about anything happening, I'll protect you,' Colton said in a mindlink to me and he glanced back, sending me a wink.

I rolled my eyes and let out a scoff, which received a death glare from the Alpha. I straightened up and tried to ignore Colton, cutting off the mind link between him and I. He was quite a well known player in the pack and I didn't really wanna catch whatever diseases that he had.

I caught a scent of a different pack and knew it had to be them. My wolf surfaced and I tensed up along with the other three with me. The Alpha, however, remained stone faced and looked towards some wooded area. Soon, two large wolves came out, one that was dark gray and held a dominant aura - beta. The other had an auburn fur and an almost playful spirit - delta?

As if feeling my gaze, the Delta caught my eyes and I could see him stop. His eyes flashed from brown to red and he tried to control his wolf. 'Oh crap, I'm looking at him.' They just showed up and I was already breaking the rules. I turned my gaze away, looking for anything else to occupy my mind. Hopefully he didn't find it too disrespectful.

An angry growl tore through the air and my wolf came on edge. 'Damn, I guess he found that disrespectful.' I brought my gaze back to the Delta. He was stalking over this way now - to me. His eyes were a dark red, showing that his wolf had won the fight. I'm totally dead.

'What did you do?!' Alpha Roman seethed through the mindlink and I flinched, but still kept my eyes on the Delta. He was coming over pretty fast, clearly making a bee-line to me.

'I don't know!' Although, I'm sure he knows I'm lying.

As powerful as this Delta clearly was, I still wouldn't go down without a fight. I kept my wolf surfaced, ready to shift if he made a move. I kept my eyes on him, but he never made a lunge. He passed the Alpha without a second glance and stopped right in front of me.

I almost expected him to tear me to shreds. His reaction was not something I could have ever guessed would happen in a million years.

He laid down in front of me and rubbed his face against my legs affectionately.

I thought I might be dreaming, but saw the dumbfounded looks on everyone around me. So, this was definitely happening.

"Um," I murmured, breaking another rule, "what is going on?" I said it slowly and cautiously, not wanting to anger the Delta, but also not understanding what he was doing and why.

The Delta looked up at me, his eyes now a dark brown. He almost looked hurt at my question and rubbed against me harder, almost making me fall over.

"He has imprinted on you," a deep voice said and I tore my eyes off of the Delta to see that the Beta had shifted back and put clothes on while we were all distracted. He definitely matched his aura, a scowl on his face as he looked me over in almost disgust. "You didn't imprint back."

My eyes widened and I once again felt everyone's eyes on me. I didn't know how to respond to that. He couldn't be imprinting on me, can he? My wolf is reacting at all to his wolf, which is expected of an imprint.

"I-" I looked down at the Delta and he seemed to be trying to ignore what the Beta said as he continued to rub against me. "He's not my imprint, that can't be true-"

The Beta let out a growl which made me shut up. Surprisingly another growl sounded and the Delta was now standing in front of me protectively, looking towards his Beta. Now the Delta's demeanor changed to a deadly one, one coming from desperation.

I was expecting the Beta to make a move at the Delta after he showed that disrespect, but he simply just glared at the Delta before bringing his eyes to me then the Alpha. "We should go somewhere more secure to discuss this...new discovery."

The Alpha nodded but didn't say anything as we made our way to the pack house. The Delta stayed at my side like a lost puppy the whole way there.

I felt almost in shock, otherwise I'm sure I'd have something to say. An imprint bond was supposed to be both ways; but I wasn't feeling any sort of connection. Was it possible to have only one person imprint on the other? Did that mean there was something wrong with me?

As if feeling my confusion, Delta bumped into me and turned my attention to him. He nuzzled his head against my hand and I hesitantly brought up my hand and began to run my fingers through his fur. He let out a sound of content as we made our way to the pack house.

This was not something I was expecting to happen today.