I'm safely tucked away in the fold of his arm; my leg draped across his abdomen. His chest feels warm against my cheek. Flesh laying against flesh feels comforting. His hands are rubbing my thigh, my hip, my back in a calming way.

The sensation of his body against my hypertensive skin makes me tingle all over.

"Shhh, close your eyes... go back to sleep." His voice is heavy with exhaustion.

I feel him move underneath me. He's grabbing for something, and it clatters against the nightstand.

A knock at the door startles me as it echoes in the silence. Another blow comes, louder than the last.

"Alpha Grey," a panic-stricken voice calls out from the other side of the door.

"What?" His voice booms his displeasure at being disturbed.

Snuggling deeper into his side, I rub my cheek against him, holding him close to me. He kisses my forehead as I try to pry open my heavy lids.

"It's the females; they've been thrown into their heat."

Even in the fog, I understand this could become a volatile situation: males fighting males to the death because of the need to mate the unmated females.

Groaning, he shifts his body weight, pulling himself away from me.

"Don't leave me." My fingers try to find something I can grab onto to stop him from leaving. Searing hot heat starts spreading where his skin leaves mine. I whimper out to him, still too drugged to open my eyes. I feel too heavy to move, to even turn over in bed.

"Please, I need you... Stay with me." I'm begging him, the pain starting to bloom inside me, spreading from the tip of my fingers to the bottom of my toes.

"I have no choice. I have to go; the pack needs me."

Gritting my teeth at his words. "I need you," I scream out accusingly."I need you."

It's hard to breath anymore as the white heat wraps around my chest, suffocating me. A sting in my thigh has me flinching slightly. I peek one eye open and look down to see the blurry syringe. I can taste the bitterness of the medication working its was into my system. I feel like my body is sinking into the bed, it's so heavy.

"I hate you." It's a very quite whisper as the tears leak out my closed eyes.

"Not as much as I hate myself."

I almost didn't catch that. It was said so quietly; my ears strained to hear it.

My mind's starting to blur. Only faintly do I hear the door click and lock. My stomach is protesting the strong sedative. Twisting and turning, the acid makes it's way up my throat explosively. I empty out the contents of my stomach onto the bed. Wave after wave of yellow bile pours out of me in unforgiving pulses.

I can't move to clean myself up; the medicine is too strong, it overpowered my system. Taking a big breath, all I smell is vomit and my body spasms uncontrollably with pain. I start screaming until I have no more voice.

The lull of oblivion calls out to me. The last thought I have before the deep dark descends is that I'll always be second. Never first.

So the cycle repeats. I wake in a twilight haze, begging for help, but my desperate pleas are left unanswered. I scream and kick my misery out, only to be told by a female voice to calm down because it will be over soon. The sharp sting of a needle and the bitter taste of the sedative always follow.

"Meela, you need to drink."

I choke on the cold water spilling down my throat. Coughing and gagging, I try to take a deep breath. The pounding in my head makes it impossible to open my eyes.

Trying to turn my heavy head away from the water, but feel fingers holding my chin steady.

"Drink!" It's spoken with authority, a command my body instinctually follows.

I'm helped into a sitting position. Coupled with dizziness and a pounding head, I retch all the water I just consumed.

"Sorry." I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and roll over, closing my eyes and trying to breathe away the nausea.

"You have nothing to be sorry for. This wasn't your fault." He brushes the hair out of my eyes. "Let's get you cleaned up."

Groaning loudly. I don't want to move an inch. I just want to lie here, wallow in misery, in the misfortune of being me.

Cramping in my lower abdomen has me pulling my knees up to my chest. My uterus starts to hemorrhage out what should have been the lining for a future's nest. The final stage of my heat, where my body expels what took a month to build in minutes.

Great, just great. Not only did I vomit all over myself, now I've ruined the bed.

Groaning again, I kick the covers off and sit on the edge of the bed, letting the vertigo ease until I think I can walk.

I see him looking at the blood, his lips a hard line. He knows he's sacrificed a pup, a future heir to the pack. He's sacrificed a chance for a pup, all for the sake of a stupid a Ceremony. A feared whisper in my mind blows out a thought: If he can sacrifice his own future, what else will he sacrifice?

I can see regret. Those dull grey eyes are full of sadness. Misery comes over him, and his lip trembles the slightest bit as he looks away. As he walks to the window, I see his shoulders heave up and down in big controlling breaths.

Standing on shaky legs, a wave of dizziness has me swaying slightly. I hold on to the bedside table for balance.

He marches back and wraps an arm around me. "Let me help you."

"I need..." I wait until I can look him in the eyes. "Nothing from you...ever."

Slowly his hands leave my body, hanging limply at his sides. This is the only time I've seen him this way...defeated.

I look from the blood to him. Tilting my head to the side, I throw his words back at him. "It's all about choices, Northerner."

With that, I make my way to the bathroom to scrub the grime from my body.

The weeks following the end of our heat has the numbers in the pack growing. Most of the mated females are expecting a pup. A beautiful glow has descended on the pack, a time of prosperity, of good fortune.

Watching Sophie on Thomas's lap, his hand on her belly, nuzzling her mark, laughing with each other constricts my heart in jealousy. They must have smelled my sour taste because both their eyes look at me in sadness.

Sophie gets off his lap and sits on her own chair.

"I'm sorry." Hanging my head at my behaviour. It's just that seeing the way they are together makes me understand how much I'm missing in my life.

"Thomas." The Northerner's voice brings me out of my melancholy. "Is everything ready for the arrival of the Easterners?"

I perk up. "Elliot," I say to myself.

"You know the Easterners?"

I nod. "They visited us often."

"Well, it seem that they have some business to discuss."

I feel his curious eyes on me.

"Elliot?" His eyebrow raise.

I blush uncontrollably. He was my first crush, my first kiss, my first love.

Unconsciously I bring my fingers up to my lips, just remembering our heated nights together, until my brother found out and gave Elliot a lasting scar. After that, we were never left alone together to protect my virtue.

I haven't seen him in years. I wonder what kind of man the boy has turned into. My girlhood love. I always thought he'd turn out to be my mate.

I hear the low threatening growl of jealousy the Northerners makes and I taste his sourness. Turning away from him, feeling butterflies in my stomach at the thought of seeing Elliot again.

The balance of our relationship has been very strained. It's affected the Northerner deeply watching the mated couples expecting their pups. He's eyes give it away, the longing in him when he watches his brother with Sophie, the way his eyes linger on her stomach, watching Thomas rub it.

He has to live with this. My heat could take years to return. His opportunity to become a father has gone, his opportunity to have an heir vanished....all because of his choices.