Kade's POV

I held Joey's hand tightly as we walked through the camp since he told me that he was going to walk me around and tell me the information that I didn't know yet. Members of the pack were shocked when they saw us walking through the street with the betas behind us since Joey felt better with Cody coming along.

Earlier in the day, Lila told me that we had to start planning the wedding because she was so excited. Joey told me a few nights ago that all he wanted to help with was the date and the reception guest list. I found out that with the ceremony, anyone from the pack is allowed to come to see us, but the reception was closed and just for the people we invite. I had been looking at some websites to see what I wanted and I've basically already found out what we were going to wear and the colors.

"So whenever someone transfers to our pack, we decide to let them in based on their past records with other packs. We always have empty houses for precaution and if we don't, then we usually start building more because people are always transferring," Joey tells me as he motions to the houses that look like the normal ones you would find in a regular neighborhood.

"And they have to pay for the houses?" I ask, wondering what the payment process was.

"Yeah, we have a realtor that works specifically with us that walks the new members through our houses until they pick the one we want, then they sit down and make up a payment plan that works best for them," he says.

"Sounds pretty normal," I say with a chuckle.

He chuckles, leaning down to place a kiss on my head. "We do things normally, just like the non-supernatural humans do. I'm not too in on the whole buying houses part of our pack, but I know a bit about it. We give people the option to build their own in one of their lots because we love letting people have free range since it's where they'll be living. So we have rental properties that they can live in while it's being built by our contractors."

"So you have a lot of people working in the camp, right?" I ask, realizing that he's mentioned multiple times of people that work within the camp.

"Yeah, we have nurses and doctors in the hospital, contractors and realtors for the houses, guards for the perimeter, office workers that help give out information about pack meetings and other stuff we need the pack to know, and there's a lot more people that help us run smoothly," he tells me.

I look up at the light poles that stand in front of some houses that hold a white camera on it that's turning to scan every point it can see. I point towards it, wondering if there was a specific reason for it. "Cameras?"

"Just for protection," Joey says, looking over at Cody and Melissa, who catches up to walk beside us as we continue to move past the houses until we get to some empty lots that have half built houses on top of some of them.

"How many houses are you building right now?" I ask, following him as he walks through the dirt to stand next to the wooden structure. The house looks like a fairly small house, but has a huge backyard that looks like there might even be a pool or something like that going in there.

"We have two transfers that decided that they wanted to build their own houses since they expect to be here for a bit," Cody says.

"Are we going to show him the lake?" Melissa asks.

Cody gives his best friend a confused look before crossing his arms with a sigh. "You haven't shown him the lake? The best part about the camp?"

"I just haven't had time to show him yet. We can go now if you're so adamant about it," Joey says with a chuckle before wrapping his arm around my shoulder and guiding me back down the street where people were starting to come out since it was lunchtime, which is when most people decide to hang out in the courtyard.

We get back to the quarter house before Joey and I pile into a car while Cody and Melissa go into the house since they said they needed to get something first. We leave the gate and go down the dirt road, which is where Joey and I fucked in his car that one time, making my face heat up immediately. As we move past the trees, a beautiful lake comes into view that has a fountain in the middle of it. There's a box filled with different floaties next to the lake that I'm assuming they put out at the beginning of spring.

I notice that there's some people, mostly teenagers and kids, playing in the water or sitting at the picnic benches with food laid out. Joey parks his car next to the others in the grass before getting out to look at all the people. I follow behind him as he goes to stand at the edge of the lake, taking my hand in his.

"This is the place I first shifted," he whispers, smiling as he looks out at all the tall trees.

I look at him in surprise. "Really? You shifted here?"

He looks down at me with a smile and a nod. "Yeah, alphas-to-be shift earlier than most, so I was 12 when I did it. My dad took me here with his beta, Cody's dad, and helped me shift since you usually do it in a private setting since it's pretty intense your first time."

"How's it intense?"

He grabs my hand before sitting down on the ground, pulling me into his side before kissing the side of my head. "When you shift for the first time, you're letting your wolf out after years of being hidden inside. Your bones are being moved around for the first time, which gets easier to do with time, but it's probably the worst pain you feel when you do it at first. It's like all your bones are breaking at once and your wolf is finally being unleashed, which basically means you lose all control at once."

"So what happens?"

"Your wolf takes control, which means lots of running and hunting. It can last from two to ten hours, depending on how feisty your wolf is. I think I was out for, maybe, about seven hours with my dad until my wolf gave me control back," he says.

"That's terrifying that you just don't know what'll happen once you shift," I whisper to him, setting my head on his shoulder.

"Yeah, it is, but we have ways to help new cubs learn control and safety within themselves," he assures me. Before I can say anything else, Joey turns his head to see Cody and Melissa coming with two bags in their hands. Melissa tosses one in front of us before giving me a smirk.

"What's this for?" I ask, looking into the bag to see towels and swim trunks.

"Get changed, we're going swimming," Cody said before rushing to his car with his mate. I looked over at Joey to see him giving me a smirk as well before pulling me off the ground to his car.

"Wait, we're actually going swimming?" I ask.

"Yeah, come on, let's have some fun for a bit," he says and I immediately start to worry about our safety until I look around and notice the guards standing around the lake for our protection. I get pulled into the backseat of the car with my man who hands me a pair of bright blue swim trunks.

I look around, noticing the people sitting at the picnic tables again. "Isn't anyone gonna see?"

Joey chuckles, shaking his head. "No, that's what the tinted windows are for."

I watch as he slips his shirt off, not too sure that the windows will actually prevent anyone from actually seeing us change. I play with the hem of the trunks, staring out the window as my fiance next to me switches into his swimming clothes. When he notices that I haven't even moved, he chuckles, digging through the bag.

"You can have sex in the car, but not change? How does that make sense?" He asks.

I scoff with a small chuckle. "Well, there wasn't anyone around to be worried about."

He sighs, grabbing a towel from the bag and holding it up in front of me so I'm sure that no one would be able to see me. I change quickly before grabbing the towel from his hands to give him a quick kiss to say thank you. We're pulled out of the car by our friends before getting dragged to the water. We all hear a small gasp, looking over at the group of people to see them staring at us in surprise because we basically never leave the house.

We wave at them before turning back to Cody. "Isaac, Oliver, and Tyler should be on their way to come hang out with us."

Before I can say anything, I'm being pushed into the lake by Melissa as she giggles along with everyone else. My back hits with a splash as my nose immediately fills up with dirty lake water along with my mouth. When I break the surface, I spit out the water, wiping my eyes before glaring at my friend.

"Sorry, it was too hard to resist," Melissa says, giggling behind her hand. Joey holds his hand out to me to help me out, but instead of pulling myself up, I find the strength to pull him in. He lets out a gasp before hitting the water with a smack. We all sit there and wait for him to come back up, but when that doesn't happen, I'm being pulled under the water by a hand on my ankle.

I let out a yell before my head goes under. I feel Joey's hands slide up my legs as he rushes to the surface to get a breath of air. I come back up too before slapping his arm as he lets out a laugh before looking at me. "What was that for?"

He wraps his arm around my waist, kissing my cheek. "Just thought it would be funny, which it was."

We all relax in the water, swimming around while we wait for the rest of our friends to show up. I notice the people in the water are looking at us while whispering something that I couldn't quite hear. I was taken out of my trance when Joey goes back underwater before swimming underneath me to scoop me onto his shoulders. When he stands up, I yelp, grabbing a hold of his hands that're on my thighs to balance myself.

"Joey, no!" I scream as he moves around to make sure I don't fall over. His hands slide down to hold onto my ankles while mine tangle in his hair, lightly pulling on the wet strands. I notice that Melissa's on her boyfriend's back with a huge smile on her face as she looks up at me.

"Hey, guys," we hear Isaac say and when we look up, we see Isaac and Oliver standing near the water in swim trunks. We all say hi as they slip into the water, freaking out as the cold hits their skin. I tighten my grip on Joey's hair when he almost makes me fall off his shoulders.

"Here," Oliver says, holding his hands out to Isaac. "get on my shoulders, we'll play Chicken."

My eyes widen as I realize what we were doing. I try to pull my leg back to get off of my mate's shoulders, but he tightens his grip on my ankles to keep me steady on his shoulders. "Nope, we're gonna play."

"Oh, come on, why do I have to do it?" I ask with a scoff.

"It'll be fun, we'll do it with three people to make it more intense," Melissa says, making Cody help her up on his shoulders. I run my fingers through Joey's hair as we wait for them to get ready to play.

Once Isaac's on Oliver's shoulders and Melissa's on Cody's, we get into a circle before we start trying to knock each other off. Melissa and I team up against Isaac since he's the strongest of the three of us with his werewolf strength, each taking one of his arms as we try to push him off. He looks between the both of us before giving us an evil glare when he realizes what we're doing.

"That's so not fair," he says with a small laugh as he intertwines his hand with mine to squeeze the bones in my fingers until it starts to hurt. I dig my nails into his skin before snatching my hand away from his with a gasp.

"Ow, bitch! You're the werewolf here!" I yell at him before using my leg to hook it around his and immediately flip it up so he fell back into the water with a yell. We all laugh while Oliver turns around to pull him up and make sure he's okay before letting out a small laugh and hitting his head lightly to tell him that he could've won.

"Oh, that was so cheating," Isaac says, moving some of his wet hair out of his face.

We laugh as Cody moves to stand right in front of Joey and I as Melissa grabs my hands, trying to push me off, but I wasn't going to fall that easily. She gives me a smile before snatching her hand back to lean forward and try and push my shoulder back, but Joey realizes what she was doing and walks backwards.

"Nice try," I tease. We continue to fight until I realize that she wasn't going to give up without a fight and my leg was starting to hurt like it has been doing since I got bit by that rogue. When she pushes my shoulder again, I let myself fall back into the water, letting her win since I didn't think my leg could've handled more stress at the moment.

When I come up from the water, Joey's there to help me stand, probably noticing the discomfort I'm feeling. He reaches to grab my ankle before helping me stretch it out. "You okay?"

"Yeah, just a little ache, I'm fine," I tell him before giving Melissa a high five on her win as Joey continues to help stretch out my leg, making sure not to do it too much.

"Hey," Tyler says, standing on the shore next to us, wearing a very cute floral bathing suit that's kinda covered by her towel that's wrapped around her body. She sets her stuff down before coming to join us in the water, immediately migrating towards Isaac and Oliver.

They all decide to play Chicken again while Joey and I stand to the side to just watch. I notice the way that Tyler immediately chooses to get on Oliver's shoulders and get confused since I never knew she was so close with him. Melissa gets on Isaac's shoulders while Cody comes to stand next to us to watch.

"When're we going to make the final decision about the rogues?" Cody asks, crossing his arms as we watch our friends having fun. I look up at Joey when I notice him stand up straighter and his eyes flash blue before turning back to their soft hazel. I link arms with him, setting one hand flat against his chest to feel his heartbeat to calm myself down since I know they were about to talk about stressful things.

"We have to do it soon or we'll lose track. We can sit down tomorrow with everyone and talk about everything to see what we can do to help prevent the situation getting to worse-case scenario," Joey tells him.

"And worse-case scenario is?" I ask.

"Raiding their camp and starting a war," Cody tells me, immediately making my stress level go higher. I tighten my grip on my fiance's arm, hating that he might have to go fight some revengeful wolves that only want blood.

Joey leans down to kiss right above my ear. "It's okay, that'll be our last resort."

I nod my head, looking back up at our friends who were still fighting as they laughed with glee. We stay in the water until it starts to get dark and that's when we all make our way back to the quarter house where Lila had prepared steak and veggies for us.

We all sit at the table as we start to talk about Joey and I's wedding since that was all everyone wanted to know about. Later that night, I get into the warm bed to cuddle with my man who was already starting to fall asleep as his eyes flutter. I lay my head on his chest, falling into a deep, deep sleep.