The Alpha King is My Mate?

3

Word count: 1542, completed

Isabella spends a couple of minutes feeding the horses their carrots and playing with them before she hears the quiet buzz of talking getting closer to her, her heart starts beating incredibly fast as she starts to panic, had someone seen her?

Instead of allowing herself to accept being found when she was meant to be keeping a low profile, Isabella looked wildly around the room before jumping into one of the empty stalls where the horses stay, she sinks to the floor and is instantly covered in dirt but she is almost glad for it as she hopes it would cover her scent so they wouldn't believe she was there. By the time Isabella has done this, Hunter is pulling open the heavy door to the stables with ease, he walks in his eyes flying around the room to look for the owner of the scent with everyone else following closely behind.

Despite Isabella being covered in dirt, that would never be able to cover up her scent from her soul mate so although it was slightly dampened, Hunter could still smell his mate and would search this whole barn until he found her and although he couldn't see her, Hunter knew she was there somewhere.

"Where is she?" he growls impatiently, "I told you, I wanted everyone outside waiting for me when I arrived"

"W-who? Your m-majesty" Alpha Axel stutters, he shrinks back further in fear when he sees Hunter's eyes going darker due to anger.

Hunter punches out his hand and wraps it around Alpha Axel's through cutting off his air supply like Finn had done to Isabella but Hunter is getting increasingly tighter allowing Axel's face to start going purple. Everybody stood around and watched, they felt loyalty to their own pack Alpha but they also felt more loyalty to the Alpha King, not to mention if they even tried to go against the King there would be severe consequences, knowing this made Hunter smirk.

Meanwhile, Isabella was listening to this fearfully, even though the thought of those who hurt her being hurt made her lips turn up slightly in a smile she was panicking, this man was clearly very powerful and angry that she hadn't followed his orders and this made her stay exactly where she was.

Isabella reaches into her pocket and pulls out the necklace given to her by Alpha Jax on her before she could remember... she just remembered always having it and it was her most prized possession but she never wore it because she was scared that Finn would take it away from her. The necklace was a heart-shaped purple stone with a silver outlining with leaves on, she runs her fingers over the smooth gem causing her instant relief, one thing she used to do as a child was swing the chain on her finger when she was bored, Isabella started to do this as a distraction to ignore what was going on a couple of metres away from her and yet the chain flings off her finger across the stall she is hiding in.

Despite fear filling her whole body at the thought of being caught, Isabella can't leave the necklace without going to collect it so she gets on her hands and knees and tries to silently crawl over to the necklace to collect it as it sat twinkling in the sunlight coming in through the open door.

-

Hunter finally lets go of Axel's neck and starts to walk forwards further into the stable, he runs her eyes around the room and backtracks when he sees something sparkling in one of the stalls at the back of the stable, he nearly misses it but it seems to call out to him so he narrows his eyes on it. Hunter walks closer to the thing sparkling but quickly stops when he sees a small ball of messy, chestnut hair coming into view, the owner? A slim girl on her hands and knees creeping across the stall, Hunter walks forward until he is directly next to the girl who turns her head when she sees his shoes in her view, slowly she looks up through her long, dark eyelashes with pure fear in her eyes.

Isabella instantly feels captivated by the handsome man in front of her, she secretly knows that this is her mate but the doubt niggles it was into her brain after everything Finn had told her about how she was never going to have a mate because she didn't deserve one – how nobody would ever love her, even her own parents couldn't.

Oppositely, Hunter was certain before he even saw Isabella that this was his mate but it confirmed it further when he looked into her big, brown, doe eyes that almost seemed too big for her slim, dirty face. Hunter couldn't help but think that she seemed too fragile and small, her small frame reminded him of a young child of around 13 but he knew she wasn't, he couldn't explain why he knew she wasn't but he just knew. Hunter reached out his hand and helped a shaking Isabella to her feet, he was filled with raging anger at how clearly undernourished his mate was, she was their queen and something wasn't right here.

"I'm Hunter," he says smiling gently as he raises her hand to his lips looking completely past the dark circles under her eyes telling tales of sleepless nights and the dirt coating her body.

"Isabella" she whispers out. If Hunter didn't have werewolf hearing he probably wouldn't have heard it but he did and it melted his heart instantly.

"Do you know who I am?" Hunter asks meaning did she know he was her mate, he had forgotten himself that he was King or that there was a group of people around them waiting with baited breath

"I'm not sure... I mean... I think so... Yes" she stumbles over her words fearing Hunter's looming figure and yet she feels comfort in him at the same time

"Would you like to go to the pack house and sort your things out?" he says his grip on her loosening only slightly

"I don't live in the pack house, I like a couple miles away on the edge of the pack" Isabella says just as quietly but the sparks running through her hand fill her with a small amount of confidence.

"Why my princess?" he says swiping the back of his hand against Isabella's dirty cheek softly making a shiver run down her spine

"She always did act as a lone wolf so she asked to be away from the pack house and of course, we granted her this wish" Alpha Axel interrupts, Hunter watches as Isabella's face crumples slightly and he knows that Axel is lying.

"Isabella...?" he says silently asking for the truth with furrowed eyebrows, it takes her a shaky minute to think about her reply, she was too caught up in wishing he would say her name repeatedly, it rolled perfectly off of his tongue, it filled her whole body with such warmth and it was the opposite of how she felt when anybody else had said her name

"Yes... It's true, I wanted to be on my own" she says, this confirms for Hunter that this is a complete lie because Isabella can't even look him in the eyes but he doesn't want to push it further

"Well you're coming with me so we will take you home to pack up your things, we can leave tomorrow," he says sounding slightly like an order but he says it softly to help her not fear him

"You're staying at the pack house tonight, it wouldn't make sense to come all the way out to take me home to come back again. I will go on my own" Isabella says at first confident but then as she looks around and sees the shock on peoples face at her defying the King and she suddenly feels nervous again

"I will be staying with you tonight so it's okay" he grins excitedly baring his sharp teeth as he runs his large hands over Isabella's face while rubbing one of his thumbs across her bottom lip. Isabella takes a sharp intake of breath half because of the electricity coursing through her veins at the touch of her skin but also as she realised she had Tobias waiting at home, what would Hunter do if he saw Tobias? Surely, he would never let Tobias come along but Isabella couldn't leave him to fend for himself

"I would like privacy" Isabella mutters, now it is everyone else's turn to take sharp intakes of breath at Isabella outright denying the King of all werewolves. Isabella is sure she will be dead any second now as her body shakes nervously.

Although Hunter removes his hand from Isabella's face he does nothing but bows his head to his princess in allowance to do as she pleased

"Okay my princess, you stay alone tonight but as a compromise, I am taking you home" he smiles, this time taking her hand back into his to kiss the back of her hand like he had done earlier.

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