Some days I close my eyes and fade away
And I fade away
That's just the dark side of me
Some nights all the colors turn to grey
Just like the dark side of me
I'm not afraid of the dark

• • •

"You're staring at him again."

"I am not. I am sending him looks every so often to make sure he's not injuring himself."

"Sweetie, you're staring. Your eyes have not drifted from him in fifteen minutes."

I released a frustrated huff and glanced at Zaria who was smirking at me. "God, you're really whipped."

"Shut up, I am not whipped," I denied, sending her a small scowl, but made sure to make it look more playful than intense. "I am allowed to watch your alpha train the adolescents without making it look like I'm drooling over him," I said broadly, sticking my tongue out at her. "The other females do it."

Yes, and I did not like it one bit. Not that I would admit it. Having the females watch my mate like bitches in heat made me want to show them just how much more territorial a feline could be.

My thoughts quickly made me realize I was getting a bit too jealous. My relationship with Princeton, whatever it may be at the moment, was still young and new.

It didn't stop Princeton from immediately announcing to anyone who would listen that we were making it work and taking it slow. It was pretty cute to watch him talk so adoringly about me and kiss my cheek whenever he had the chance. He wasn't afraid to show me off and make me feel like a Queen.

Zaria rolled her eyes and tugged at a string on the padded wall of the gym, ripping it from the mat that was attached to the wall itself. She flicked the string to the ground like she was shooing away a pesky fly. "They're not 'watching the alpha train the adolescents', Rivera, but your trust in him is sweet."

My nostrils flared at her words, because she was both right and insensitive all at the same time. "Thanks for that," I said dryly, letting my icy gaze wander to a few females watching my mate like bitches in heat [ no pun intended ].

Heat. I almost shuddered at the thought. Werewolf females got their heats only after they've been marked and it's the full moon. Unmarked females will not go into heat when the full moon hits. It's to both prevent a male from assaulting an unwanting female that's not his mate, as well as to give mated couples a time stamp for their pregnancy.

When a she-wolf goes into heat, her ability to get pregnant is at its strongest. Of course, she can get pregnant like a human female without the heat based on her ovulation, but the heat is the most assured way of pregnancy for her. Wolves get pregnant easier than felines because of this heat cycle, and are less likely to miscarry if they conceive under the full moon. It's some freaky ass stuff, but it's how their systems work.

This cycle is also to bind the pack closer through spiritual closeness. Mated pairs will disappear for the night respectively, and the rest of the pack will hunt together as a unit — rankings are ignored for that night, all wolves equal to the other next to them.

That's what I envied, secretly, about wolves. Their systems of reproduction and group bonding have a deeper, meaningful way to go. They had an assured way of making sure their unit did not fall apart, and a very strong system of adding to that unit.

Felines were different, very different. Our heat cycles came monthly, just like a wolf's and their full moon, but ours weren't set in an exact time. A heat will hit a female at any given time. If one female is in heat, there's a possibility it might cause another female to go into heat. A female who is pregnant and miscarries will go into heat after the body heals itself from the loss of the child, so that is something to watch for. It could happen any time. If a female skips a heat, it's not a cause for concern. It usually means her body isn't ready to attract a mate to carry a child. It's still "preparing" itself.

A wolf's heat will last about a week. A feline's heat will last about two if left unmated. During those two weeks, heated females who don't have their Chosen will quite literally lock themselves away. Their family members, such as parents and siblings, will tend to their needs like food and drink. Pregnancy in a feline is a hit or miss, which is why a heat lasted so long for felines. If not in heat, we're even less likely to get pregnant than wolf shifters who are not in heat as well.

My heat — it was the most painful thing I ever experienced. I wasn't hot, or writhing, like many speculate it to be. A human girl can get painful cramps during their period — those cramps amplified times ten is what our heat feels like. The cramps are radiating and often crippling, leaving us bedridden. We experience the pain due to our bodies attempt to encourage us to mate, only then will it disappear [ briefly ], until they return and need to be eased again.

It was a brutal process and I hated it. But I knew, I could tell, that very soon my heat will come along. My body took two months to heal from the miscarriage, and it'll more than likely trigger a heat at any given point.

I would probably need to speak with Lana about that in advance.

"Staring at them like you want to tear them to shreds won't make them go away, you know," Zaria said with a little grin on her face.

I snapped out of my thoughts and glanced at her, my eyes ripping from the fawning females. "If only they could," I murmured.

Zaria snorted next to me. I ignored it and returned my blue gaze to Princeton, where he was holding an adolescent my his neck, not harshly, and saying, "If an enemy gets his jaws around this area of your neck, the jugular, and nobody was able to help you, you'd be dead."

The adolescent whimpered at the words, probably imagining his own death and growing uneasy with Princeton's hand so close to a sensitive spot.

My mate noted the unease and gently released his neck, placing his hand on the male's shoulder and saying in a gentler fashion, "In a battle, we cannot afford to lose our pack members. You're young, and you'll learn, but I do not want to see your face in a body count. You hear?"

The youngling nodded rapidly and Princeton smiled at him kindly, stepping back. "Again. This time, don't hesitate to defend yourself with physical force."

I sat and watched Princeton train the younglings for hours after that.

• • •

"Don't even think about it."

"Please, mi sol? Just one little kiss?"

I wrinkled my nose as I stared up at Princeton's sweaty form, watching him grin at me cheekily. "No way. My sensitive nose can literally smell the endorphins on you. Go shower."

Princeton's face turned into a pout and he watched me with wide eyes. "Please?" He leaned forward with an adorable look on his face.

I laughed, placing my hand on his cheek and pushing his face from me. "No!" I giggled. "If you so much as kiss me on the cheek I'll withhold all kisses for a month!"

His lips pause mid-kiss, and suddenly he pulled back. "I'll go take a shower," he relented, nodding his head and ruffling his hair with his fingers.

"Good boy." I smirked, making him shoot me a lighthearted glare.

After Princeton showered, he asked me out to dinner ever so kindly. It went like this:

"Can I get my kisses now? I showered, see?" He shakes his wet hair at me and I squeal and shove him away.

"Hey, stop!" I wiped at my arms, grimacing. "You've not been very nice to me lately."

He smirked, leaning forward and trapping me in his arms. Then he kissed me, cupping my cheeks and holding me close. I immediately melted into the kiss and pressed against him, wrapping my arms around his neck and linking my fingers together behind his neck.

"Eres el único que me lleva a mis rodillas," he whispered against my lips, tightening his embrace around me even as his lips pulled away from my own [ You are the only one who brings me to my knees].

"I don't know what the hell you just said, but it was hot."

A small smirk tugged at the corners of his lips and he leaned in, whispering, "Lo recordaré, mi sol," in an almost purring fashion [ I will remember that, my sun ].

I glowered at him playfully, though my heart sped up in my chest. "Shut up. What does mi sol mean anyways?"

"My sun," he murmured, reaching up to tuck a strand of my blonde hair behind my ear. "You are my light. My soul. The light to my dark."

My eyes locked with his as my heart skipped a beat. His sun. The sun to his moon . . .

I swallowed, shaking the thought away. Instead I leaned up and brushed our lips together once more, enjoying the way his hands moved gently down to my hips and settled comfortably there as he kissed me back.

"What's your favorite color?" he asked me later that day as we sat on the couch with our fingers twined together. I gazed at him and offered a small smile, my lips twitching upward.

"I don't know. I like a lot of colors," I admitted to him, raising our joined hands and squeezing the grasp ever so gently. It was true — colors were important to me in a sense that I used them to help describe moods and moments. Every memory engraved in my head was remembered by a certain color and the vividness of it within the memory.

Princeton gave me a look of disbelief and he eyed me suspiciously. "Everyone has a favorite color. Everyone. Even you."

I rolled my eyes at his childishness and laughed softly. "Whatever you say. The closest color to being my favorite would probably have to be orange."

Princeton blinked. "Orange," he repeated, testing the word as if he'd never heard it before in his life. "Oh-range."

"Yes. Orange," I agreed, laughing at him again and poking his chest. "You pressure me into giving you a color that I really like when I don't exactly have a favorite and you judge me for it. How mean."

He rubbed the spot where I'd poked him and scowled playfully. "I mean — I try not to judge. But . . . Come on, orange?" he emphasizes.

"Orange is a pretty color," I defended, scowling at his raised eyebrows. "Don't look at me like that."

He shook his head and scoffed. "Look . . . Just . . . Really? Our of all the colors."

"See, you say you're "trying not to judge" me yet here you are judging me. Ass," I dryly pointed out, shoving away from him and beginning to brood. I crossed my arms and gave him a scowl to show just how displeased I was with him.

He gave me a pout when I removed myself from his arms. "Okay, okay, truce," he whined, opening his arms to me. I rolled my eyes.

"That won't work on me."

"Go our to dinner with me," he said abruptly, causing my head to down from where it was angled toward the ceiling.

"What?" I blanched, staring at him with widened eyes in shock.

He grinned at me and reached his calloused hands out, brushing his gentle thumb across my jaw like he was admiring fine pottery. "Please go to dinner with me tonight."

A blush actually covered my cheeks when his hand met my skin. I bit my lip and allowed myself to lean into the touch with ease, resulting in a loud noise in my head equivalent to a cat's purr. "Feline seems to want to go."

He smiled, a small glow turning his brown eyes gold. His wolf was out to say hello, it seemed, but not to completely take the reigns from Princeton. "My wolf woke up like the horn dog he was when he heard that. Thanks."

I stifled a small laugh, biting the bottom of my lip and blushing again. God, what the hell is wrong with me? I'm not some school girl with a crush on the football player. I needed to grow up.

"Where are we going to dinner at?" I asked, indicating that I was agreeing.

Princeton lit up like a freshly used bulb, a grin splitting his features and revealing his pearly whites. "Have you heard of the Ned Ludd?"

• • •

"Stop fussing," Lana ordered as she smacked my hand away from my curled hair. "You're making a big deal out of nothing."

I snatched my hand away from her as Maddy carefully curled mascara through my eyelashes, mumbling something about moving.

"My hair looks so awful when it's curled, though." I looked at myself in the mirror and bit my lip. Letting my gaze travel down the curled blonde locks, I felt slightly put off by the perfectly done curls. I so wasn't used to fluffing and making my hair up like this. "Besides, it's just dinner."

"Just dinner," Lana mumbled as she adjusted the straps on my baby blue dress. "It's your first date. The first date is very, very important. It's how a male proves himself to his mate."

"See, thats exactly why I don't want it to be a big deal," I sighed, trying to pull away from a determined Maddy as she came at me with an eyeliner pencil. "I don't need all this makeup and updos. I don't want him to prove himself to me again. If I felt he hadn't proved himself to me, I wouldn't have given him the chance to be a proper mate to me in the first place."

Maddy took my shoulders and used one hand to hold me down as she leaned in and began sketching wings around the corners of my eye, making them twitch. "Stop moving your damn eyes, Rivera. You're worse than Isabea when it comes to eyeliner."

"Poor Isabea," I sympathized, feeling sorry for the poor girl — whoever she may be.

Lana was watching me with soft eyes. She seemed to have understood why I was so against her making a big deal about the dinner. "Maddy, finish the eyeliner and then leave her alone," she told her daughter.

Maddy scoffed. "You're too soft on her." But she finished both my eyes and when I looked back at the mirror I was stunned. The pitch black eyeliner made my icy gaze pop. I was begrudgingly impressed.

"Now," Lana said, clapping her hands, "time for the date."

I put the black heels on my feet after they left. I grabbed my bag and looked at myself in the mirror one last time before heading out of the bedroom with a deep breath and a strange, pounding feeling in my chest. Nerves. Fast heartbeat. Shit.

I walked down the stairs, allowing my curled hair to be used as a protective curtain around my blushing face. I could feel eyes on me, and could smell the surprised pheromones of my mate at the end of the staircase.

"You're beautiful," he breathed. If I were human, I wouldn't have heard the words, but I was glad I wasn't human. A smile tugged my lips and his hand encased mine. "Let's go, beautiful."

"Use protection!" Maddy screeches as we walked out the door, followed by a smack, "Ow! Mamì!"

• • •

It started halfway through dinner. We were discussing what we had wanted to major in at college. Despite being shifters and heavily dedicated pack animals, we still had passions and desired professions.

Princeton noticed it before I did, which surprised me. He had stopped talking about science engineering, lifting his head and staring at me with nearly black eyes and dilated pupils. A low growl began in his throat.

"Princeton?" I asked, setting down my fork and looking at him before glancing around. "Prince, I don't know what's got you upset. But we're around a lot of humans right now. Calm down."

He grit his teeth, nostrils flaring. "We need to go. I'm going to flag down the next waiter and get the damn bill. If he so much as glances your way, Rivera—"

"Woah, there, Fred Flintstone, don't you think you're getting a little possessive there?" I asked, something inside my abdomen twisting with worry. What the hell had gotten into him?

My stomach dropped suddenly, and then the pain overtook my entire body.