Suitcases were packed, food for the trip was already made, and the cars were waiting at the entrance of the pack. Everything was ready to start the trip, I just had to say goodbye to Faustina.

I imagined that the news of my departure would be hard for my sister to accept but she surprised me by taking it more than well. Instead of wanting to prevent my trip she almost kicked me out of the mansion so she could go on her girls' trip with Geldra and Khalia.

Her excitement was so much that she started packing her bags at the same time as me.

"You know you're not leaving until tomorrow, right?" I asked her, watching her choose what dress to pack.

"Why can you leave today and I have to wait?" She complained, pouting.

"Because we don't want anyone to know you're leaving the mansion," I explained for the fifth time. "It's like your own secret mission."

"It's not fair, I wanted to tell Octavia about my trip. Can I tell her when I get back?"

"When you get back you can tell her all the details." I helped her fold the dress. "If you want you can take pictures to show us all what you did."

"Can I send them to you when you're away?" She closed the suitcase.

"Unfortunately not," I replied, fixing her hair. "It's safer this way."

"So I can't call you either? I thought we would be able to talk at night. Almec told me that you could contact me sometime."

"Did he say that?"

I sat on the bed, biting my tongue to avoid insulting Almec in front of my sister.

Why did he say that when he knew we couldn't have any communication with her? The only thing he managed to do was give her false hopes that would lead to Faustina ending up heartbroken.

Maybe he was trying to help, my wolf told me.

He should know that it's better to be clear from the start than to have Faustina sit there every day waiting for a call that will never come.

"Come here," I told Faustina, holding out my arms.

She came closer and I hugged her, making her sit on my lap.

"Do you remember what we talked about about the bad men?" I asked her.

Faustina nodded. "The bad men want to take our pack."

"Exactly. Almec and I are going to look for a solution but we have to be careful just in case. If they listen to our calls they might know where your secret location is."

"And I won't be able to stay there anymore?"

"Your secret mission is going to be ruined." I smiled at her. "That's why we can't call you when we're away."

"But Almec—

"Almec has a lot of things to do, sometimes he gets confused." I couldn't think of any other way to tell her that her favorite person was wrong.

"What did I get wrong?"

I looked up, finding Almec leaning against the door frame. He had his arms crossed and was looking at me confused.

"Almec!" Faustina screamed, running towards him.

"Hey, princess." Almec lifted her into his arms. "How's the preparation going for your trip?"

"I've got everything ready, I'm just waiting for tomorrow." She pointed to her suitcase. "Are you going to bring me a gift from your trip?"

"Do you want something special?" Almec asked her, putting her back on the floor.

"Any gift is fine." Faustina was silent for a second. "Can it be two?"

"How about I bring you one for every day we're apart?"

Oh, Moon Goddess, she started again. Then I ask myself why my sister is getting spoiled.

"Did you hear Valen? I'm going to have a lot of new gifts." Faustina jumped around the room.

"The best for my princess. Can you let me talk to your sister alone for a moment?" Almec asked her. "I think Demian had your breakfast ready."

Faustina left the room without even complaining. If I had tried, she would have surely asked me the reasons why she had to leave.

I crossed my legs without getting out of bed and looked at Almec angrily.

"Oh, no. What did I do now?" He took a few steps towards me but didn't completely break the distance between us.

The tension in our relationship was still as intact as the previous evening, the fact that I was his luna and that we were about to start a dangerous journey together didn't solve our problems.

"Did you tell Faustina that we could call her?"

"I didn't want to tell her that we are going to be incommunicado, she will surely get sad." Almec scratched the back of his neck.

"So I have to be the bad one to tell her that her dear Almec is not right? You know how she is, she takes your words very seriously."

Almec lowered his head and said nothing. I wanted to continue the discussion but it seemed to me that he had already understood the point.

"Are we ready to go?" I changed the subject, standing up.

"Yeah. I'm done talking to Geldra and Feinid," Almec replied. "And the Moon Guardians members are waiting for us at the pack entrance, they seem pretty excited."

"Well, they're going back to their pack bringing the alpha and the luna of Wild Fangs, no wonder they're happy." I stood in front of Almec. "I'm sure they think they won the battle."

Almec raised his hand, almost brushing my mate mark but lowered it before it made contact with my skin.

"Are you sure you want to come with me?" He asked me.

"I thought that was what you wanted," I tilted my head to the side. "Have you already regretted inviting me?"

"It's not that. This trip is going to be dangerous, it's not just a simple visit to another pack. It'll probably end up in a war and I don't want to force you into danger."

"You need to have more faith in my strength." I walked away from him to grab my suitcase. "I can handle whatever they have in store."

"I asked you to come with me, if I didn't have confidence in your strength I wouldn't have asked you in the first place." Almec stood in front of the door, blocking the exit. "I know that at times it may seem like I don't care about you. Hell, sometimes I don't even understand what's going on between us. But I want you to know that I care, what I want most is to be able to fix this mess so that everything goes back to normal."

"I know you care about us." I stood in front of him, set down the suitcase, and grabbed his hands. "What worries me is that you don't care about yourself."

I didn't expect an answer and I didn't get one either. Still, the small flash of concern on Almec's face was enough to give me hope.

"Let's say goodbye to Faustina," I told him, letting go of his hands. "She's going to get mad if I don't give her a goodbye hug before we go."

***

It had only been an hour since we left and I was already missing my sister. It's not that we'd never been apart for longer but I always knew I would return to her at the end of the day.

Leaving her in someone else's care for more than a day worried me. Even though I knew it was the safest option for her I couldn't help but think that no one would know how to take care of her as well as I did.

They didn't know her well enough.

I could still feel the warmth of our goodbye hug as I looked out the car window at the scenery of the road.

Next to me, Almec had his eyes closed but kept tapping his right hand against his knee. Every now and then, he would open one eye to watch the driver and look where we were.

"How much longer until we get there?" I asked to get Almec's attention.

I wanted to talk about anything to calm him down, but without asking him directly what was bothering him so that the driver who came to pick us up from Moon Guardians Pack wouldn't hear us.

"We're almost halfway there," the driver replied. "Now we're going to make a stop to rest."

"Is that really necessary?" Almec asked without opening his eyes. "It's not that long of a trip."

"Mr. Romeo gets sick when he travels by car. I apologize for the inconvenience."

I struggled to contain my sneer when I heard him call Romeo mister, he wasn't exaggerating when he said that in his pack he was treated like royalty for being the future beta.

It was going to be difficult to survive in Moon Guardians without offending any of the leaders.

"We're here," the driver announced, parking the car next to a gas station.

I almost shot out of the car and when I managed to get away from the driver I let out a laugh.

"Mr. Romeo, that sounds ridiculous," Almec said, standing next to me. "I'd recommend you calm down because they're coming."

"And you take off your disgusted expression," I answered, patting him on the back.

"What for? They already know I hate them."

"At least try to be civil while we're in their pack." I stopped in front of Almec and stood on my tiptoes to fix his hair.

"That's what you're here for. I thought it was clear that you're the nice one in the relationship."

"You can't always hide behind me," I joked.

My promise to stay away from Almec until he talked to his lycan was forgotten as soon as I saw the beautiful smile on his face.

"I can always try." Almec kissed my forehead.

"What a cute couple you two are," Romeo said, almost shouting, standing next to us. He put his hands on our shoulders, forcing us apart. "Don't leave me out, I get lonely."

"For someone who gets sick riding in a car, you look great," Almec said, grabbing the hand Romeo had on my shoulder.

"Thanks, I always look good." Romeo broke free and pointed at his companions who had already settled themselves at a camping table behind us. "Why don't we go get something to eat? We need to replenish our energy."

"I'd rather stay here away from you," Almec said, standing between me and Romeo.

"And what about your partner?" Romeo asked.

"My wife." Almec sounded menacing, causing Romeo to take a step back.

"Your partner, your wife, it's the same." Romeo tilted his head to look at me. "Don't you want to come eat or have something to drink? Expeditions can sometimes be dangerous, it's better to have all the energy you can. You never know if they'll end in an accident like what happened on our last hunting trip."

The last hunting trip? When I finally understood that Romeo was talking about Ezra, Almec had already pounced on him.

It all happened in the blink of an eye. One moment Romeo was smiling, proud of his comment, and the next he was on the ground holding his nose where Almec had hit him.

"Who do you think you are?" Almec asked, approaching him. "Trash like you has no right to even mention Ezra."

Almec stepped on Romeo's leg, making him scream.

The other members of the Moon Guardians ran to defend Romeo and I understood that all our efforts were going to be ruined if I didn't stop Almec first.

"Almec, that's enough!" I yelled at him, grabbing his arm.

His red eyes locked on me as I yanked his arm to get him away from Romeo.

"Let him go," I insisted. "You're going to bring us more trouble."

Almec listened to me and stepped back just as Yaros caught up to us.

"What happened here?" he asked, helping Romeo to his feet.

"He should learn to keep his mouth shut, that's what happened," Almec replied defensively.

"We're sorry," I butted into the conversation. "Almec's reaction wasn't the best but Romeo was the first to provoke him by making jokes about Ezra's death."

"Is that true?" Yaros asked Romeo. "In that case, I apologize to you."

"You can keep your apologies to yourself," Almec said before walking away from everyone towards the road.

I ran after him, afraid that he would lose control if he was left alone.

"Calm down, you know he does this to provoke you," I told him, grabbing his hand.

Almec stopped at the side of the road and looked down at me. His eyes were still red, so dark that I expected the lycan to come out at any moment.

"Go back to the car and wait for me there," he told me, breaking free from my grip.

"I'm not going anywhere."

"Go back to the car. I don't need your help."

He was lying, we both knew that very well. If I didn't use my power to calm him down he was going to lose control once again and every time that happened the lycan's anger grew stronger.

"Stop lying to yourself." I pressed my body against his and held his face firmly. "It's more dangerous if you get away from me."

"Do you think you can solve all my problems? You're not my hero, you can rest from your role now. Go find someone else to save."

Despite his words, Almec didn't force himself away from me.

"Sometimes I feel like letting you sink alone," I confessed in a whisper, already tired of the pain caused by Almec's constant rejection.

I brought his face to mine until our lips met in a sweet and sad kiss.

I kissed him with all my strength while I transmitted my calmness with my power.

Almec didn't stay behind, responding to the kiss with passion and surrounding my waist with his arms.

He clung to me until his anger disappeared.

Little by little he let go of me and when his hands left me I almost threw myself on him once again.

"I hope you enjoyed the kiss," I told him after I recovered. "Because that was the last one unless you have the courage to speak with your lycan once and for all."