Chapter 3 First encounter

I woke up early to inspect one of my smaller offices in the city. Even though I didn't have to check everything, I liked it. After all, no one will do a better job than yourself, and being the perfectionist that I am, I knew that better than anyone. After that, my day was jumping from a meeting to another.

I took a shower to freshen myself up for the day, picked one of the classy office-worth black dresses, and slipped into my black stilettos with a small purse on my shoulder and my laptop in hand. I skipped breakfast and told my driver, Simon, there is no need to drive me today.

After a brief trip, I arrived at the office to start the inspection on the site and make sure no problems have occurred. After entering the building, I headed straight to the office manager, Liam, to give me the data, and then to the programming floor to look at the code. His office was on the 30th floor, and I didn't feel like taking the public elevator as I knew it would stop at every floor, so I dodged that one and went to the private elevator. I stepped out of the lift and went to Liam's assistant office.

"Good morning Maya, how is your day starting?" I asked while smiling, in a good mood.

"Good morning Miss Murik, excellent, how about yours?" she replied politely.

"Pretty good, but we'll see what happens later. Is Liam in yet?" I asked Maya, hoping he won't keep me waiting.

"Yes, he is in the office," she replied, rising from her desk to announce my arrival to him.

"No need, I'll let him know I'm here," I said, signaling her to retake her seat, as I didn't need a ceremony to walk into an office.

She gave me a slight nod in understanding, and I went to Liam's office straight away.

"Who is your favorite boss?" I asked while throwing the door open and entering his office.

"You are my only boss," Liam replied with an arrogant smirk.

"True, despite that, after weeks of nagging from you, today I will meet with the new CEO at Maplebite group. That being said, if I see anything wrong here, it's off with your head," I stated, taking a seat on the couch in his office.

"Thank you," he replied with a bright smile on his face.

"Don't thank me too soon; he can still mess up, you know? I agreed with the meeting but can't say if we'll do any business together," I said in a severe tone.

"I know, but I did my part; the rest is up to him," he stated, now leaning on the chair.

After that, he started briefing me on the progress we made with the new game, and we checked the code. Finally, feeling satisfied with everything, I said my farewell and left for my company's headquarters.

After I exited the building, I headed straight for the parking lot. However, as soon as I got to my car, I saw a j***s blocked my way out. I hung my head in annoyance and went straight to the car that was blocking my path. To my surprise, no driver was in sight. I blinked a few times, not wanting to believe the idiot had left the car there, and went on with his day when a tall man approached me. I looked him over; he was tall with a nicely built body, thick black hair combed perfectly, and he was wearing a custom-made suit. When he looked at me, he had the most piercing deep sea-blue eyes, and I felt mesmerized at the sight of him. The aura he was giving felt like he was on top of the world, sending shivers down my spine. He looked like a perfectly sculpted Greek statue, as there was not one flaw on his porcelain face. At the sight of him, a sudden feeling grew in me. Similarly, I could feel my wolf Rhea getting excited as she whimpered and was now pouncing to let her out.

"Rhea, what's wrong?" I asked my wolf while struggling to contain her.

"MATE," Rhea shouted and made me freeze in my tracks

"Are you sure?" I asked, confused and uncertain. I have long lost hope the Moon Goddess would give me a mate or at least reunite me with the one I hoped is going to be my mate, my first love, and the person I promised to wait until we grow up as the Moon Goddess will bestow upon us to be mates.

"YES" Rhea screamed in my head again, making me dizzy

"Is that your car?" the man asked.

I had to take a couple of breaths and negotiate with Rhea to calm down. Even if the guy was our mate, at least for now, I couldn't do anything. The pungent wolf's scent coming from him made me very wary, and I had to tread lightly; she agreed but as soon as she did and I found my voice again, anger took over me. That was the j**k who was blocking my car.

"Yeah, mind moving, yours? If you didn't know, this is not a parking spot. You need to be aware of other humans that may need to leave," I snapped, gritting my teeth at him.

"I knew I'd come back in 2 minutes, so I saw no reason to leave it here," he answered in a low, unfazed tone.

"Regardless of how much you plan on leaving it here, you're not the only one using this parking lot, inconveniencing people at your leisure shows just how ill-mannered you are, now move that car, or I'll tow it for you," I replied in a harsh tone with my eyes going dark from anger.

He waved me away like I was nothing and entered his car to move it. Shock and anger grew inside me as I snapped a picture of his plates. I'll find out who he was later.

I got in my car and sped to the office; gee, traffic was more of a pain than usual. Because of the President's repair on the road, everyone had to go on only one side, making it slower than the regular busy traffic. Thankfully, they'll finish it by the end of the week, and we'll go back to normal.

As I got to my office, Lisa, my assistant, handed me a cold brew, and she went about what I had planned today. First was the oh-so-requested meeting with Maplebite group's CEO that Liam has nagged me.

The group was the second largest in the realm, and the conglomerate held a prominent place globally. While the world knew them for many things, the most important thing that made them known was their many hotels worldwide. I thought of landing a business deal with them in the past, but since the late CEO was high on prejudice and hell-bent on old ways with no room for discussion for modernization and technology, I just thought it would be too much of a hassle. My business focused on the future with everything high-tech and modern; hence, his conservative thinking didn't appeal to me.

But the real reason I didn't want to do business with them was a secret to the rest of the world and painful truth to me. Despite the group's name change, Alpha Arawn Loke was the one who took over the Alpha position of the Crimson Moon pack after my parent's demise, and I suspected him of being the one behind it.

Usually, the role of Alpha with the current Alpha dying would be next of kin. Still, as I was an only child and presumed dead, it would go to the Beta, who was my father's best friend, and I knew that if he would've been Alpha, I could've gone to the pack and assumed my role without fear. Something I learned a couple of years ago while looking into this. After uncle Erik, my father's best friend, and Beta had to assume my father's role pushed by the elders and hierarchy, he didn't even wrap his head around his best friend's death and grieved in peace that Arawn Loke has challenged him for the title. Destroyed by grief and overwhelmed by the events, he lost the fight and died in the battle. Therefore, Arawn became the leader.

While I still did not want to do business with them, seeing how his son took over, I thought I would be safe if I only concerned myself with the company and never met Alpha Arawn. Even more so, maybe I can dig up some more details on my parent's murder.

After entering the meeting room, Lisa told me the new CEO was stuck in traffic and late. I felt annoyed at the news, and any other day, I would have canceled the meeting in the blink of an eye as I held pride in punctuality. If you didn't bother to show on time, you most likely had other things to do, and this wasn't as important; however, as I got stuck in traffic, earlier it made me lenient, and I didn't hold it against him. It was a rough day to drive.

While waiting, I caught up on some emails and approvals I needed to oversee. Not long into the emails, my laptop chimed to tell me it's running out of battery. Right, I forgot to charge it and used it in the other building as well. I was about to grab the charger when I noticed Lisa's charger plugged in already. After connecting my laptop to it, I sat in her seat, as I didn't feel like dragging the cable towards mine.

About 15 minutes later, a tall man walked into the meeting room, following Lisa. Then the sweetest scent hit me. It smelled warm and deep, like a good old whiskey with a tint of vanilla spiced with tobacco and leather. It was giving me goosebumps, and my wolf started going crazy again. After I looked up, tracing where the source was, that's when I saw him. The same guy who waved me away and couldn't care less that he did something wrong. Once more, it drew me to him, and I had to negotiate with Rhea. What was up with her? She is usually calm and indifferent to people, even though she set off 0-300 in the blink of an eye with the same temper I had.

"Oh, so the President is late as well. I worried I'd made her wait," he said, facing Lisa, who now had a puzzled look on her face.