Born One Minute Too Late, But I Was the True Alpha Chapter 10

Born One Minute Too Late, But I Was the True Alpha Chapter 10

One year later, I graduated first from North Coast Advanced Academy.

My name was called once

No correction followed.

No one replaced it with my brother’s.

I walked across the stage in a black graduation gown with ink stains on two fingers.

My friends shouted from the audience.

After graduation, Nightglass Tattoo moved into a larger building.

The first floor held six tattoo stations.

The second became a training room for young female wolves whose Packs did not believe they should fight.

I taught them how to hold their ground.

I also taught them how to keep bank accounts in their own names.

Strength meant little if someone else controlled where you slept, what you ate, and whether your work

belonged to you.

A watchmaker in the city repaired my mother’s watch.

The crack across the face could not be removed.

I asked him to leave it.

The broken line reminded me that repair was not the same as pretending nothing had happened.

Declan wrote every month.

He told me he had returned to training.

He told me the Pack council had delayed the succession.

He told me he was learning to read his own maps.

I read the letters.

I did not answer.

Father sent formal invitations.

He offered me the Alpha title three more times.

I returned each envelope unopened.

Lenora no longer lived in the Pack House. Brielle had transferred out of Westbridge after losing the award. I

heard that she still claimed Lhad destroyed the family because I could not forgive one mistake.

It had never been one mistake.

It had been dinner after dinner.

Ranking after ranking.

Room after room.

Every time they looked at me and decided I could survive receiving less.

On the first anniversary of my departure, I opened Nightglass before sunrise.

Snow covered the street.

My mother’s watch rested beside the appointment book.

Outside, three students waited for the women’s training program. Two clients stood behind them, talking

about the tattoos they wanted.

People who knew me by my own name.

People who had never asked me to become smaller so someone else could feel important.

I unlocked the door.

Warm air moved into the cold street.

I had been born one minute after Declan.

But that minute was not why I lost my childhood, my work, or my place at the family table.

I lost those things because I had been born into a family that never truly loved me.

For eighteen years, I waited for them to become fair.

I did not wait anymore.

I had my shop.

My strength.

My name.

My life.

And every part of it belonged to me.