Chapter 15

Anila POV

The growling of my stomach stopped my words from escaping my lips. My cheeks flushed right away, and I held onto my stomach, attempting to silence it.

“Sorry,” I murmured, embarrassed by the intrusive sound.

Penny stood to her feet, laughing.

“For what? Being hungry?” She asked, glancing at her phone.

“Dinner will be served soon. Let’s go to the dining hall, and we can continue this conversation after” she said, motioning for us to follow her.

I was grateful for the momentary distraction and subject change.

I hadn’t even realized an hour had passed since I was trapped in the elevator with Zach. The memory caused my body to become incredibly hot. I swallowed the lump that formed in my throat and stood with everyone else.

Penny draped an arm through mine.

“We are in this together, Anila,” she assured me. “Stick with us and you’ll never be alone.”

I smiled, it was a nice thought having a group of girls that I could depend on and even consider my friends. I never had friends before, and I never felt like I truly had anybody in my corner. When I wasn’t at work, I drowned myself in chores around the house. When I wasn’t doing chores or working, I was locked away in my room. Either by choice… or not.

I spent most of my life being alone and I loved that I didn’t have to do that anymore.

Between my roommate, her friends, and Xaden, I had enough people to soothe the internal damage my stepmother had done.

This was exactly what I needed.

The community living room was starting to flood with other students; some of them I could tell were new because they were eagerly looking around and touching things. Other I could tell have been here for a while and were watching all the new faces with disdained looks.

I noticed a couple of them giving me a specific look that gave me a chill down my spine. From Penny’s main impression of me, I could tell that I’ve been spoken about. If Penny and her friends witnessed my first arrival, I’m sure others did too.

I ignored the wandering looks though and went with the girls into the elevator.

Once we got to the lounge of the dormitory castle, my mouth hung open by how many other people were wandering around. This whole area was brought to life as soon as classes ended.

“They call this area the student lounge,” Penny explained over her shoulder as we shoved our way through the crowd and made it outside where I finally felt like I could breathe.

The girls all bantered and chatted as we walked towards the large glass building in the middle of the campus that I knew was the dining hall.

Even Sage partook in some inappropriate jokes. Most of them contained Xaden, Zach, and Harley. It was obvious these girls found my mates attractive and for some reason, I felt a surge of anger in the pit of my stomach.

I wasn’t sure where it came from; it took me by surprise. But I ignored it as we reached the dining hall.

I could already smell the food before we reached it.

I could tell right away that Penny was outgoing. She made friends easily and she wasn’t afraid to talk to strangers. She said hi to almost everybody we passed. She even paused to make small talk with a few people, and it took Sally to pull her away and direct her to the food.

“We are hungry,” Sally complained. “Enough with the chatter.”

“Sorry if I want to branch out and mark my territory,” Penny said shrugging. But then she gave me a playful wink telling me she was only pulling Sally’s strings.

Sally just rolled her eyes.

We made our way into the closed kitchen where the scent of the most incredible food invaded my nose and made my mouth practically water. Decadent foods, prepared by five-star chefs by the look of it.

I mean, I’m no expert but I know a cook who loves to cook, and these people are it.

And the variety made me want to choke. Filet mignon and 16 oz steaks, prepared in all different ways. There were sausages, burgers, hot dogs, pizza, and pasta, including ravioli, with different types of sauces, salads, fruits and veggies. There were different types of soups and sandwiches as well.

I’ve never seen sushi before in my life, but there it was. Delicately wrapped in rice and seaweed and filled with so many colorful innards, I couldn’t even begin to guess what was in it. They were being prepared on the spot by a separate sushi chef and neatly placed in the lit-up glass case.

Next to the sushi was a ramen station with a ton of different options to put into the ramen.

On the far side of the kitchen was an entire smooth bar!

In the center of the kitchen was a large lit-up open-air cooler with an assortment of snacks like different cheeses, yogurts and parfaits, premade sandwiches, hardboiled eggs, and premade salads.

There was a separate large fridge with a see-through glass door with a ton of bottled beverages and a fountain machine.

My mouth hung open at the sight of it all.

“Holy hell,” I whispered, staring at my surroundings. “This place is huge.”

“The kitchen staff works really hard,” Penny said, looking around as well. “They change it all over for breakfast at 8 pm and then again for lunch.”

“That’s amazing,” I breathed.

I watched as the other girls grabbed trays at the front of the kitchen and I followed their lead, walking toward the buffet of food.

Penny grabbed two large slices of pizza, cheese trailing behind as a Suo-chef cut the thread and Penny whisked further down the line, filling a bowl of chili.

I also grabbed two pieces of pizza. As I whisked by the sushi, I shrugged and grabbed two pieces of Spicy Shrimp.

Once we all got our food, we left the kitchen and went into the dining hall where students quickly found places to sit with their food. Penny walked toward the tables, navigating the crowd easily as I struggled to keep up with her, and sat down next to the twins, who were demolishing plates of pasta. Sadie had a mound of spaghetti, while Sally had Alfredo.

I sat off to the side. Far enough away to not invade space, but not so far as to be excluded, either. Sage sat down next, plate stacked with pan-fried noodles and a bowl of steaming ramen. Followed by Becca, who decided on a massive steak and a loaded baked potato.

As we ate, Sally looked up from her food and leaned across the table toward me.

“Okay, so spill,” she finally said, keeping her tone low. “What’s the deal with the Alphas?”

My face flushed from her questions; I was hoping they would have forgotten.

I swallowed the pizza that was in my mouth and wiped my lips on the napkin before answering.

“Xaden came to my town with the recruitment team, and he brought me here,” I said, shrugging. “I ran into the others when I got here.”

“We saw you run into the others,” Penny said chuckling. “It looked intense. We saw Damien take his wand back and then the others started to fight. We weren’t sure what started the fight.”

“We were the ones who got the principle,” Sadie admitted.

“You saw the whole thing?” I asked, stunned.

They all looked at one another.

“Yes,” Penny answered. “As did other students. This place is a huge rumor mill, so rumors had already spread.”

I sank further into my seat.

That was the last thing I needed to hear. I just wanted to blend in but that seemed to be impossible around here.

I put a piece of sushi in my mouth; I was surprised by how delicious it was, even with the seaweed, which I never imagined ever eating before. I thought about the seaweed at the beach and winced at the thought of putting something like that in my mouth.

But this was delicious.

“So, what were they fighting about?” Sage asked the question everyone was wondering.

I wasn’t sure how much I should tell them; do I tell them they were all my mates, and they were fighting over me? Or do I lie and say something else?

There was something inside of me that was telling me to keep quiet about the situation.

“I bet I have a guess,” Sally purred as her eyes narrowed at me.

My face warmed immediately. Did she already know?”

“What? I asked, staring back at her.

“When you grabbed the wand and went to search Damien, Xaden was holding your hand,” Sally said, making all the girls nod their heads.

My heart stopped in my chest. I can’t believe they saw that; which meant others did too.

“Xaden is the biggest, meanest, hottie around here. Like, cold and ruthless kind of mean. He’s very domineering. He used to be involved with quick flings with girls who would beg him to continue the relationship, but he always said no. I had never seen him look so smitten before until you came along,” Penny explained.

I blinked, dumbfounded. That didn’t sound like the Xaden I knew at all. To me, he was kind and caring. Not to mention helpful and protective.

“Yeah, he was actually smiling,” Sage added, furrowing her brows together.

“And if you were holding hands with Xaden, that means Zach is going to go after you and want you for himself,” Sally said, shaking her head. “Those two are always competing. They are both Alpha’s despite Zach being his younger brother.”

“How do you know all of this?” I asked, peering around at them. “Didn’t you girls just get here today?”

“Yeah, but we weren’t sheltered from this world like you were. We grew up with all this knowledge. Around here, the Gresham brothers are practically famous. The Gresham pack is the largest pack in the world and soon, Xaden is going to take over completely. He’s already basically in charge but his father wants him to finish school first,” Penny explained, shrugging.

Before I could stop the words from pooling out of my mouth, I blurted, “Xaden is my mate.”