Chapter 3: Leo

The last letter had arrived at the Villa estate, the estate itself was beautiful and grandiose, hints of Spanish architecture filled the grounds. The grounds themselves contained one of the contenders, the youngest of the three, Leo de la Villa.

"Leo, you got a letter." Amara, his mother and leader of the Villa clan, walks into the kitchen waving the letter.

Looking at the letter, the tan skinned and cinnamon haired man stops frying and proceeds to walk to his mother to eventually retrieve and read the letter. He walks across the room around the marbled kitchen island, and reaches the tall figure. He grabs the letter, rips it open with a kitchen knife and reads the line "In a week, Leo de la Villa will be joining the mating candidates for Ja Kang-Dae, best of luck." He was simply perplexed, who even is this guy? Never in his life did he see or know this person. Of course there were notorious rumors, but is the guy all that?

"Mijo, you know you have to follow through with it. You know it's from the Ja Clan, you can't avoid them after all they've done for us. Especially after they helped me secure the seat for Mayor."

Walking to her son, she sighs and approaches the wide back of the male. His cinnamon hair that once cascaded down his shoulders was tied into a bun by his mother, in a sort of condescending way establishing her power over him. Once finished with the subtle display of power, she questioned the male upon what the alpha is making for dinner.

Glad to hear his mother interested in his cooking he eagerly replies with sparkling eyes, "I have been making something like tacos de papa, but to me it tends to lack more protein and acidity, so I added crab meat into the potato mix. I also plan to use cabbage drenched in lemon juice to balance the savory, as toppings I chose sourcream and the salsa I made yesterday."

She rubbed his back as he flipped yellow corn tortillas because they were the best, the white corn tortillas could never compare. These tortillas were warmed over the cast iron skillet and put in a basket to maintain their temperature and retain the texture they had off of the skillet. From then on he would stuff the tortilla, fold it in half, and fry it to a golden brown in batches of about 3-4. Mouth watering as it was, dinner was going to be good.

Just from showing interest in cooking it was interesting how this child brightened at someone's interest in his food, it was adorable. The way his eyes lit up, the genuine smile in pure enjoyment.

After finishing explaining dinner, the alpha sat at the dinner table with both mother and father. His father was actually an omega, quiet and reserved unlike his alpha wife, Amara, who loved social events and any chance to socialize would be one to look forward to. Their son was caught in the middle of both personalities, but no matter what the boy was cared for unconditionally along with his baby sister.

At least it was a courtship and not a direct marriage, making him a part of a harem to the leader of the syndicate, right? Whatever happens, happens and it happens for the reason of following orders. Might as well go with the flow after everything Kang-Dae has done for the family, without him they would be stuck as the extorted not as the extorters. Even though they are part of the "extorters", the Villa family has the duty of exporting drugs and supplying most henchmen to those in need of them. The entire connection to drugs and a whole lot of disposable loyal people made them rise even higher up into their position where they now stand, of course it was not all Kang-Dae but their own work that made them go up in rank. Now as one of the domineering families they have the chance to climb even higher, who would pass up a chance like this?

Let's hope the youngest one of the bunch will captivate the heart of the old omega leader looking for fresh meat. All the omega leader knows is that the Villa family had a son, but who even is he? Well, it's quite safe to say that it will be a pleasant surprise to the man.

Leo on the other hand, has dreamed broken figments of his beloved "true mate", it was all a blur. No recollection of what, or who this was in his dreams. Just the feeling of yearning and need for this woman, it grows immensely as the time ticks clockwise. An endless search with a likely non-existent subject trying to be tracked down, it's comical, it's from another nation, Leo's imagination that's for sure.

Either way it's pointless to even go against Kang-Dae. The man was scary as is, even scarier if no one listened to his orders. It would be a breach of loyalty and their head on a silver platter for dinner. Of course, Kang-Dae was not as ruthless as people made him to be, but he did in fact incur the ideas in the minds of many. This was a benefit to him in many ways, and this was useful to actually have his contending mates delivered without delay on the day noted. Exciting as it was, Leo was one that was neither content nor upset over the decree. All that mattered was his mother's approval and his own happiness so to speak. It wasn't that bad, but it's practically being sold off to a stranger for money and benefits.

Who would be happy being sold off to a strange man, nonetheless one who is older and has no face known to the young Leo. Leo himself was weirded out at first, but when the time came a week later he would oblige and willingly go.

That's all he wanted, abide by his mother's rules and continue to stay in stability whether or not that called for risking his own or other's life.

Family was everything, but the question now is whether or not this omega will join the family?

It doesn't matter if he took the place beside the omega as the father of their children or not all that mattered was continuing to cook.