Alphy's Challenge (16 page)

Gale wrapped her arms around
Alphy’s
neck and buried her face. The adrenaline played havoc
on her emotions. She cried softly into his shoulder as she curled into a ball
in her mate’s arms. She didn’t pay any attention to the commotion that took
place around her.

****

Alphy nearly lost control over his bear when
they drove near and saw the commotion. Adrenaline rushed through his body,
pushed hard by his racing heart. His eyes immediately found his mate, a look of
horror and shock replacing the happy glow she’d had when he last saw her. Alphy
usually prided himself on his self-restraint, but at that moment, he couldn’t
think of anything else but getting her safe in his arms. He’d deal with
everything else after that.

He jumped out before the truck came to a
complete stop. He continued the momentum to launch forward across the road to
his mate but stopped cold when she threw her arms over her suddenly ashen face.
The scent of fear slammed into him at the same time she tripped. The fear was
to be expected when something this traumatic happened, but he could tell this
was directed at him.

Alphy
took a quick moment to fill his lungs with
air, calming himself before he carefully walked over to her. His bear was
pissed at him for scaring their beloved, and it roared at him in his head and
paced. The scent of blood from the soon-to-be dead hired brutes wasn’t helping.

He squatted down and wrapped his arms around
her sobbing form. Her weight was nothing to his shifter strength. He lifted her
easily, but he still went slowly and carefully. He buried his nose in her neck
and inhaled her unique aroma. His bear began to settle as he sat down in the
cab of the truck and situated her on his lap. He then wrapped his arms around
her and rubbed her back with one hand while he used the other to lightly press
her head into the crook of his neck.

“
Shh
, it’s going to
be all right. You’re all right now. Your mom is all right. Havana is all right,
and everything is going to be all right.” He kept speaking words of comfort to
her and kissing her temple until her sobs finally started to subside.

He watched as the men were quickly tied up together,
then picked up and thrown into the back of his truck. The truck shook, and the
sound vibrated through the cab with a loud banging. Gale jumped violently and
shrieked. Alphy was afraid if he growled at his men it would scare her further,
so he gave the men a deadly glare, which they read loud and clear. Slate and
Kace
jumped in the back with the prisoners, and Matteo
jogged over to the new vehicle.

Betty jumped into Gale’s car with Connie and
Havana. She steered the car back onto the road and pointed it towards home.
Enzo jumped back into the driver’s seat and made a U-turn. Both vehicles easily
caught up and followed behind Betty.

Chapter Eleven

Gale was completely silent as she held her
arms tight around Alphy on the short trip home. With the cell still open and on
speaker between them, Alphy kept his voice low as he gave orders to Slate and
Kace
to take the men out to the barn and watch them. Then he
addressed Ryker, ordering him to bring in Nix to help “interrogate” their new
prisoners and get word to Tom and Seamus to head straight home once they had
the new vehicles.

Enzo didn’t drive home like he had been just
moments before. He drove carefully over the ruts and dips until they finally
reached the front of the house. As soon as they parked, Alphy carried his mate
up the stairs and into their room. After placing her on the bed he wiped her
tears away. “I have some things to take care of. Stay in here until I return.”
Tucking a blanket around her, he leaned over and placed a tender kiss on the
top of her head. Letting out a heavy sigh, he turned and walked out of the room.

Alphy’s
insides were threatening to shake in shock. He
had almost lost her today, and his sister. Alphy didn’t know how to deal with
this situation. He knew his sister was probably the instigator behind
convincing them they were following orders, and in a normal pack or sleuth,
that would easily be true. But it wasn’t. This was a mixed paranormal pack with
humans. Humans were by no means inferior in most respects, but in physical
strength, they were. Gale was his mate, and as an alpha mate she was a bigger
target and more vulnerable because she was human. He needed to send a
statement. He would also bear some of that responsibility, because he should
have been slightly more specific.

The steps only lightly squeaked as he
descended the stairs. He went in search of Ryker, who was predictably in his
room. “Ryker, Alpha David on the phone.”

Ryker quickly dialed the number and handed it
to Alphy. Alphy paced the small space as the phone rang. On the fifth ring, it
went to voicemail. Alphy scoffed at the cowardice of the guy.

“Hello, coward, I hereby challenge you. You
have twenty-four hours to arrange a meet in a neutral place. If you don’t
choose a place by that time, I get to choose by default. If by forty-eight
hours you don’t answer, you’d better be already dead because I’m coming for you
and there isn’t anything the council can do. You attacked my mate, her mother,
and my sister. That isn’t retribution. That’s outright war. It is eleven forty-five.
Twenty-four hours starts now.”

After he pushed end, he handed the phone back
to Ryker then turned around. Enzo stood in the doorway leaning against the
frame.

“What do you want done with those idiots in
the barn? The two biggest ones are human.”

Alphy let out a heavy sigh, he wasn’t about
to let them go. “David probably thought using them would prevent anything from
being linked back to him, if it wasn’t for his other lackeys going along with
them. But that does pose an issue. He’s possibly exposed shifters to them, so
we can’t let them go. As for the shifter, that’s the second attempt. He was
given a warning. I’ll take him a little ways from the clearing and complete my retribution.”
Enzo only grunted his acknowledgement, but Ryker looked a bit uncomfortable. They
knew the retribution was the shifter’s life forfeited. Alphy looked at the pale
vampire. “Ryker, what did you find out about the council?”

Ryker seemed to have perked up with the
subject change. “
It’s
run pretty much the way it is in
the States, only friendlier.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “I looked into the
covens, too. There aren’t as many up here in Canada as the States, and it looks
like the one in Toronto is the closest. And here’s an interesting tidbit,
there’s a gargoyle clutch staying with them. They are partnered with the coven
since they are a pretty small clutch and none of them are mated.”

“That’s a lot of faith put in to the local
coven, so that’s good to know.
Kace
wants to spread
the word he needs workers. Maybe you could let them know.”

“Already done.”

Enzo eyed Ryker. “Hey,
Rye,
got anything that can’t be put off ‘til later?”

“No, why?”

“You look a little hungry.” He gave the
little vamp a heated look, and Alphy suddenly got blasted with the scent of
lust on both sides.

“On that note, goodnight,
Enzo.”
Enzo gave a nod as
he passed but didn’t take his eyes off the other man as Alphy slipped past and
disappeared around the corner.

Alphy made his way to the kitchen, where
Betty had both Connie and Havana helping prepare lunch. They had a very large
pile of sandwiches next to a large bowl of grapes and another filled with
chips.

“Hey, Betty, I’m going to be just a little
bit. Could you keep an ear out for Gale for me?”

She didn’t look up right away as she was
cutting some tomatoes, but Alphy could feel the subdued tension in the room.
“Sure, I was going to have these taken out to the barn. How many do I bring?”
Her knife dripped tomato juices as she pointed it at the stack of sandwiches.

Alphy understood what she really meant. She wanted
to know if she needed to provide something to eat for the prisoners. “Only two
extras will do, and you might want to wait thirty minutes or so.”

She glanced up briefly and lightly tilted her
head.
“Yes, alpha.”

Alphy looked at the other two, who looked
like he was about to reach out and strike them. “I’ll dole out your punishments
at a later time. Connie, have Tom meet me out in the barn when he gets back.
Tell him if I’m not there, to wait for me.”

“Yes, alpha.”
Her voice was very quiet, and she didn’t
look up at him. He could smell the nerves rolling off both girls.

“Betty, can you give me directions to a shack
that needs to be burned down?”

She nodded, wiped her hands on her apron, and
grabbed a paper pad and pen. She wrote down some directions with landmarks and
explained how to get there. Alphy nodded and thanked her then headed outside
towards the barn.

He couldn’t enjoy the warm sweetened breeze
or the beautiful sounds of happily chirping birds. Even though he could take
someone’s life quickly and even without hesitancy, he still hated it. He kept
thinking of what he saw when they had arrived on the scene. His bear was a
little bloodthirsty, but his gut slightly churned at knowing a life would be
taken without mercy in the next few minutes. It took the beauty out of an
otherwise perfectly beautiful day.

He stepped into the barn and focused on the bloodied
group tied together on the floor with four of his men surrounding them. He let
his cold side be felt as he approached. He knew it showed on his face and in
his walk, as well as in his scent. Even though the two humans couldn’t smell
him, the enforcer did. Even
his own
enforcers and
trackers backed up a few feet.

He looked down coldly at the shifter, whom he
recognized as the first one he’d met the other day. He looked up at his men.
“Nix, keep close and your eye in the sky.”

Nix, who was only wearing a pair of jeans,
nodded, turned on his heel and exited the barn. Moments later,
Alphy’s
shifter hearing picked up the sounds of flapping
wings. He turned to his other three. “One of you needs to stay here while I
need two of you to untie the small one and follow me.”

“No! Please! I’ll do anything, please don’t!”
the guilty shifter begged.

Alphy turned back to him. “You were warned, and
now I have my right to retribution.” He really hated when they begged. It always
pulled at his heart that maybe, just maybe, they were good people but were being
forced to do something bad or that they may just actually be sorry. Alphy hardened
his resolve by reminding himself of the mumbled response he’d heard when he
first met the shifter. The lead enforcer had said he didn’t want the family in
his territory, that they weren’t worth the trouble, and this one had mumbled “Yeah,
one of
them’s
gay.”

Alphy’s
bear growled. This one wasn’t sorry; he just
didn’t want to die.

He stood guard as Matteo and Slate untied the
ropes then re-secured the two humans.
Kace
stayed
behind with them. Alphy grabbed a few things near the entrance of the barn,
then headed out, followed by Slate and Matteo carrying the struggling and now
swearing doomed enforcer. He followed the directions and soon found a really
old gold rush style shack. More than half of its roof had fallen in from rot,
and one of the walls was totally gone, revealing the small insides of dirt,
moss, fungus, and rotting wood. Ferns were growing on the mounds of moss on the
roof and in a few of the corners, too.

He signaled for the enforcers to release the
sifter. “What is your name?” he asked.

“Fuck you! I’m not telling you shit you fag
loving prick!” the guy spat.

Alphy shrugged. The man had just made it easy
to live with his death. “Suit yourself. You took part in the attempted
kidnapping of my mate, her mother, and my sister. You were warned to stay out
of my territory, and you were told they were under my protection. I am within
my rights to take your life in retribution.”

Alphy felt the sun warm his flesh as he stripped
from his clothes. After folding them, he placed them on a nearby log then
instigated his shift. His thick brown fur broke through, covering his bare
naked skin, and his hands and feet grew in size and thick sharp black claws grew
out from their tips. The elk shifter’s eyes grew big, and he started to
struggle.
Alphy’s
bear was bigger than a normal
Kodiak bear. They usually stood about five feet tall if they were on all fours
but reached about ten feet if they stood on their hind legs. The males usually
ran close to fifteen hundred pounds, but
Alphy’s
bear
was large and powerful, the very reason the other sleuths and alphas in general
didn’t want him around. He was a whopping eighteen hundred pounds, and stood
over five and a half feet on all fours. He reared up onto his hind legs and
towered over the others at over eleven feet tall.

Slate stepped away and started to undress,
shaking out his blond and black mane after completing his shift. His lion was
pretty large and powerful but not an alpha. He stood at a small distance
standing guard so the shifter couldn’t run.