Chapter Ten
I searched for my dad and found him with Augie and Sam on the far side of the area. Liam and I made our way over there, taking the long way to avoid walking through the crowd and getting stopped. People were still curious about Liam and enjoyed asking all kinds of inappropriate questions about him being my mate. At least they were accepting, and I’d take that over protesting any day.
Augie grinned when he saw us approaching. “I was getting ready to come check on you but thought better of it. Thanks for not making me do that and ruining my innocence.”
I laughed. “I’ve seen the covers of some of those books you read. You’re not as sweet as you portray yourself, August James. I know better.”
My dad glowered at us. “Enough. I don’t care to be present for either one of these topics. We’re going to give the pack another ten minutes to arrive and then we’ll begin. I’ll be doing all of the talking, but Taya, you need to pay attention. There is a lot you can learn today about our pack. Watch the crowd; listen not only with your ears, but your eyes.” He paused to glance around us.
“Connect with the pack and soak in their emotions,” Dad continued. “You don’t have the same connection Augie and I do, but if you’re concentrating well enough, then you’ll get the gist of those around you.”
I nodded. I could do that. It was better than getting up there and speaking to them, or so I hoped.
We moved toward the stage where Rick waited, eyes closed and body slumped. Sam purposely kicked the chair as he walked by, but Rick didn’t take the bait. He stayed still with no reaction to the move.
My heart broke for him even though I was pissed at him for holding out. Something was telling me that we were about to make a huge mistake, but there was nothing we could do about it if Rick didn’t want to be helped.
There were several rows of chairs in front of us, but they quickly filled, and pack members began pushing in closer to stand as close to the front as possible without blocking those in the chairs. When enough time had passed, my dad’s loud voice boomed over the murmurs in the crowd.
“Welcome, Pack. We thank you for showing up today, whether it’s in support of Rick or against him. We all want the same thing. Truth and safety for our family. If we can’t get the truth, then how do we know our young are safe? We don’t. Today, we will decide the punishment for Rick’s betrayal. Death or banishment.”
Voices whispered amongst the crowd as my eyes searched their faces. As I made my visual observations, I also attempted to reach the pack’s emotions as my dad had asked, but I only received flickers of feeling from random points. Nothing concrete. I had no idea who the emotions were coming from.
Realizing it was something I needed to practice in smaller settings, I gave up and went back to people-watching. I didn’t know all of the pack members well, so it was hard to decipher some of their faces, but I did my best. Eyes wide with fear of the unknown were the most prominent, followed by glaring eyes and narrowed faces. Some were confused and uncertain, while others were stoic, giving nothing away.
My dad turned to Rick, whose eyes were now open, but he was still not looking up. “I’ll ask one last time, what were you doing with the sensors when Sam found you?”
I held my breath, waiting for an answer that never came.
“Do you understand that this is your last chance to plead your case with the pack, Rick?” Dad asked. “By refusing to answer, you’re giving us no choice but to believe you’ve been helping Declan.”
Rick didn’t budge a muscle. I glanced back at the crowd and everything had shifted. Those who had been confused now joined the angry ones, while those who had been in fear turned to acceptance.
Rick finally glanced up and met my dad’s fierce eyes. “Do what you have to do.”
I flinched. My first reaction was to smack him upside his head, but I held back. Liam tightened his grip on my hand, expecting the reaction from me as well. I held back my grin, loving how well he knew me.
Sam growled. “Just finish this, Gerald. We need to move on. He’s cost our pack enough.”
Murmurs of agreement ran through the pack and my heart shattered, because I still didn’t believe killing him was the right thing.
My dad brought his attention back to the crowd. “As you can see, Rick is refusing to work with us, and typically, these actions would bring someone death, but there is more at play here than any of us realize. Rick will–”
Before he could finish his sentence, a scream rang out across the field. A woman staggered toward us, barely able to keep herself upright. Her hysterics captured everyone’s attention. I made a move to go toward her, but Liam held up his hand.
“Would you mind if Augie and I checked her out?” he asked. “It would make me feel a lot better to do something other than stand here.”
I nodded as I pushed him forward. Sam joined them as I stayed with my dad next to Rick. Everyone behind us stayed silent, everyone wishing to hear what was happening just as much as us.
What I didn’t expect was the reaction from Rick. When the screams from the woman finally processed with him, he began bucking in his chair, trying to break free. What the shit?
I placed a hand on his shoulder. “Calm down. You’re not helping anything right now.”
“She needs me,” he pleaded.
I glanced at my dad in confusion, wondering how the hell Rick even knew her just by hearing her call for help.
“Relax. We will help her and sort out whatever is happening,” my dad said.
Rick stopped struggling, but his body was rigid and far from calm. The guys made it back with the woman. She had dry, cracked blood on her face and arms as if she’d been badly beaten.
Even with her weakened state, she fought to get out of Augie’s grasp. When he finally set her down, she rushed for Rick, wrapping her weeping body around him.
“Please, don’t kill him,” she begged.
I sighed, feeling resigned. I couldn’t even pretend to be surprised anymore. There was so much fuckery happening around us at every turn.
“Who are you?” Augie demanded.
“My name is Elena. I’m from a small outlying pack further north.” Her voice shook as she answered, but she didn’t shy away.
“What happened to you?” I asked.
She glanced around the area, taking in the rather large audience. “My pack was attacked by Declan. They thought I was dead, but I held on until they left. As soon as it was safe to do so, I made my way here.”
My dad addressed the mass behind us. “We’re going to figure out what happened to this woman’s family and, once we do, we will update the pack. Please, respect our need to discuss this privately. We will send news as soon as we can.”
An uproar came from several sections of the group. There would be no settling them until we had more information, so we left the stage as quickly as possible. I held on to Liam as we headed back toward the pack house. Augie held the woman, Elena, again while my dad and Sam followed behind with Rick.
When we got into the office, I went to the attached bathroom and got a warm hand towel to give Elena. I considered getting her clothes from my house, too, but I didn’t want to miss any of whatever she had to say.
I handed her the washcloth and moved to stand next to Liam by the desk. I glanced around the room, noticing Sam was no longer with us, which didn’t surprise me. He’d never sat in on important meetings before, and I had a feeling we really shouldn’t let everything that was about to be said in the room leave it.
“Elena,” Dad said calmly. “Why were you screaming when you came out of the woods?”
Her eyes flicked to Rick before answering. “I saw Rick tied to the chair and knew something was wrong. I didn’t want to be too late to stop what was happening. Whatever you think he did, it’s not true.”
I watched Rick, gauging his reaction. He shook his head as if he was exasperated with her, but at the same time, he held a smile I hadn’t seen on him since before Cord and Davis had passed. I had assumed their deaths were the only reasons for his change in mood, but maybe this woman had something to do with it, too.
“How would you know that?” Augie asked.
“Because he’s been protecting me for as long as he was able, and I love him. His heart is pure.”
I wasn’t surprised by her words. Her earlier screams for Rick had told me they had feelings for each other, but I was curious as to the ‘how’ of it all. I had never seen this woman before in my life, but she was someone Rick had managed to have a relationship with without anyone else knowing.
Dad turned to Rick. “Are you ready to tell us the truth now?”
Rick nodded as Liam cut the ties from his hands.
Elena ran into his arms as soon as he was free to catch her. Their embrace was full of passion and comfort.
Rick kept her at his side. “I went on a run for Cord right before he was killed. When I was out, I came across Elena on the side of the road. She had a black eye and her clothes were ripped. I didn’t even know she was a shifter until she was in the truck with me. I just knew she needed help.”
Elena smiled brightly up at him. “He saved me.”
Rick shook his head. “I tried to save her. Her pack was in trouble. They had gotten into some debt. Her father was in way over his head with another alpha from the Rocky Mountains. The alpha offered him a way out. Her dad could walk away without paying a dime of his debt if he gave his only daughter over to be the alpha’s mate. When she refused, the alpha beat her, which is when I found her.
“I took her back to her pack, because I knew I couldn’t bring that kind of drama to our pack without someone’s permission. The first person I saw was Cord when I got back. I told him about her and the situation, and he promised to help. We made a plan to get Elena, and Cord was supposed to talk with Gerald and Davis about it the next day, but Rafe showed up and changed everything.”
I took a step forward. “Why wouldn’t you have told us still? If her pack was in trouble and in our territory, it’s our responsibility to protect them.”
I was angry. Rick’s poor decision-making had gotten people killed. I wanted to throttle him, but I held back in hopes that somehow this story got better.
Elena glared back at me, clearly not liking the irritation in my voice. “I asked him not to. I told him his pack needed to come first and if they could stop Declan, then maybe things would get better for me. I’ll admit I made a poor choice, but Rick did nothing wrong. He was only doing his best to respect my wishes.”
She was equally upset, and I couldn’t blame her. If people I didn’t know were trying to kill Liam for something I knew he didn’t do, I’d be fighting tooth and nail to save him. Elena was handling everything quite well by comparison.
“So, what were you doing with the sensors?” my dad asked Rick.
“I had been with Elena when they were installed. I didn’t know what they were, but when I saw we had triggered them, I sent her away and tried to cover our tracks in case there was any video or listening ability that might have told anyone she’d been here. By the time I realized it was just a motion sensor, Sam had found me.”
“I don’t understand why you wouldn’t tell us when it came down to it.” I huffed. “You were going to die for this secret when you had to have known we would help you. It doesn’t make any sense.”
I began fidgeting so much from my frustration that Liam settled his hand on my shoulder to calm me. I smiled my appreciation at him, but I still wasn’t okay on the inside. Rick was a valued member of our pack, and I was pissed he hadn’t trusted us.
“I’m sorry, Taya,” he said. “I’ve claimed Elena as my mate and there was no way I could break her trust. Not even for my own life. She was convinced she had a handle on things for the time being. The other alpha was busy helping Declan and that would buy us some more time. Her parents were doing everything in their power to find a way to pay their debt and get out of the situation.”
I took a seat, unable to argue with him. Now that I had a mate, I knew it made you do irrational things. I knew there was nothing I could say or ask that would make sense of what Rick did, because in his head, he was doing the right thing for his mate. To him, nothing else mattered.
Liam stood behind me and rubbed my shoulders as we continued to listen to the conversation. I let Augie and my dad take over, while gladly becoming a bystander.
Augie brought his attention to Elena. “What happened today at your pack?”
“Hayden, that’s the alpha I was supposed to mate. He showed up with some of Declan’s men and said they needed to take over our area to be closer to your pack. They’re planning something, but we didn’t learn what. When my parents refused to be a part of it, the ones who attacked us didn’t blink an eye. They shot them dead, captured several others in our pack, and beat me within an inch of death. I came here to warn you, but saw Rick, and well, you know what happened next.”
Declan was coming for us again, but we wouldn’t have the witches to give us a heads-up this time. Not only were we unprepared for an attack right at that moment, but we still had a traitor in our pack and no clue who it might be.