Alpha Markus
Chapter 51

Markus P.O.V.

How the f**k do people get on my property and take someone from my f*****g packhouse. Someone f****d up and I intend to replace them and make them pay. What if Celeste had been there?

I drove so fast back to the Packhouse, I was sure we would flip over during a bend in the road. Celeste was silent the whole ride home. She was just silently crying and wringing her hands, though the hand wringing was probably due to the speed.

We drove right to the Packhouse and Celeste was out of the truck with a jump before I had shut down the engine. She rushed towards Maya who ripped herself out of Danny’s arms to meet her in a hug. Maya was shaking and it looked like her legs would give out. Danny looked on helplessly. I thought he was struggling with the fact that Maya looked to Celeste for comfort and protection and not him.

‘For 12 yrs she was her protector. It’s a natural instinct to her,’ I mind linked Danny.

‘No, it’s not that. Maya was still sleeping when it happened. She had forgotten that Celeste was out of the Packhouse. I was searching in the woods when she woke up and she was going nuts trying to replace Celeste. She thought she had been taken too. She had to be restrained by two guards to stop her from shifting and trying to replace her and I couldn’t even f*****g replace Ruby while she went through all of that alone. It was all for nothing.’

‘That’s not your fault -’

“Show me,” Celeste said to Danny as she held Maya around the shoulders as they walked towards him. Maya transferred herself from Celeste to Danny and buried her face in his chest.

Danny hesitated, flicking his eyes towards me before looking back to Celeste. “I don’t think you want to see Luna. It looks worse than it likely is.”

“Show me,” was all she said and she waited for me to get to her before we followed Danny inside. I wrapped my arm around her waist and she held on to my arm as we walked to the third floor. The door was open and there were a few of our security people taking prints. I growled at the scene in front of me.

There were splashes of b***d on the floor and the broken window. You could see there had been a big struggle.

The guards all turned and bared their necks at us as both of our auras rolled off of us. “Tell me everything. How did they manage to get to the third floor of our parkhouse,” I growled.

“There’s been several crews coming in and out of the packgrounds to deliver decorations and settle the menu for the Luna Ceremony. They followed one of the approved crews in. They had the same type of van. We didn’t realize they weren’t part of the crew until the other two delivery vans left without it. We hurried to replace them but by the time we heard the staff screaming about intruders, they crashed through the windows and ran with the unconscious she-wolf over one of them.”

Atlas pushed me to the back as he pushed forward and roared. “Where’s the video? Show me.”

One of the techs came by with a tablet. He pulled up the feed. I felt Celeste get close to us as she looked at the feed. The camera feed was first of the crews coming in through the gates. The first two had clear catering signs on the side, while the third was just white. I growled as the van was stopped, they chatted shortly with the guard and then they were passed through. The feed cut to a camera on the side of the house. The two other vans were seen leaving and Kelly went over to a guard and asked about the other van. You can clearly see her asking who it belonged to, the confused look of the guard and running inside when you heard running as a little girl yelled “Help, someone’s attacking Luna’s friend!” Every guard on the outside moved inside, a few shifting on the way. The feed flipped cameras once again and you can see the back of the Packhouse. You can hear struggling and grunts, then you hear a voice screaming “Leave her alone! Millie go get help.” then you hear two yelps and a chair crashing through the double windows. One man jumps out, shifting mid way through to avoid injury. He shifts back and looks up to catch Ruby. Atlas growled and Celeste gasped. It was one of the men that Danny had photographed. The man caught an unconscious Ruby as she was dropped from the third story. The second man dropped down, b***d clear on his face and torso when he shifted. One turned into a wolf, Ruby was strapped to its back before the other shifted and they ran. Not a full minute later, you can see Danny and Gillian jumping out the window in their wolf forms to chase after them.

“Where’s the boy from the video? Is he OK?” Celeste asked. Atlas retreated at the words, letting me take back control, knowing she would not be able to deal with his anger. She had too much worry in her voice. She cared too much for everyone.

‘The guards at the gate, make sure they double their training. I will not be so lenient twice,’ He mind linked to the guard as he retreated.

“I had him taken to the Pack Doctor. He tried to fight the traffickers and he got knocked into the dressers. The Pack Doctor has linked that he will be OK. Mild concussion and a lot of anger that he got knocked out. He is Millie’s twin brother,” Danny said.

“Where’s Gillian?” I asked. Danny looked at me confused and surprised. He’d never seen Atlas give back control as quickly as he had after something like this happened. He had a habit of making himself understood that failure was not tolerated when it came to the protection of the Pack. It was probably why the guards were out of practice with proper protection procedures. No one had dared attack our pack since word had gotten around of what the last people to get into the pack had been put through. We would have to change that. The Pack would not get this close to danger again.

“He’s still out with a couple of trackers, trying to get a trace of which way they went. We were in the middle of a conference meeting with one of Alpha Rhett’s men who had found some information about the men in the pictures. I’ve been working with him on and off sharing information as we were both trying to track them a few months ago.”

“What did they replace?” I said as Celeste walked towards the window. I was itching to grab her to my side, every nerve in my body on edge that she was so close to the open window even though I knew it was irrational, I wanted her no where near any kind of danger.

“I don’t know. We didn’t get that far. I will have to get in touch with him again when this is settled” ‘I need to get Maya out of this room. I can feel her anguish,’ he added through the mind link and I nodded at him.

“Tag everything you can. Ruby fought, let’s not let it go to waste. Have Gillian come back. I need him to figure out how they knew the caterers were coming in today. This was too planned for them to have been waiting for a random opening.”

I started walking through the room to where Celeste was kneeling. I saw her touch the edge of the glass and I was suddenly pulled forward, into one of her visions.

We were in a shallow cave opening. I could see the river rushing over the edge. The sun was high in the middle of the sky. The two men were talking on the phone. While Ruby was beaten and bloody in a corner. Her hands were bound in silver shackles. She was crying. I turned to the talking men, trying to hear what they were saying.

“The b***h bit my ear off. If we’re found, we’re not going down alone. You better do something. Grab the damn Luna before they catch us so they don’t come looking for us. Give them something else to chase…..Yes, I told you. The b***h said Luna is the girl you were looking for all those years ago. The Dellarosa kid. Well f**k, I don’t know. You’re surrounded by idiots, cousin. No wonder she was right under your noses this whole time…..Look I can keep low for a while but you need to clean up this mess.”

He hung up and then turned to look at Ruby, who was crying. Her eyes went wide as she saw the glint of the silver knife that one of the men pulled out. “No, no, you said if I gave you information you would let me go. Please, I don’t want to die.”

The men chuckled, “You think I would let you leave after you bit my ear off like a rabid dog?”

Ruby closed her eyes and took a couple of deep breaths. “I’m sorry Celeste, I just wanted to live. I hope you can forgive me one day.” She looked at the men and said, “I hope they make you suffer a slow death. My only regret is not being there to watch them do it,” Then she screamed and ran at them. She didn’t get very far, he slammed the silver knife straight into her chest to the hilt. She fell to the ground, looking up at the roof of the cave, tears running down her face.

I got jerked back and I heard Celeste gasp. I looked at her and our eyes connected. Then, as if in slow motion, she jumped off the window, shifting into her wolf half way down and landing with a small huff, and off she went in the direction of the woods.