Extinguishing Wildfire
Chapter 20: Down Time

Alpha Kedrick

“Damn…so Aaliyah is the girl who rejected Jordan? That actually makes a lot of sense,” Gabriel rubbed his chin as he slowly nodded.

“That’s what Isaiah said, am I just missing something that I never even suspected it was my own sister?” I threw up my hands in frustration.

“I wouldn’t say that, I’m just saying the timing lines up for when she came home for Oren’s party, and Alphas usually mate with Alphas.” He was right, and I was just letting my frustrations get to me. I feel like I should have known the truth this whole time.

“I’m here, what’s up?” My brother barged through my office doors as I had called my Beta and Gamma in for a meeting. It had been a while since it was just the three of us, as I had included everyone else in everything. Today, though, I needed it to just be the original three.

“K was filling me in on your sister and Jordan being mates.” They both chuckled as my brother grabbed the seat next to Gabriel.

“Yeah, it’s definitely on brand for my sister. I just hate that all that happened to Jordan, he’s a good kid. At least we know he’ll take good care of our sister, right K?”

“Oh, did she take back her rejection?” Gabriel looked between me and Isaiah. We'd

“Jordan said they were working on it when they were attacked.” I rubbed my face. I hadn’t slept much since the attack, and I was starting to feel the exhaustion. We had visited all of the injured warriors, most were healing well but a few guards had also been injected with silver and wolfsbane, which is how the bastards broke through our borders. Jordan had described the man who took Aaliyah, and Gema was pretty sure it was Marek’s Beta, Griffin. I saw the fear in her eyes as she talked about him, but she didn’t say more about him. I just hoped he wouldn’t touch my sister as Jordan said she was knocked out before he passed out himself.

“When can we make contact with Alpha Larkin?” Gabriel was doing a great job keeping me steady through all of this. Rainer needed more holding back than usual as he was upset about our sister being taken, so Gabriel had helped get everything cleaned up. The battle had destroyed our whole festival setup and left the entire pack upset. He had also helped with taking care of the two Wildfire warriors that we had saved. We had gotten them medical care but once they were stable, Gabriel helped get them transferred to our cells. Once they woke up, we’d question them and see if we could get any information from them.

“How are the cats doing?” Isaiah had just come from the hospital, so I asked for an update.

“Nathan, the cougar, is still not doing great. Other than me, he was closest to the bomb, so he ended up getting a lot of copper in his system. He’s healing but very slowly. His wife is beside herself, so Ellis is sitting with her right now. The others are doing better, Dr. James says they should be fine in a few days. Jordan’s flushed out the silver and wolfsbane completely and should also be good soon.”

“This is such a mess. We need to replace out how they knew about the cats.” We had kept things between just our allied wolf packs and the cats until recently.

“Do we have any idea where to start looking for the problem?”

“I hate to say it, but I think we might want to look into the Council members. They were the last people I told.”

“Damn, I’ll get with tech and see if they can dig anything up on any of them.” Gabriel was already on top of things with his suggestion.

“Thanks man, I don’t know what we’d do without you.” Gabriel and I had grown up together with Isaiah following closely behind us. He was my best friend since childhood and our fathers had been best friends, too. We were always in sync with each other. My father’s Gamma only had a daughter who ended up moving to her mate’s pack when she found him as he was an Alpha, so Isaiah was a logical choice for me when she left. The three of us ran this pack quite well if I did say so myself, and I was proud of our small team. My dad had raised this pack to its current strength, but Isaiah, Gabriel, and I helped maintain our status as one of the top packs in the country.

“Here guys, let’s have a drink.” I opened up my minibar and poured us each a drink, “We haven’t just hung out in a while. I know the timing isn’t great, but we’re all here now. How’s Maximus been doing? You have any problems with him since you discovered your mate?” I took a long swing of my whiskey as Isaiah gathered his thoughts. His wolf Maximus had been a little sad and broody since they had to leave their mate behind, which was odd as he was usually a big teddy bear of a wolf.

“He’s okay, still sad, but we know our mate will be here soon and that she’s safe where she is for now.”

“It’ll be nice having her here. I’m sure Moon Goddess will have her to you before the holidays. Maybe then we can have a few more pups running around the packhouse.”

We all chuckled as we took a drink. “Actually,” Gabriel cut in sheepishly, “That might happen sooner rather than later. I was going to wait to say anything, but now’s as good a time as I’ll get. Clara and I are expecting again. It’s still new, and we didn’t plan it, but we’re happy about it.”

“Congrats man,” Isaiah patted his back, and Gabriel gave us a big smile. Even after everything that had happened and with my sister gone, Gabriel’s news gave me a glimmer of hope that things would work out in our favor and we’d be back to regular pack life before long.

We spent the rest of the evening just hanging out and joking around. It felt like we stole time away from our responsibilities, but it also gave me a renewed spirit to continue what we started. Tomorrow, we’d return to searching for answers, trying to save my sister, and training our warriors.

Jordan

“Hello, I have dinner for you.”

“Hadley, right? You work here?” I recognized the tall brunette as the girl Gema came with from Wildfire.

“Umm, yeah, that’s me. I just volunteer here for now.” She set my food on a tray and helped me sit up so that I could eat. “I work a lot with Aaliyah. My mate's Dr. James, so we’ve been working on everything for the war.”

“I see. That makes sense. Is it weird getting ready to fight against your old pack?” The words were out of my mouth before I realized it might be insensitive.

“A little, but this is my pack now. Harvest Moon has treated me better in the month I’ve been here than Wildfire did in my lifetime. It’s nice to finally feel like I have a choice in my life.”

“Was it really that bad over there?” My nerves started to rise and Neo whined at the thought of Aaliyah at the mercy of Alpha Marek.

“I had a good life there, a good family, a happy childhood. Alpha chooses our roles in the pack though. As a warrior, he also decides how we look and what we wear. His warriors are just a number to him, not actual individuals. I didn’t want to live like that anymore. Hell, I didn’t even want to be a warrior to begin with, so I’m lucky to be here now.”

The door opened to reveal Jasmine coming in to eat with me. She brought what looked like a sack lunch for herself.

“I’ll let you two have some time, but don’t worry. If Gema and I found a way out, then they'll replace a way to get Aaliyah back.” With that, she headed out leaving me and my sister alone.

It was our first time alone since I got hurt, so I expected she had a lot to say.

“Where’s Jade?” A tense silence washed over the room.

“She didn’t sleep well last night. She fell asleep now, so I left her to rest.” I was worried my being injured would cause a setback for my sisters. They’ve already lost so much, there’s no way I’m leaving them here without me.

“What about you?”

She looked at me, seemingly uncertain about what to say. She swallowed the lump in her throat. “I’m okay. I don’t sleep much anyway. I’ve gotten used to it these past few weeks. I’m glad you’re okay, though. It’d be too much without you.” Her eyes glistened but no tears fell. “Let’s talk about something else now, there’s only so much of this I can handle.”

“Me? I’m good. Dr. James said I should be out by tomorrow.”

“You’re good? Really? You’re telling me your mate was taken and you’re good?”

“Alright, so not entirely good, but I’m healing. Then I can get back to training so that we can get Aaliyah back. Alpha Kendrick said the Council is helping now, so there’s no way we’ll lose against Wildfire with so many of us.”

“I hope you’re right, I want this to all be over soon.” She pulled out her food, and we both ate in silence for a few minutes. After a while, Jasmine loudly cleared her throat, getting my attention. “So…she decided to accept you.” It was a statement, and she looked at me with expectant eyes. “Is that what you want?”

“Would you think me an idiot if I said yes?”

She laughed, and even though it was at my expense, it was nice hearing her laughter. “I would. She said she didn’t want you and has been stringing you along since she got back. I get that you’re fated and all, but I think you can do better.” Neo growled, not liking Jasmine’s words. I want my sisters and mate to get along, so Jasmine’s words cut deep. I was their guardian now. The reality was that whoever my mate was would have to accept all three of us, not just me and my sisters would have to accept my mate as well.

“Will you be mad at me for forgiving her and taking her as my Luna?”

She looked away and sighed deeply before turning back to face me. “I won’t be mad at you, I could never be mad at you…but Aaliyah’s a different story. She’s…” She took another deep breath, and I could tell she wanted to use more colorful language but was probably restraining herself from doing so because of me. “She broke your heart, she’d need to prove she’ll never do that again for me to be okay with her. I’ll be there for you whatever you choose though. If you really want her, then, I’ll suck it up.”

“Deal…but maybe you’ll end up liking her once you get to know her?”

“Doubt it,” She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest, “You’ll owe me though, I’m totally expecting you to go easy on my mate once I meet him. No going all big brother Alpha on him.”

“We’ll see, there’s still lots of time before that happens.”

We finished eating, and Jasmine went to her training class. Alpha had canceled school for the week but not training as we needed to stay in top form. It sucked being here in bed while life went on all around me, but even Neo understood that we needed to heal if we wanted to take part in the final battle.