Chapter 33

Cody

I sat in the Alpha's office discussing what findings had been discovered so far. One of the ranch hands managed to find out from a waitress at the bar that there is a few wolves with arm tattoos, but she couldn't say for sure who had the wolf howling, only that she knew she had seen it. Even though we owned the town, wolves from other packs came there to eat and relax. There was an unspoken rule that we don't engage if there is trouble between packs. The Godsend Pack was the closest pack to us in mileage, and we had been in alliance with them for decades. The Alpha was about to get on the phone with Alpha Chris to set up a meeting.

I leaned back in my chair, listening to the one side of the conversation I could hear. I could tell by the Alpha's expressions and tone that he didn't like what Alpha Chris was saying. At some point though, he must have finally gave in and agreed to meet with us, but he wanted it on his land. That's actually better for us anyway, we could gauge the temperature of some of the wolves and maybe one of the trackers would notice the scents they had picked up. There was no doubt we'd be taking them with us, along with several warriors. We couldn't be to careful, because it could go wrong easily.

Gabe slammed down the phone and took a deep breath. "We are heading there after lunch. Dawson needs to come. Seems that Bonnie's boyfriend is spinning an entirely different tale. Chris is sending a couple warriors to grab Bonnie and bring her to his pack house. I will have to use my Alpha aura to force her to be truthful, that's all there is to it." He ran his hands through his already disheveled hair.

"So if we find out that these wolves were from his pack, what then?" I ask.

"Well he's agreed to punish them, whatever that means. And I will be banning Bonnie from our pack lands. She's lucky I don't force her to become a rogue. In consideration of the pup they have, Chris is going to allow her to stay, but he's not happy about it. He even acknowledged she's been a trouble maker for him, that's why he gave her an ultimatum." The Alpha stood up from behind his desk. "I'm going to go for a run before I blow a gasket. Gather whoever you need before we head to Godsend. Meet me out front at noon. It's going to take us about an hour by car, and I'm not doing this in wolf form, so we have no choice." He waited for me to nod in understanding and then he walked out. I heaved myself out of the chair and went to prepare for the day. This stuff was sure taking a lot of time and energy, and we have horses to get ready for breeding. I just hoped that Ashlynn was ok with her and the vet techs doing the bulk of the work for the next day or two. They were going to have to check the horses for signs of their heat, log their temperatures and mannerisms, as well as intake the twenty five other mares that were supposed to start rolling in today. The good thing is, we only allowed five at a time to come in each day, to give Ashlynn time to do a complete vet check on them. If they didn't meet muster, we'd send them back and tell the owner to try again at a later date. Breeding season was no small job.

As I made my way around the main stable and to the breezeway, I saw Dawson coming out of Ashlynn's loft in his sweat pants, darting for his apartment. It's a good thing he told the Alpha they were mates, because the wrong person to see that and the rumors would fly quickly around here. If he's spending the night and they are fated mates, I don't know why they don't just move in together. Maybe I'm thinking to old fashioned, but when I found my mate, we were on each other that first night and she was moved in by dinner the next day. I sighed. That was so long ago. My mind wandered to another woman, who now filled my thoughts. Carolyn. I hoped I could convince her to become my mate. I wanted to erase all her pain, and fill her sadness with new memories. Memories that were happy. I'm turning into a sap. I guess love will do that to you. Wait? Love? Do I love Carolyn?

***

Dawson

I ran back to my apartment and changed into my work clothes. Cody had mind linked me to come to his office. When I got there, he was working on some paperwork and two of the trackers were sitting on the couch against the wall. "What's up guys?" I looked to them. They just shrugged and pointed at Cody.

I slipped into the chair in front of him, waiting. Cody looked up, "We are just waiting on two of the warriors to come off patrol, then I will let you all know what's going on. Give it," he glanced at the clock on the wall, "Five minutes."

"Hey Dawson, you look unusually happy," one of the trackers, Jeremiah was his name, quipped out. I turned my head to look at him.

"Do I? Hmm, well I guess I am." I left it at that. I looked over at Cody and he had a grin on his face, like the cat that got the mouse. I knew right then that he knew I was with Ashlynn last night. I didn't care one bit. She was mine.

A couple more minutes passed and two of our best warriors walked in, each with a cup of coffee in one hand and a sandwich in the other. "Hey boss," they nodded at Cody.

Cody clapped his hands together, "Alright, you're all here. We've got a mission this afternoon. We will be heading over to Godsend Pack. It could be totally fine or it could go to shit, so you all have to be on the lookout and ready for a fight. Let's just hope it doesn't get to that." He continued to fill us in on the plan, to include Alpha Chris sending a warrior out to drag Bonnie back to his pack house. Seemed like this would hopefully work out. Alpha Chris was a reasonable man, even if he had a lot of wild ones in his pack. He liked to collect misfits from other packs. He said he was doing his due diligence by giving even the most feral wolves, a place to call home. I think he just did it to increase his numbers. He was always fighting with another pack that was just over the Montana and Wyoming border.

Once all instruction was given, we went out to meet up with the Alpha, the seven of us loading in to two of the ranch trucks and heading out. I was a bit irritated that I couldn't tell Ashlynn we were leaving and didn't know when we'd be back, but the Alpha said he had asked Carolyn to let her know. I left it at that.