Chapter 263 I'm in the Truck
Fennigan's massive, bloodied frame physically shook. The violent tremor bled straight through his white-knuckled grip on the tactical vest, rattling Jax against the thick bark of the oak tree.
"Gone, Jax," Fennigan choked out. The two devastating words carried the heavy, suffocating weight of a death sentence.
Jax didn't flinch. He stared straight back into his brother's wild, glowing eyes, his own golden irises locked and absolutely refusing to back down or look away. For decades, that had been their unspoken dynamic. Whenever Fennigan’s Alpha temper threatened to burn the world down, his fiercely loyal Beta standing his ground was the anchor that always snapped him back to reality. It was the only thing that had ever gotten Jax out of a physical fight with his brother unscathed.
But this was fundamentally, terrifyingly different.
The beast staring back at Jax wasn't just lost to its temper; it was entirely consumed by the abyss. Fennigan’s chest heaved with shallow, jagged breaths. His nostrils flared violently as his feral mind tore itself apart, trapped in an agonizing purgatory somewhere between absolute, blinding fear and a cold, world-ending rage. He looked like he was a fraction of a second away from ripping his own heart out of his chest just to make the silence stop.
Then, a voice sliced through the heavy, freezing tension.
"Guys..."
It was Marcus. The seasoned Head Warrior wasn't barking a tactical command. He sounded completely out of breath, his voice echoing from the impenetrable shadows of a massive, moss-covered rock formation about twenty yards to their left.
"Alpha... hey, I think I've found it."
Fennigan froze. The blinding terror in his eyes instantly calcified into pure, lethal murder.
He opened his massive fists, instantly releasing Jax’s vest and letting his Beta drop flat onto his heavy boots. Fennigan didn't say a single word. He didn't even take a breath. The Alpha King simply spun on his heel and lunged straight through the razor-sharp briars toward the sound of Marcus's voice, completely ready to rip the earth wide open with his bare hands.
Jax immediately drew his weapon and surged right after him.
Fennigan tore through the razor-sharp briars like a massive, unstoppable force of nature, completely ignoring the thorns tearing into his bare chest and arms.
He found Marcus on his knees at the base of a towering, moss-covered rock formation. The Head Warrior’s hands were caked in freezing mud as he frantically scraped away layers of dead vines, packed dirt, and crushed ferns.
Fennigan didn’t hesitate. He dropped to his knees right beside his Head Warrior, his massive, bloodied hands plunging into the wet earth. He grabbed thick, stubborn roots and violently ripped them out of the ground, hurling them into the dark. Jax slid in right behind them, using his heavy boots to kick away the displaced rocks and debris.
Together, the three lethal predators unearthed the monster hiding in their woods.
It was a massive, heavy-duty industrial steel hatch, masterfully sunk into the natural bedrock and painted to perfectly mimic the forest floor. But as Fennigan clawed away the last thick layer of mud covering the top edge, his violently pounding heart skipped a beat.
There was no handle. There was no wheel to turn, and no hinges to rip off.
Instead, Marcus brushed his gloved hand over a recessed cavity in the steel, revealing a sleek, glowing, high-tech digital interface. It wasn't just a keypad; it was a complex biometric scanner flanked by a heavy magnetic locking mechanism that hummed with a lethal electrical current.
"Don't touch it," Jax barked, instantly grabbing Fennigan's massive forearm before the Alpha could try to punch his fist straight through the glass. "Fenn, look at the casing. It’s wired. If you try to brute-force that lock or rip the steel, it’ll trigger a failsafe. It could permanently seal the bunker, or worse, trigger an explosive collapse."
Fennigan let out a feral, agonizing snarl, his silver eyes flashing as he stared down at the glowing red LED mocking him from the dirt. He was literally inches away from his mate, separated only by a few inches of encrypted steel, and he was completely locked out.
Jax didn't waste a single second. He immediately reached into his tactical vest and pulled out a heavily encrypted satellite phone.
"I have to call the Weaver," Jax said, his thumbs flying over the screen to hit a secure speed dial.
The line rang twice before a groggy, irritated voice answered. "Jax? Do you know what time it is?"
"I don't care," Jax ordered, his Beta tone leaving absolutely zero room for negotiation. "Grab your decryption rig. I need you on Blackwood land right now. Eastern mountain base."
"Are you insane?" the voice hissed, suddenly wide awake. "The entire territory is locked down tight. I heard the radios—you've got patrols sweeping the perimeter and fifteen visiting Alpha packs inside. I'm not getting ripped apart by your guards for trespassing in the middle of a crisis."
Jax's jaw tightened. "My guards will clear a path for you. I need that lock picked now."
"No way, man. Not tonight. It's suicide." Before Jax could argue, a massive, blood-slicked hand shot out and violently snatched the phone from his grip.
Fennigan brought the speaker up to his face, his liquid-mercury eyes burning a hole straight through the steel hatch.
"We are going to pay you triple your usual rate," Fennigan growled, his voice dropping into a terrifying, demonic rasp that promised absolute, unadulterated violence. "Triple. In cash. But if you are not standing in front of this hatch with your gear in exactly ten minutes, I am going to leave this mountain, hunt you down, and rip you in half."
There was a long, suffocating silence on the other end of the line. The sheer, lethal gravity radiating from the Alpha King was undeniable.
"...Ten minutes," the tech finally swallowed hard. "I'm in the truck."
The line went dead.
Fennigan tossed the phone back to Jax. He turned back to the glowing red lock, his massive chest heaving as he dropped into a hard crouch right on top of the steel hatch, refusing to move a single inch away from Leela until the door was opened.