Page 24 of Pack Kasen, Part 1 (Caught #1)

23

AREN

I head immediately to the bunkhouse to investigate something that has me glaring before I push open the infirmary door.

“What were you doing letting Leo in to see her?” I demand.

Gregor is busy sorting through bandages, so my glare is wasted on him. “Leo is a law unto himself. Like herding a cat, that one.” He glances up at me. “And I wanted to talk to you.”

“About?” I step into the room and don’t push the Leo issue.

Leo is seven years old, and he truly is like trying to herd a cat. I’m not looking forward to the day he shifts because as a boy he is curiosity personified, always going where he shouldn’t. But as a wolf…

I feel sorry for his mom already.

Fortunately, Dania has some time to prepare for the rambunctious wolf pup that we all foresee Leo will be. The first shift is tied to puberty, so it isn’t until age ten for boys and girls shifting a little later at around twelve. Very rarely will it happen before then, and in the past, it was almost always due to a traumatic experience.

Boys shift first, but it’s the girls who learn better control faster. Joy likes to say female brains develop faster than the male. Anyone who tries to disagree with her is given a strong reason as to why Joy is one of my fiercest enforcers.

“You need to let the girl out of the cage. She is no threat to anyone.” Gregor, finished sorting or counting the bandages he had on the table, stuffs them back in a drawer, slamming it shut to look at me.

“What happened with Leo?”

“Francine’s mate got into a fight, and I went to check out the wound. When I returned, Leo was playing with his lion by the window.”

“And the feral?”

“They were talking. Both looked guilty as hell when I opened the door.”

“What did the feral have to be guilty about?”

He shrugs. “Not sure.”

“You shouldn’t have left her alone,” I warn him.

“And if you truly regarded her as a threat, you wouldn’t have left her with me at all.”

I don’t respond, but he’s right. I would never have left a feral like that. Not to show her civilization, whatever the hell I’d meant. When I’d seen her on her back, face white, a part of me had wanted to drag her out of the cage as fast as I could.

I turn to leave before I can think too much about why I would let her out of the cage at all, and why I would leave her with Gregor. “The feral belongs in the cage.”

“She didn’t hurt Leo.”

“Because I was smart enough to chain her to the bed.”

“It’s okay to be wrong,” he calls after me.

I stop in the hallway.

The pack’s survival depends on me being right. It’s a truth and a reality I’ve had years to become accustomed to. Shrugging it off isn’t something I can just do.

But the echo of the feral’s words still ring in my ear. I can’t shake off my unease. She had stared me in the eye, told me I was wrong and that she would never forgive me for what I’d done. Not even if I begged.

She had sounded like she was telling the truth.

Even my wolf, who has had a strange fascination with her scent since we smelled it the first time, fell silent at her quiet, intense words.

Then I had remembered what I’m dealing with.

A feral.

They only care about themselves.

They will say anything, and likely do anything to save themselves.

I’m not wrong.

I am saving my pack. I am doing what is right for them. When the world is free of ferals, and when I find my mate, I will never have to worry about a feral killing her.

Because I would have kept her safe.

“I’m not wrong,” I say quietly, and I walk away.

I’m still hungry since I left my food with the feral before I was finished. Finan had asked me why when we left the cage. I’d told him to go back to the house, and that I needed to speak to Gregor, when what I’d wanted to do was dodge a question I didn’t know how to answer.

I make my way to the house, sticking my head in the dining room.

The kitchen workers have cleared the dishes, so I continue my search for food. In the kitchen, I spot Marisa’s blonde head near the sink at the back of the large stainless steel and speckled marble space almost as soon as I swing the door open.

She doesn’t look my way, though her back stiffens the moment I step inside the room.

I greet people on my way to the refrigerator and make myself a plate from the leftovers I find there. I could have asked someone to make it for me, but the kitchen is full, everyone is busy, and I’m eager to get in and get out as soon as possible.

I’m stepping out of the kitchen, already digging into a plate piled high with cold chicken, pasta salad, and sliced melon when Finan appears.

He’s holding a phone.

I frown at it.

“It’s not Tagge,” he tells me before I can ask, “but I am concerned. He’s stopped calling, and I don’t think it’s a good sign. Might be a good idea to find out if things are well between you two?”

I shrug on my way to the enforcer meeting to discuss the nightly patrols. We like to change them up periodically so no one gets bored. “Sounds like he finally got the message that I’m not interested in his sister.”

My enforcers are already sitting at the big table on the right hand side of my office. For once, Emilio and Joy are not arguing or sticking their tongue down each other’s throats. A rare exception I’m happy to take advantage of.

Joy is watching me, and her expression is thoughtful.

I drop into my seat at the head of the table, nodding at Finan to begin as I dig my fork into my pasta salad.

I’m lifting the bite to my mouth when Joy says, “You’re wrong about the feral.”

Silence.

Emilio sighs. “Baby, we discussed easing the man into the conversation, not dumping it on him like that.”

“Aren respects bluntness,” she tells him and looks at me. “I don’t think she’s a feral.”

I put my fork down, push my plate away from me and sit back in my seat as I cross my arms.

Emilio sighs again. “Maybe this was a little too blunt.”

Emilio is right. So is Joy. I do respect bluntness. But no Alpha likes to be told they are wrong.

“I see, and what would you have me do?” I ask mildly.

Emilio winces, and everyone at the table leans away.

Joy shrugs. “Maybe you could?—”

“ That was a rhetorical question, mi vida ,” Emilio interrupts her, eyeing me warily. “I’m going to ask you to stop talking now before the Alpha kills you.”

Smart man.

“Should I let her out of the cage to kill before we manage to restrain her? Will you take full responsibility for her getting into the schoolroom and painting the walls with blood?”

No one says a word.

I lean toward Joy as I rake my gaze around the table. “They are manipulative. Yes, I saw the feral let Leo win his game of hide and seek earlier. I’d have been blind to miss it. How do you think the feral convinced my mom to let him out?”

Again, no one responds, because again, it is a rhetorical question.

“I make the decisions which keep my pack safe. The responsibility for a feral getting loose and causing harm would be on me, as it should be. I am the leader here.”

My appetite destroyed for the second time, I push myself up from the table, leaving the food behind to do what I often do when I need time to think over a problem. Sometimes, it’s easier to think on four feet than on two.

“A test,” Joy calls after me. “That’s what I was going to suggest.”

I pause, feet from the door.

I’m the leader, but I respect my enforcers' opinions. They have, through hard work, blood, sweat, and dedication, earned the right to advise me, so I’m open to ideas. “Go on.”

“You think she’s a feral, and I do not. Set up a test. We clear the surrounding area so no one will get hurt. Have us form a perimeter to stop her getting away if the test reveals you’re right. We can create an opportunity for her to prove herself a feral or a shifter, like us.”

“No.”

I’m open to all ideas except that one.

No way in hell am I letting a feral loose here.

Why Joy thought I would ever agree to that after everything a feral took from me…

No .

Not a fucking chance in hell.

“Then kill her. Problem dealt with once and for all,” Joy says.

Funny thing is, a part of me recoils even harder at that second option.

I leave my office.

Outside, I strip out of my clothes, let my beast free, and bolt for the forest.

I’m fast as a wolf. One of the fastest in the pack.

But some things you cannot outrun. This is one of them.

Joy’s words pursue me. Dogged. Persistent.

Un-fucking-relenting.