Highbanks wasn’t the biggest town, but we were densely populated and most of that population were members of my pack.
The few humans here tended to be on the outskirts of the town, and I was more than okay with that, since the cross section of our town, the Rainford area, and then Drake’s Point, one of the biggest cities and for which the county was named, was where the humans tended to congregate.
So when I walked in, quickly scanned the diner, and saw no humans, I knew I could relax some and that my reason for being here didn’t need to be put off until some trucker had finished his apple pie.
The diner was an unofficial meeting ground for the pack. My father had been too up his own ass to even consider that the pack might gather every Wednesday night at six PM to talk about shit they knew the council didn’t give a fuck about, but I wasn’t like him.
I’d known for a while how it rolled, mostly because Austin and Ethan had warned me back when we were younger, and also because I knew the pack had to have a voice.
Levers and his wife, Maggie May, were those voices.
My father—again, dumbfuck—had just thought they were trusted by the people. Me? I knew the rest of the pack leaned on them to be their speakers.
That wasn’t how I wanted my tenure as alpha to be.
I didn’t want the elite in my packhouse, eating my fucking cheese and drinking my goddamn wine.
I wanted these people.
I wanted them to be welcome, for our issues to be shared, and for us to make this pack and this area better.
So I let my wolf out. It roared in my head, echoing in my brain as the prospect of freedom enticed it, but then I felt her hand on my back. Immediately, the wolf was calmer.
Which made me calmer.
I was still uneasy about letting him loose, because if anyone knew his full strength, it was me, but I knew I had to. Showing Sabina my power, coming to see that I wasn’t terrifying, watching her rip through my domination, it gave me the courage to reveal a side of myself the people hadn’t seen before.
And I only did it because I knew, within the flash of a heartbeat, if things turned crazy, Sabina would find a way to stop me.
That was her strength. It was equal to mine. A Mother-granted gift.
The power I exuded was enough to make every person within the diner cringe and drop to their knees in submission, only, as I gradually pulled back the veil on my wolf, there were over four dozen gasps, but no one flinched or cowed.
They knew what I was doing.
I was telling them I was here as alpha.
I was here as their leader, but I wasn’t here to dominate them.
Thank fuck that had worked. It had been a hard-won thing.
The hush that had overtaken the diner at our entrance broke at that, and Maggie May, from behind the counter, declared, “You sure know how to make an entrance, Eli.”
My lips curved. The irascible old bat had never called me alpha, not once, and she was one of the few I didn’t mind that from. I appreciated her shrewdness though.
Her breaking the ice like that made things a whole helluva lot easier.
“It’s style, Maggie May. You’ve either got it or you don’t.”
She sniffed at me, but her smirk and the gleam in her eye told me she was amused.
She’d always liked me.
I knew that like I knew she’d hated my father.
Whenever I came here, I always got extra servings, and that was without my asking for it or her even charging for it. I shoved a hefty tip on there, of course, but she was just like that.
A feeder.
Especially to those she liked.
In fact, Sabina reminded me of her in that regard. She was a nurturer too. I figured Ethan was right about the pair of them probably getting close over time, and if that was to happen, it would be fortuitous, because Maggie was a great ‘in’ to the rest of the pack.
The majority of them, honestly.
As I moved toward a booth, I eased Sabina into the seat. I mean, I knew she could manage on her own, but helping her meant I got to cop a feel of her ass, and even if I was an alpha, nothing took priority over his mate’s butt.
That was essentially the law.
Austin and Ethan slipped in opposite her, and rather than take a seat too, I leaned on the Formica tabletop and stared around the place.
Highbanks was a town forged on minimal industry. Most of the people here worked at pack-owned businesses.
We had a logging company that enabled us to sustainably cut down trees, while ensuring they were replanted, we also had a few other businesses that kept people afloat—they were pack owned as well, but they were currently managed by most of the council.
And that was my biggest issue in tossing them out.
They were the bosses, and while I was their boss, I had to have someone to replace them, which was why I’d been stuck, left to figure out how to get rid of people who I needed.
I rubbed my chin as I glanced at my people, and when no one turned their attention back to their food or to the conversation they’d been in the middle of, I gruffly commented, “You all met Sabina. You all know who she is. You all know that she’s the omega, and that her other mates are Ethan and Austin Carter.” I pursed my lips. “What you may not know, because it was council only business, is that my mother found a rite that was essentially a way of elbowing the Mother into gifting me my mate.” Gasps came at that, and I couldn’t blame them. That was still fishy as fuck to me. “You evidently felt the loss of the omega, and I’ve been remiss in sharing the details with you in regard to Mom.” I sucked in a breath. “This is the meeting I wanted to have with you after I claimed Sabina, but council protocol doesn’t allow that. And, to be frank, I think that it’s time for that protocol to change.”
A heavy stillness seemed to blanket everything around me, and I knew I had their attention more than ever.
Eagerness whirled around the room, and I felt Sabina stiffen a little as she processed the sudden communal surge of emotion.
“There was no body to bury, but we will be arranging a community wake for everyone to wish her well into the Mother’s care—”
“I wouldn’t bother, son, your mother was a crappy omega. No one here is sad to see her go, aside from the way she leveled us out, that is.”
I wasn’t surprised that Maggie May was the one to say it, but I cut her a look anyway. “She’s still my mom, Maggie.”
The older woman shrugged. Her hair was bleached a steel gray, and she had the straight locks contained in a tight ponytail that brushed the back of her plaid shirt-clad shoulders. She lived in a white tank top and jeans with a similar shirt, no matter the weather. And on her feet? Steel-toed boots.
She looked like a female lumberjack, but her face? Even with the steel gray hair? Beautiful. Her skin was like caramel, her eyes a rich coffee, and her features were perfectly symmetrical.
She’d probably been a babe back in her day, and I’d admit she was definitely a GILF, if you were that way inclined. But though our wolves made us age at a different rate, there was no hiding from the fact that Maggie was really old.
She arched a brow at my prolonged stare, but I just shook my head at her. “Whether you liked her or not—”
“Not.”
Several dozen mutters reached my ears then, and I felt my mouth gape a little at the universal dislike for my mom. In all honesty, I’d known my dad wasn’t popular because he was a hard-ass and he relied too much on the council. But Mom? I’d thought she was—
Bill cleared his throat as he plunked a hand on his mate’s shoulder. He was a genuine person, just like his woman, but he had a softer way about him. Maggie didn’t mind if she cut you verbally when she was speaking the truth. Bill? He added some honey to the vinegar.
“Your mother wasn’t the softest person to come to. She wasn’t all that good at easing pack concerns, because if she was, we’d never have needed a reason to meet the way we do.”
Well, that wasn�
��t a lie, was it?
I knew for a fact that these meetings had been going on for a long time, and that was because Father had been obsessed with building pack wealth rather than the community.
I wasn’t like him.
Community was all that mattered, and now that I had a mate who had a purpose that was Mother given? I knew things had to change.
Sure, the pack needed wealth to sustain itself, but more than anything, we needed a place that was safe for our pups to be born.
I blew out a breath and said, “Sabina isn’t like her.”
“No, she isn’t,” Linda Green muttered. “Remember that panic attack Ariel Johnson had the other day, Elsa? Right in the middle of the kitchen, she was. Thought she was having a heart attack.”
I twisted around to look at Sabina, brow arched, and she just shrugged, but her smile was sheepish.
“She’s a lot more potent,” Maggie confirmed. “That’s for sure. Only fitting that the Mother would grant us a true omega after gifting us shitty ones for such a long time.”
My lips almost twitched at her maligning my family, but what could I say? It wasn’t like I could disagree.
I hadn’t known my grandparents. They’d died when I was only a few years old, and I didn’t remember them at all, but if Maggie said it, then it was true.
And from the glum nods that followed her words, I figured she wasn’t bullshitting me.
“Anyway,” I muttered, trying to get things back on track, “I’m here now for a reason.”
“Aside from spoiling our Wednesday night get-together, you mean?”
“I do mean,” I retorted, rolling my eyes at Maggie. “This, here, is going to be our new council meeting spot.”
Everyone froze at that, even Maggie.
“Jesus, never thought I’d see the day Maggie shut the hell up,” Riley Hunt muttered somewhere behind me, and when even that didn’t prompt Maggie to snark back at him, I knew I’d truly stunned the hell out of her.
“What about the council?”
I pulled a face at Bill’s apt question. “I’m in the process of dismantling them.”
“The process?” Jim Koln repeated, his disappointment clear.
“The process, yes, because most of them run the pack’s businesses and I need to find replacements before I put those businesses in jeopardy.”
Maggie finally defrosted at that, because she muttered, “Those fools don’t know their dicks from their thumbs. Half the people in here do the managing. You don’t need to find your replacements—they’re looking right at you.”
I grinned at her. “Maggie, I was hoping you were going to say that.”
“Then why not just spit it out?”
“Because I don’t need false modesty or people trying to oversell themselves. We’re transitioning to a new phase in the pack’s government, and I need to make sure that all the Is are dotted and the Ts crossed, because if they’re not, we’re going to be putting the entire community in jeopardy, and I can’t have that.”
Maggie harrumphed, but then she muttered, “Jonas? You manage the brewery, don’t you?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Jonas replied, and I arched a brow because that came as a surprise.
Jonas wasn’t a beta-type personality, but the brewery was our second largest business and employed a good chunk of the people in town.
“Are you good at it?”
He shrugged. “Place would fall apart without me.” About ten or so people muttered their agreement, their nods were strident too. Eager.
She sniffed at me. “That seem like a good reference?”
My lips twitched. “Like the best. What about the logging company? The farms?”
Maggie, as she’d done a few moments before, picked out people she knew were the best at their jobs, and as I stared at her, I knew I was looking at my next council leader.
I was a dumbass for not piecing shit together before, but hell, sometimes it took a slap to the face with a fish to figure out what the fuck was going on.
“We’ll have you reporting for duty on Friday. I’ll call each individual council member to tell them that their services are no longer wanted, and that they’re free to leave our pack, or they can join the workforce as a member of the staff.
“I’ll expect the newly appointed managers to deal with the old incumbents fairly, even if they never treated you fairly—a good leader doesn’t treat his old team like shit,” I intoned darkly, loading the words with a threat I would enforce. “We all have to live together, and we all, more importantly, have to work together to make the pack a better, stronger place for future generations to come. Do you hear me?”
When I received a lot of “Ayes,” I nodded, then murmured, “You’re all going to have to accept that Austin and Ethan are my right- and left-hand men. The world is changing, and we need to embrace each other, embrace what we don’t understand, because we don’t understand so much.
“If you have an issue with them, you have an issue with my leadership, and we all know where the challenge circle is. You can come toe-to-toe with me, but we all know how that will end up if you don’t take this seriously.”
When that had a lot of people dunking their heads between their hitched shoulders, I knew I’d gotten my point across.
“Now, for the final matter, Maggie May and Bill are going to be my council leaders.”
Though I sensed her surprise, Maggie just smirked at me. “Was just waiting for the chance to ride roughshod over you.”
“I figured as much,” I said dryly.
Her eyes, however, were filled with pride. “Just knew you were going to be a good alpha, Eli.”
“Give me time, I’ve barely started.”
“No, that’s true, but you weren’t ever like your family, son. You were a good boy from the start to now, and with a strong woman at your side, I’ll be glad to serve as a liaison between you and the pack.”
I smiled at her, touched because I knew she meant every word. “That being said, I will be here every week, and you can come to me directly. No more only meeting at the totem. No more only meeting at the packhouse. You have an issue, you can bring it to me, Sabina, Ethan, or Austin either privately, or we can deal with it together as a pack.”
That had a roar of applause bursting out around me, which I figured meant they were happy with the changes.
Of course, I knew some people who were going to be miserable about those changes, but fuck them.
The council had fed my father’s ego, had built him up into an alpha who was out of touch with his pack, who was disconnected with the world in which we lived.
Only my influence at the logging company had kept us from going too deep into our territory where we were going to be losing valuable running land, and he’d been shortsighted in so many ways.
I had ideas that I needed to run by my family—Sabina, Ethan, and Austin—ideas that would thrust the pack straight into the twenty-first century, but also, I was happy just to change the status quo bit by bit.
Completely wiping out the council was a heavy hit to the start of my reign, but if it was one that defined my rule?
I wasn’t going to cry over that.
I was born to be alpha.
Born to be Sabina’s mate.
And I was born to rule with my brothers at my side.
That was what would define me.
But the Mother’s will had granted me a future that would see these people’s numbers expand dramatically, and I was going to be the father of a new future, with Sabina as the mother of them all.
It would take time, it would take caution, but we had both in spades.
This was the first day of a new era for the Highbanks pack, and I’d never been happier to be its leader than I was right now.
Eighteen
Sabina
Fourteen months later
I tucked Knight into my arms, tightening the little sling I had him in so I was closer to him.
I wasn’t sure we could physically get any
closer, but trust me, if it was possible, I’d try. I’d try like hell. Skin close wasn’t enough, and I was just glad that the packhouse didn’t care about nudity, because since the birth three days ago, I’d been spending a lot of time wandering around in my skin just so that we could be together.
My problem was my fear that I’d lose him.
I’d lost Joshua. I’d lost him, and I hadn’t been able to protect him, but even though the grief and fear from his passing would never leave me, neither would the terror that I could lose Knight too.
The thought had me dipping my chin so I could brush his temple with a kiss.
When he cooed, his bright green eyes peering up at me with a smile in them, I had to marvel at the fact that he was so happy when Eli was such a glum SOB.
Of course, he wasn’t when it was just us, but that was the truth of it.
My male was grumpy most of the time. But I got it. I did.
He had a hell of a lot of responsibility, and even though Austin and Ethan were there to lighten his load, he took his duty seriously.
Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I could love him more because of his dedication to our people.
He wasn’t an absentee leader. None of us were.
We were as involved in the pack as if each member was our family, and that mattered to him. To all of us.
It was about us being accepted, about the stupid hatred for twins in the pack dying a death. It was about unity and community.
And I knew why.
All so that when I gave birth to the next child I was destined to carry, there’d be a place for him or her.
A place that was new, sure, but a place that wouldn’t put him in hatred’s way when they were born.
Where dissent could be sown, Eli had made damn sure that he was there, ready and waiting to stomp it out. Not because he was a control freak, but because we had a purpose.
Our pack was going to grow. The Mother had told us.
And now that I had the placenta to bury? I knew that next step on the path was about to commence.
WOLF CHILD: A PNR RH Romance (The Year of the Wolf Book 1) Page 36
