Filed To Story: Their Bullied and Broken Mate by Teri Petry
One day. We haven’t been home one day, and we’re already dealing with drama. In the past 3 hours, I have had 15 phone calls and 4 visits from Scott, Alette’s friend Micah’s boyfriend. He seems desperate to find her, and has now started to have her mother call me. I assured her mother that I would look into the situation, and would let her know. I also told her that if Scott contacted me one more time, whether himself or through someone else, I would put him in the cells until I figured out what was happening. I was done messing with him.
I called my sisters to see if they knew what was going on, and Alette informed me Micah was there, but she couldn’t tell me why. I had given them until the end of today to tell me what was going on, or I was bringing Micah’s mom with me to their house. If I had to make another trip to Seattle in this short period of time, it wasn’t going to be a good visit at all. I wanted to get this Micah situation taken care of before I addressed the mystery man Alette was talking to in the park. I hated secretly keeping tabs on them, but dad had overridden me in the guard department, and I wasn’t OK with that.
I decided to take a break before my next meeting, and go see my girls. I had quickly grown fond of baby Willow, and just like Riley, I couldn’t picture my life without her. I am close to finding out who her biological dad is, but people are very tight-lipped where he is concerned. I find it odd, but it also makes me feel like it’s someone I know. Why else would it be such a hush-hush secret?
I found Riley and Willow in the garden. Riley was weeding and planting, and Willow was lying on a blanket next to her. “There’s my girls,” I said as I bent over to give my bride a kiss. “The flower bed is looking amazing, babe. I love the yellow and purple together,” I told her. I sat next to her and started playing with Willow when I heard the alarms going off. I stood at my feet and instructed Riley to get into the safe room with our daughter.
I ran around to the front of the house, and noticed it wasn’t an attack, but a large fire. Coffee & Thyme was on fire, as were the buildings on each side of it. On the left of it was an office building, and on the right was Nick’s place. I called out for warriors to go into Nick’s place to make sure everyone was out, and I turned to go towards the bistro.
I could see someone inside, but there was a wall of fire between me and that person. It looked like a woman, and I instantly started to worry. It had to either be Hazel or Christy, and they were both like aunts to me. I didn’t hesitate and busted through the door. I hollered out to whoever it was, and they didn’t move. I started to run and jumped through the fire, only slightly burning myself. I bent down beside the woman, and realized it was Hazel. I picked her up and tried to find an opening to get out of safely.
My only option was to go out the way I went in because the rest of the building was engulfed in flames. I found a table cloth and got it wet in the bar sink. I wrapped it around Hazel, making sure her head and face were covered, and I ran as fast as I could through the same fire wall I went through before. Thankfully, she wasn’t hurt anymore than she already was.
As I came out of the building, I was coughing from all the smoke inhalation. I tried to holler for a medic to come help. As I made my way closer to help, I collapsed with Hazel in my arms. The fire brigade was working hard to get the fire contained, and someone had pulled me up onto a gurney. I had an oxygen mask on my face, and I was finally coming to. “Hazel?” I called. “Alpha, she is fine. Just unconscious. She took a blow to the head, and breathed in quite a bit of smoke, but she will be fine. Her wolf is already helping her pull through.” a medic informed me. A wave of relief consumed me, and I asked about any others. “Everyone else so far is fine, Alpha. They are still sweeping through the children’s home,” he said.
I pulled off the oxygen mask, and got up off the gurney. I started towards Nick’s Place, and noticed Henry and Celeste lying in front of the building. Both had been knocked unconscious. One of the warriors came rushing towards me with a note in hand. “Alpha, we found this pinned to the door with a knife. The gamma and his mate were the only ones inside,” the warrior said. I took the note and read it.
“Quit trying to track me down. I don’t want the kid, just like I didn’t want her mom. If you persist in asking questions about me, I will retaliate. Sincerely, the kids father.” I crumbled up the paper, and shoved it into my back pocket. I know it said not to continue, but it only made me more determined to find out who it was. Not only to answer for why he abandoned his child, and sign over his rights, but to answer for why he attacked three people, and set fire to pack property.
I called George and Jack to let them know about Henry, and then I called Tim to let him know about Hazel. Tim said he had already been contacted and was on his way. He asked if I needed anything, and I told him that he just needed to tend to his wife. I checked on my mate and child, and then met George in my office. When I walked in, I plopped myself in my chair and said, “Bro, shit is getting stupid, and my parents haven’t been gone a full 24 hours yet. It’s like whoever started that fire waited for them to leave just to test me. I pulled the note out of my back pocket, and slid it across my desk to him. He read it and threw it back on the desk. “What do we do now?” he asked. I ran my hands down my face and said, “We are calling a pack meeting, and my cousin Luke. Time we find out the easy way.”
Familiar Faces
*MADDIX POV*
Coffee & Thyme is a total loss. The infant’s room and Henry and Celeste’s rooms are burned at Nick’s place. The office building that housed the offices of the Royal Council, vital statistics, and housing placement, is a complete loss. I am thankful that mom thought having all the documents that were housed in that building were scanned onto a hard drive for situations just like this. I’m just thankful that no one was seriously hurt. Most things in life can be replaced, but people can’t. Hazel is due in my office tomorrow, and we have already gotten word from the council they are going to offer her a hefty grant to rebuild. Her bakery, thankfully, wasn’t involved in the fire, so they would at least have some other income coming in, other than Tim’s warrior wage.
Nick’s place won’t be hard to fix, but Celeste is upset about losing some of her mother’s belongings. Most of their belongings were still in storage, but she had brought in a few items. One of those things was her mother’s wedding dress. She was in the process of altering it for their official wedding, and it was ruined. I felt bad for her, but Riley said she was going to help her try and figure something out to where maybe they could use a little of the lace from the dress. It may be slightly charred, but the girls are creative. I have faith in them both.
I have been trying to figure out how to identify who set the fire, attacked Hazel, Tim and Celeste, and if it was also Willow’s biological father. The cameras at Coffee & Thyme were burned, along with any footage. The cameras at the office building weren’t working at the time, and the cameras at the pack house didn’t catch anything. That left the library and the abuse shelter. I picked up my phone and called Chris. “Hey, Chris. This is Alpha Maddix. I have a quick question for you. Do your security cameras possibly face the buildings involved in the fire?” I asked. He was silent for a moment, and then replied, “I believe so, Alpha. If you like, I can copy its recordings from the past couple of days for you.”
I gave out a sigh of relief and told him that would be fabulous. He said it would take a couple of hours, and he would bring it in when it was done. I thanked him profusely and hung up the phone. Next, I called Jace, he is head of security at the abuse shelter. “Jace, Alpha Maddix here. I need the past few days of security footage from the cameras at the shelter. Are you able to email those to me, or will they need backed up on a flashdrive?” I asked. He started to stammer, and I asked him if there was an issue. He promised it wasn’t and that he would send it via email. We disconnected the call, and I waited for his email. His hesitation was concerning to me, but it could have just been because it was me who requested it, instead of George.
I called the kitchen to have them send a few sandwiches and some potato salad up to my office for lunch, and patiently waited for the email from Jace. It was taking a lot longer than I had anticipated, and I messaged Henry to check on Jace. Something didn’t feel right to me. It didn’t take long for Henry to get back with me, and it wasn’t good news. “Maddix, stay calm please. When I got there, Jace was nowhere to be found, and the whole security system was destroyed. However, I was able to get the chip out of the crushed recording system. I’m on my way over with it now.” he stated.
New Book: Returned To Make Them Pay
On her wedding anniversary, Alicia is drugged and stumbles into the wrong room—straight into the arms of the powerful Caden Ward, a man rumored never to touch women. Their night of passion shocks even him, especially when he discovers she’s still a virgin after two years of marriage to Joshua Yates.