Filed to story: Sorry Alpha I Am Wolfless Novel
“He better fucking not be part of this.” I snarled. “I’ll kill him twice.”
“My sentiments exactly, Joaquin.” Shawn’s words were cold and venomous.
“I need to protect my little girl.” Dietrich added as he seethed with rage.
For several moments, the five of us just stood there and let the anger and rage burn inside of us. I don’t know about the others, but I was imagining what I was going to do to this Warrick and Clovio. I was thinking that maybe dismemberment, disembowelment, and perhaps cutting them into ribbons with my claws. And that would just be a start. These were our little girls that those boys were trying to take from us. They were too young for this. They were not ready to meet their mates. They needed to give it some time, see the world, learn and grow. Maybe a few hundred years or a millennium, perhaps that would be enough time.
“What the hell happened to you lot?” Juniper asked as she came into the room with Paul and Cedar.
“You look like someone just stole the last cookie and you all wanted to fight over it.” Paul laughed.
“Shut up, moron.” Cedar snapped at him. “What happened, Joaquin? Were there more murders?” I guess our rage would lead them in that line of thinking.
“No.” I snarled out angrily.
“It has nothing to do with the case.” Noah added to the snarled words.
“My daughter Alyssa thinks that she has met her mate.” Shawn growled.
“And Rika thinks that she might have hers as well.” The others hadn’t known about Rika. Only Noah knew. This led to a whole new round of questions and snarls from Shawn, Dietrich and Shane.
“Look, I get that you’re upset, I really do.” Juniper was almost laughing at us as she spoke. “But this is going to happen. They’re getting older. They’re adults now. And that means that they are going to get their mates, have lives of their own. And they might even be getting married soon. I mean, they’re the same age that Riviana was when she mated with you, Joaquin.”
“That was different.” I snarled at her.
“Oh, OK Cujo, tell me how it was different.” She crossed her arms and looked at me with humor filled eyes.
“Riviana wasn’t my daughter, she’s my wife. And I say that my daughter is too young for this.” I gave her my reason and she started to laugh so hard that she nearly fell over.
“Ha ha ha ha ha. You have got to be kidding me. Get over it, Joaquin. You too, fang boys. They’re adults. I will be sad when my daughter tells me she is mated, but only because it means that she isn’t a kid anymore. They’re grown up. They’re on their own. Let them be.” She was trying to make us see reason, but I didn’t want to.
“She’s right, you know.” Cedar added in his sister’s defense. “They are adults, they’re going to find their mates when fate tells them that it’s time. Whether we like it or not, it’s going to happen. I have several kids, you know that. And I know that it’s going to be hard to hear when the first one comes home with their mate, but as parents that’s just what we need to deal with. They’re going to move on and live away from you eventually. The sooner that you accept that, the sooner that you can move past this and be happy for them.”
I hated that both Juniper and Cedar were trying to make me see reason. Reason was overrated in moments like this. Still, their words did have somewhat of a calming effect on us all.
“Fine. I will accept it for now. But if either of those boys hurt our girls, they’re dead.”
“Agreed.” Shawn nodded.
“Agreed.” Dietrich added as he took Shawn’s hand.
I wanted to continue to seethe in rage for the rest of the day. I felt like I was going to have a hard time just getting myself to think about anything other than killing one of those boys. Or both of them. But I also knew that I needed to settle down and get ready for the meeting. We had those computer specialists coming in soon. They were going to tell us more things and look at the information about the names in the files. It was going to be a busy day, and I knew that I couldn’t brood. But dammit, I really wanted to brood.
****
Riviana
****
I don’t know what had been going on when I walked into my office, but it had clearly been a tense moment. I didn’t care right now, as long as it didn’t have anything to do with the case, then I wasn’t interested. In fact, that was just what I told Joaquin when he started to explain what had happened in my absence.
鈥楻iviana, there is something that I need to tell you.” Joaquin had come over to me with a strange look on his face.
“Is it about the case?” I asked him without stopping as I walked toward my desk.
“No, it’s not.”
…..
“Then it can wait.” I shut him down instantly. “We’ve got other work to do right now. Reggie and Darrol will be here soon. We need to focus right now. It can wait. Tell me later.”
I had gotten word from Wayne, the pilot, that he had landed with Darrol a half and hour ago. To my knowledge he was going straight to Reggie’s and then heading over here. They were supposed to be here any moment now.
“I think that you should hear this right now, Riviana.” He was still trying to pester me about whatever that was, but I heard the ding of the elevator in the hall.
“Hold onto it for now, Joaquin. They’re here.” I turned to face the door in time to see the two people coming into the room. They were here before a lot of the others were.
Reggie was tall, slender, and beautiful. Her long brown hair fell to the middle of her back in waves. Her brown eyes matched the color of her hair perfectly. And the dark coloring of her hair and eyes made her pale complexion stand out even more.
Darrol was around the typical height for a feline shifter, just over six feet tall with a well-built physique. He had mahogany brown hair that was buzzed short on the side but was several inches long on the top. His very typically bright yellow feline eyes were practically glowing in excitement as he looked around the office. He had a large bag on each shoulder and a laptop in his arms. I could tell that he came here ready to work. That was good, I wouldn’t want to worry about having a lazy computer tech that was supposed to help me.
“Queen Riviana.” Reggie called out to me. “We’re here.”
“I noticed.” I spoke sarcastically to her in reply. I mean, clearly they were here, they were in my office, for crying out loud.