Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 87848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
“And do you have a plan to do so?”
“Several,” she says. “I rarely think of anything else, if I am to be honest. I come to the pack dinners and I see them eating and carrying on as if nothing has happened. Nobody cares what they do. The pack seems to adore them. The worse they act, the more they seem to be worshipped. The girl killed someone in the village for amusement, and there are two fresh graves in the cemetery that don’t belong to any of the pack.”
I am bound to report genuine threats to the alpha, as he is the closest to an authority in a pack system. This is starting to sound very much like one. Of course, I would be reporting her to the man she is afraid of.
“Do you intend on carrying one of these plans out?”
She looks out the window for a moment, then back at me. “I hope to gather the strength.”
“We can work on processing your grief and moving forward.”
“Hmm,” she says. “Yes.”
“I’d like to see you again tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow? I thought therapy was once a week.”
“It’s as often as I deem necessary.” And you might kill someone, or get yourself killed trying. I don’t add that last bit, but it is my main concern. The body count around this pack is disturbingly high.
When she is gone, I go and find the alpha. He is in his office, discussing matters of business with his advisors. He seems very competent when it comes to handling the day to day of the pack. I hear positive murmurings around the financial wealth of the collective, which covers for a lot of personal sins.
I knock on the door. Armand looks up at me, and an expression of annoyance flits over his handsome face. He is not good at hiding annoyance. He doesn’t seem to think it is necessary.
“I need to speak with you, alpha. It is a matter of some urgency.”
“Give us a few minutes,” Armand says to his friends and advisors. He sends them off with a wave to a side study. I note they are all male. The pack’s female influences seem limited, which is not a sign of health.
“I thought I was done talking to you,” he says when they are gone.
“This isn’t about you. Well, it is, but not in the usual way. I’m not talking to you as a client. I’m talking to you as an alpha, because a matter of pack security has come to my attention. A woman named Jenny Duplante came to see me.”
“Oh.”
“Yes. She believes you murdered her husband.”
He nods and shrugs slightly. “She’s right about that.”
“She also says you’ve made no attempt to make amends. She is afraid for her financial security, and deeply mourning her mate.”
He frowns, as if those feelings make no sense to him.
“The man was bad news. She’s better off without him.”
“She doesn’t feel that way, and I’m afraid she might do something regrettable.”
“Like what?”
“She wants to kill you.”
It takes several minutes for Armand to stop laughing. “You’ve seen the woman. She’s not a threat.”
“As you are well aware, women are often more dangerous than they appear, and they are always a threat,” I say. “But do with the information as you will. I’ve held up my end of the bargain. You’ve been warned.”
“Thank you,” he says. “I do need to give her some assurance she’ll be taken care of. I thought she would have known that. No member of our pack will be destitute.”
I could walk out the door. I don’t owe him anything else. I’ve done what I need to do. But I find myself staying behind.
“I’m worried about you, Armand.”
“I know. But you don’t need to worry about me. I’m the alpha of this pack. I’m in control.”
He’s a handsome young alpha, and yes, he’s in control, but he has a lot on his plate. He seems to lack any guidance from older pack members since his father retired. Having been born relatively late in his father’s life, the old man was never of much use to him. He is a prince with the intelligence to manage the pack, but his emotional intelligence is not keeping up.
“Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t look at me like that, like you’re understanding me.”
“Heaven forbid.”
“I’ve got this. I’ll deal with Jane.”
“Her name is Jenny.”
“Right. Sorry. Of course. Yes.”
“You should know the name of the woman who wants you dead, Armand.”
He smirks, handsome and reckless. He is a decade older than his mate, but what they say about men maturing slower than women is so clearly true in this moment. He seems almost as wild as she is right now.
“Women have wanted me dead before. It’s not as interesting as it seems. Most females don’t actually try. Beatrix might, but Jane… Jenny, she was happy to be pushed around by old Duplante. She’s not going to suddenly get a backbone now.”