The Green Witch and the Alpha

Chapter 2: Ian

Should’ve thought this through more.

The warm air hit as I stepped out of the SUV and adjusted my jacket with hopes I didn’t sweat through it. Being it was late summer, it cooled down enough at night to make the mornings pleasant but still got really warm during the day. Usually, I would only wear suits for meetings in an air-conditioned offices. Today, we were going to be outside most of the time.

“You ready?” I asked.

“Yeah, let’s get this over with,” Connor replied as he started walking in front of us.

Dave looked at me, “Remind me why we’re wearing suits for this?”

“Textbook power move. We look more intimidating to a bunch of granola-making green witches this way. I want them to agree to our terms without argument. ”

He gave me a side-eye, “Last time we saw Moira, you were the one who seemed intimidated.”

“Mention that again and you’re walking back.”

Dave tried to hide the s.hit-eating grin on his face.

What I’d said was a load of crap. When I woke up this morning, I felt the need to dress well today but instantly regretted it when we got in the car. Now Dave had to bring up a conversation with Moira from three years ago. My mood shifted and I felt myself scowling. I needed to get it together. We wanted to appear strong, not frightening, while we checked out the farm owned by the witches.

Traitorous witches.

I could hear my old man’s voice in my head, spitting out his hate for witches countless times over the years. He’d bust a gasket if he could see what we were doing now. When I took over as Alpha of Hunter’s Moon, he moved to the Florida Keys; said all he wanted to do was fish and see beautiful women in bikinis all day, and that winter could “f**k right off”.

It was a good thing he’d already gone before this coven moved in. He would have pulled no punches to intimidate them into selling to our pack, not only because of his hatred for their kind but also because McEntire decided to sell the farm to someone else. We’d been after that land for years but McEntire kept turning us down. I always wondered if Dad had pissed him off about something else at some point because the old coot took too much joy in telling us no.The plan was to just wait until he died and snap up the property at auction, since McEntire’s only family was a distant cousin several states over.

Then three years ago, the old farmer decided to sell and move to a fancy community for senior citizens located in a cheaper country. He had the gall to call me a month after the sale went through.

“Tell your old man his move to Florida inspired me,” his voice rasped through the phone. “I bought a house in Belize and am going to live out my retirement in f.ucking comfort. Good luck with your new neighbors! They’re a bunch of lesbo hippies trying to build a commune or something.”

“What are you talking about, McEntire?”

“I sold my farm! Bunch of girls bought it from me. Called themselves a 'collective' and said they’re going to grow vegetables and sh.it to sell,” he chuckled dryly. “Can’t wait for your stuck-up a.ss to see the sh.it they got planned. One of them is an engineer and was surveying the land, talking about adding greenhouses and building tiny homes or some kind of sh.it. They’ll probably paint rainbow flags and sh.it everywhere.”

I paused for a minute and absorbed what he’d said.

“Thanks for letting me know, McEntire. What’s your new address? I’ll send you a card once we buy the farm from these ladies. We’ll even send you a photo of me on a bulldozer, tearing down that old house you love so much.”

McEntire lowered his voice and channeled every bit of mean that resided in his soul, “You can try, motherfucker. But these women seem pretty f*****g set on building the land up and staying, and it seems like they have deep enough pockets to do it. I didn't even think twice about selling to a bunch of carpet munchers considering they paid in cash.”

I’d had enough of his filthy, homophobic mouth; the thought of never again having to hear the hateful thoughts coming out of his rancid mouth was the silver lining to the sale of the farm. All I wanted to do now, besides tell McEntire off for the final time, was to find this “collective“ and figure out how to convince them to sell to Hunter’s Moon.

“Wish I could say it’s been a pleasure, McEntire, but we both know that’d be a lie. Don’t ever call me again.”

“Listen up, you --”

I hung up before he finished whatever nonsense was about to come out of his mouth and blocked his number.

-

It was imperative that we found this “collective” and convinced them to sell to Hunter’s Moon. The last thing we needed so close to our packlands was a whole community of humans. McEntire had been easy to manage because it was just him and his workers, and they were never there at night and stayed away from our land.

The main headache had been that the part of our property bordering his had to be a no-man’s land of sorts; no werewolves allowed. We couldn’t have human authorities poking around, investigating wolf sightings, and putting themselves and our pack members in danger. Merging this property with ours would put a larger buffer between us and the human world.

I had Carol, my assistant, reschedule the rest of my appointments for the day and texted my Beta and Gamma to come to my office. We needed to act fast; the new owners would probably be less open to selling once they started construction on the projects McEntire mentioned.

Dave, the Beta for our pack, and Connor, the Gamma, listened solemnly as I filled them in on the situation. They also hated McEntire; Dave in particular, since the old pervert had said some pretty nasty stuff to his mate once at the clinic where she worked. Security took care of him at the time, but Dave still talked about relieving the farmer of a limb or two.

“How did we not know he was selling?” Connor queried. “We have the only realty company in this area and that land is right next to the pack.”

“That’s one of the questions we need answered. He didn’t share and if I’d asked, he wouldn’t have given a straight answer anyway.”

Dave and Connor nodded in agreement, ready to get a plan together.

Connor jumped right into it.

“Sounds like they're building commercial-grade greenhouses. What about delays on the construction permits and inspections?” he asked. “If we can slow things down enough, they’ll get frustrated, want to bail, then we’ll swoop in with an attractive offer.”

Dave chimed in, “That’s not a bad idea at all. Especially if they’re planning on some income from the farm. Give me a few minutes and I’ll pull up McEntire’s financial info.”

Since he was the head of the private security company the pack owned, Dave had all kinds of tech and resources and could find information on almost anyone and anything quickly. It took him less than half an hour to get the information we needed.

“It was actually pretty easy to find,” Dave shared. “Most of it’s public record, like tax assessments and court records from employees suing for back pay. Some of it came from ex-employees griping on social media. It was easy to connect the dots and dig a little deeper.”

I motioned for him to go on and made a mental note to look up the complaints on social media later.

“His farm hasn’t broken even in years; that has to be why he decided to sell. His payroll was eating up the profits because he was too old to do any of the work and his equipment was out of date, if it was even working. He ended up cutting back on planting and maintaining the fields and from what I read, most of the farm is in pretty bad shape. Considering it’s a small farm to begin with, that meant he wasn’t turning out much product. The new folks have a lot of work ahead of them to turn it around."

I looked over the notes I’d written down, "I don't know how many people are in this group, but McEntire mentioned they have plans to build a tiny house community. The farmhouse is big, but if there are more than a half-dozen adults, it'll be uncomfortable for a long period of time without additional housing.”

Connor looked at me, “Do we have enough favors to call in to get these permits taken care of, too?”

“We should. Can you talk to the pack members who work at city hall about it?”

“Yes, I’ll go this afternoon.”

“So,” Dave continued while looking at the screen of his laptop, “if we can delay whatever upgrades the farm needs to make it profitable while making their living situation unbearable, we’ll have a desperate group of sellers ready to offload this farm. Hunter’s Moon Realty will step in to save the day, and we’ll ride off into the sunset. It seems too easy.”

“Yeah, it does,” I agreed. “The main unknowns that we need more info on are: a) how many people are in this group, and b) what’s their financial situation? McEntire mentioned they seemed to have deep pockets. Dave, can you find out where they’re moving from and who’s funding them?”

“I’m on it,” he said while he typed away.

“Connor, let me know how it goes and if I need to make an appearance down there.”

“They would crap their pants if you showed up,” he grinned. “You get more flies with honey; I’m confident my good looks and charm will get us what we need.”

Dave looked up, “Keep it in your pants this time, Connor. We don’t need any more drama added to this situation.”

Connor scoffed, placing his hand on his chest like he was offended and sarcastically said, “I would never!”

Yes, you would, I thought, and you have.

“Connor, the last thing we need is a pissed off she-wolf or human at city hall when we need their help. Keep your powers of persuasion PG.”

Connor wouldn’t put our plan at risk on purpose, but if he went into fuckboy mode without me or Dave to rein him in, there could be problems.

“I’m going to drive out to the farm and see if the new owners are around. I’d really like to know how they learned about the property being for sale in the first place, and see if this can all be avoided.” I stood and grabbed my keys and wallet.

Dave looked up from his computer, “Going to make them an offer?”

“Going to make them an offer. I’ll ask them how much they paid McEntire but just in case, can you text me once you find out?”

“Sure thing.”

I opened the door to leave and paused, “We’ll still proceed with everything as planned. Let’s follow-up tonight at the packhouse.”

They both nodded and we focused on our tasks with hope it really would be that easy.

-

Should’ve known it wasn’t going to be easy; I smelled them as soon as I stepped out of the car.

Traitorous witches, the memory of my dad’s voice saying those words seeped in.

I walked up the front steps, rang the doorbell, and waited. It was completely quiet in the house. I walked over to one of the windows and peeked in, being careful to not touch the glass. It looked like everything of McEntire’s had been cleaned out and the smell of new paint filtered through the window.

I sniffed the air again. McEntire had only talked about women being in the group but I could detect a couple of males and something familiar, but I couldn’t place it. I pulled out one of my business cards, wrote a note on the back asking them to call me, and signed it, “Alpha Balfour”. They would understand the meaning. I left it on the little table they had out for deliveries and left.

They called a few hours later. Moira, who was the head of the coven, and her son, Jimmy, would be coming to meet us at my office the next day. She offered to come to the packhouse that evening so we could meet sooner, but there was no way a witch would be allowed to set foot in the Hunter’s Moon pack. Werewolves were taught from a young age that witches were untrustworthy.

I tried to temper my expectations of what they’d look like, since my knowledge of witches came from movies and the ramblings of pack elders. While we waited, Connor claimed they kept wolfsbane in their pockets and wore all black to hide blood stains. Dave and I laughed before realizing he was serious. Then Moira walked in looking like someone’s glamorous grandma, wearing this crazy, colorful outfit, lots of jewelry, expensive sunglasses perched above her long, silver locks, and a huge smile.

“Hello, darlings! I’m Moira LaVigne, and this is my son, Jimmy,” she gestured to the tall, young guy who had walked in with her. He looked like a hipster lumberjack. Their scents were all over the place with so many herbs coming through, but I definitely detected a very faint note of weed from Jimmy.

“Good morning. I’m Ian Balfour, the Alpha of Hunter’s Moon pack. These two gentlemen are my Beta, Dave, and Gamma, Connor.”

Dave and I shook their hands, keeping our touch as brief as possible, while Connor just sat down and stared at them.

We sat and I took a closer look at their faces before we started talking. They didn’t seem threatening. Moira had two different colored eyes; her left eye was honey brown while the right was a very light green. The contrast between the two was shocking. I noticed Jimmy had the same eyes, and wondered if their eyes were tied to their powers?

Traitorous witches.

My guard went back up at the memory of my father’s words.

“Thank you for coming in to meet with us. Mr. McEntire called yesterday to inform me that a 'collective of hippies', those were his words, bought his farm. Imagine my surprise when I learned it was, in fact, a witches’ coven who purchased the land next to our pack,” I paused for a moment, then continued. “My pack elders are on my back now, worried that we have a coven of evil witches who are after our pups right on our front doorstep. They are convinced your group moved here to open a blood portal to hell that will suck us all in. As crazy as those things sound to me in this day and age, as the leader of my pack I have to ask: should they be concerned by your presence?”

Jimmy’s face remained neutral. Maybe he’s stoned, I thought.

Moira blinked slowly, “Wow, darling. There’s a lot to unpack there.”

I nodded at her to proceed.

“Mr. McEntire is not a witch, a werewolf, or any other kind of supernatural, so we explained ourselves as a farming collective, which we are, for all intents and purposes. We are not evil and we do not practice dark magic, so no one is after your pups, or any of you for that matter. We are a peaceful coven of Green Witches and Hedge Witches. We already have an online shop selling spell candles and aromatherapy items. We bought this farm because we were seeking a sustainable way of life and more control over the ingredients in our products. Our coven is also interested in opening a brick-and-mortar shop and the nearby town is full of tourists who would provide a strong flow of customers.”

She seemed sincere and everything about the business had already been found to be legit by Dave. Her heartbeat was regular, and I didn’t smell any fear or nervousness. That doesn’t mean she’s being truthful, I thought.

Traitorous witches.

From over a thousand miles away, my dad still haunted my thoughts with a warning.

Moira leaned forward, “May I ask a question, Alpha Balfour?”

“Sure.”

“If there were concerns about us being evil practitioners of dark magic, why did you come alone to our house yesterday?”

I flinched, “How did you know I was there alone?”

Her chuckle was soft and warm, “We have a doorbell camera, darling.”

“I didn’t know you were witches until I got there and scented you out.”

Her brow furrowed slightly, “Then why did you come there? I don’t see an Alpha popping over just to give new neighbors a welcome.”

“Our pack has been offering to buy that farm for years but McEntire claimed he would die there and never sell. That’s why I came to see you; we're the only realty company in this part of the state yet had no idea he'd listed it.”

Moira leaned back in her chair, “He didn’t. A little divination spell with a map led us to this area. We were able to make him a lucrative offer and helped him find his new home in Belize.”

Connor and Dave looked at me with barely disguised shock on their faces.

She continued, “My dear Alpha, I cannot read your mind but am guessing that you are about to ask us to sell. We will not. Just as you believe in the divine wisdom of the Moon Goddess, we answer to Others as well. Our coven was led to this place and we must honor that by staying and cultivating our haven. Surely, we can find a way to peacefully coexist.”

I paused for a moment. As an Alpha, I was able to read people's auras and nothing about our interaction today led me to believe these witches wanted to harm anyone. They weren't anything like the heartless tricksters described by the elders, although their stories were pretty out there and probably based on fairytales.

Every fairytale has a grain of truth, though.

Pushing that thought away, I decided to move forward with the scenario discussed with Dave and Connor at breakfast in case they refused to sell.

“I appreciate your straightforward answers, so I'll be just as forthcoming with you. We've been after that land because we can't have humans living too close to the pack. If someone were to buy it and say, build a human housing development, that could be disastrous for us. We cannot have human authorities showing up, tracking wolf sightings on our land; or have random human teenagers partying in the woods, uploading a video of a shifting werewolf onto the internet. If your coven agrees to respect our privacy and anonymity, I believe we can be unproblematic for each other.”

Moira smiled and looked at Jimmy before turning back to me.

“However,” I continued, “my people are distrustful of witches. Not that I believe any of those stories mentioned earlier, but some of the elders, including my own father, have had negative experiences with your kind. This is what I propose: we will stay off your land, and you will stay off ours. I’ll speak with the pack and make sure everyone understands we are to be cordial to each other when in town and to not engage.”

She nodded in agreement, but her smile fell away to a solemn expression. “I understand. That sounds like the best scenario until your pack accepts that we are not stealing pups and summoning demons.”

We all stood and I walked around the desk to escort them out. When she held out her hand, I grabbed it without thinking.

“Oh,” Moira sucked in a breath sharply and then turned her two-toned eyes to me, holding my gaze. Her hand gripped me with more strength than I expected. The air around us crackled.

She held onto my hand and stared into my eyes.

“Mr. Alpha, she is close.”

“Who is close?”

“Your moon mate. No, that’s not the word. Your Luna.”

I felt a chill run over my body, and was unable to pull away from her gaze.

“She is close. The one the Moon Goddess chose for you; your fated mate,” she leaned closer and whispered, “your babygirl.”

I stood there frozen, unable to form any intelligible words at the moment. Moira dropped her hand suddenly and turned to leave.

“Stop whoring around so much, and you will find her,” she called over her shoulder while walking away with Jimmy, who had the audacity to wink at me.

Moira’s outburst unsettled me. All I could think was what my dad would say at this moment.

Traitorous witches.

-

Since that meeting three years ago, a bland sense of peace had taken place between the coven and our pack. The witches kept to themselves unless they were in town at their shop or the bakery they opened. Members of my pack bought their candles and baked goods, and some of them probably bought weed from Jimmy. But for the most part, we just stayed away from each other.

Then last week, Moira called. The coven wanted to expand and wondered if we would sell a few acres of our land that bordered theirs. I told her no, but proposed we go into business together. They could use our land for their expanded operations if they hired pack members and gave us some of their edible crops. We had recently absorbed another pack and this would help us with jobs for the new folks while cutting back on the pack’s food expenses.

The elders jumped on me about it and threatened to call my dad, like he would fly up here to keep his 32-year old son in line. Dave and Connor each gave me an earful about it, too, but once I explained my reasoning they calmed down for the most part. I used the old line about "keeping your enemies closer", which seemed to alleviate any lingering concerns. Even so, I didn't really consider these witches as enemies. For three years, they'd never given us a reason to view them as a threat.

The three of us came here to check out their operations and meet the rest of the coven before we finalized the contract. We were waiting to begin the introductions on the back porch of the main house after an odd encounter by the greenhouses that left me feeling unsettled.

Moira walked over and explained that there would be a few stragglers, but she wanted to get started. She introduced me, Dave, and Connor, then turned to introduce her group.

That’s when it hit me; the feeling of electricity crawling over my skin. My mate…my Luna…the one I’ve been waiting so long for, was here. I started sniffing the air for a scent and walked toward the steps as I followed it.

I spotted her, a curvy blonde with glasses and hair pulled up, as she looked at me from the bottom of the stairs. She had a perplexed look on her face; it was adorable.

Without any hesitation, I jumped down and landed right next to my mate. She took a step back from me. My wolf side started to take over; I had to have her.

“Mine!” I growled out, and placed my hand on the back of her neck before I pulled her in for a kiss. All I could think about was how sweet her lips tasted and how much I enjoyed the feel of her soft body against mine.

I gently released her and stepped back to look at her beautiful face.

That's when I felt the slap.