The Alpha's False Mate

CHAPTER 6: Lavine's Initiative

Lavine's POV

“Tell me what you need.”

I repeat my sentence since she doesn’t seem to understand when I first said it. However, she remains unresponsive. Her sobs are gripping my heart like pincers while her coffee almond eyes emit tremendous loneliness. My words might have been too much for her to take in. I feel a little guilty for poking fun at her. She jerks her chin off my fingers, obviously mad at me. I stand up and offer a hand to her. But instead of taking it, she gets to her feet on her own while drying her tears with the back of her hands. She holds her gaze down, avoiding my stare. Then, she turns around and pushes her trolley back to my living room. I trail from behind and just study her next move. The silence is too deafening so I have to halt it.

“Are you just gonna ignore me?”

She stops wiping the glass center table then angles her petite figure towards me. With her gaze still on the floor, she responds,

“I’m sorry if that’s how I make you feel but I’ve already wasted a lot of time and I haven’t scrubbed a single dust. Now, if you please excuse me. I still have other rooms to clean.”

I click my tongue at her response. Her audaciousness to speak to me as if we’re equal is unbelievable. She really said that after kneeling down and begging to retain her job. If only I didn't know what she’s going through, I’d really fire her right here, right now. As a CEO of a multi-billion company and as an alpha of one of the strongest and largest packs on the planet, nobody dares to speak to me the way she does. Luckily, my coolheadedness strikes down my irritation. There’s no point in arguing with someone who’s not even related to me. Besides, I have important things I need to attend to and dealing with her isn’t one of those. When she diverts her attention to the table again, I don’t bother her anymore and just stride out of my suite. Just when my two gammas are about to follow me, I wave a hand at them.

“I can go wherever I want safely,” I say while peering through the still open doors. “The woman inside, she needs protection more than I do.”

My gammas glance at each other. Once the doors behind them are shut close, I explain in a hush voice, making sure that my employee wouldn’t hear a thing.

“The woman inside is Cloette Gil. She’s attacked by Kobe Chua last night in his wolf form. Make sure you follow her everywhere she goes just until her shift ends. I don’t want blood spilling in my building.”

“Roger that.”

I tilt my head to show my appreciation at their response. While I take steps away from them, I bring my phone out of my pocket and dial Clark’s number. Like always and what should be, he answers my call after two rings.

["Mr. Acosta, this is Clark speaking."]

“I need you to do a background check on Cloette Gil.”

Clark doesn’t respond and all I could hear is his breath. I’m certain that he wanna question my order but doesn’t have the balls to do so. He has, without a choice but, to bite his curiosity and do as I command. Needless to ask whether he understood me or not, I drop the call and enter the VIP elevator which is exclusively used by me and my gammas. My eyes are affixed on the glass door that’s transparent from the inside and reflective on the outside. As the numbers on the floor designator go down, the unhappiness in Cloette’s eyes boggles me. I’ve never seen such a lonely person like her. I thought I was the loneliest when Olivia, my most precious, almost got killed. I draw out a stiff sigh, giving it my all to forget that fearful night. With that heavy burden in my chest, reaching the second floor feels like eternity. I keep glancing at my gilded wrist watch, trying to skew away my focus to something else. The heaps of fret I have dissipate when the elevator says, “second floor.”

Not wasting a single second, once the glass door slides open, I hurriedly make my way towards my destination - the conference room where I’ll meet the heads of my empire who are also the betas of my pack. I’m still a few feet away from the room and I could already smell a pungent sandalwood scent. There’s no doubt he's here. I stop for a moment to relax my nerves. Just when I’m ready and before I could take a step forward, my father, Russell Acosta, gets out of the conference room.

“Lavine, my son, I haven’t seen you in a while. I went to your house but found out that you’re currently staying here. So, I paid you a visit.”

The deep lines on the corners of his mouth appear when he grins. He spreads his arms sideways while ambling through the corridor towards me. Pretending that I’m excited to see him, I walk forward then imprison him in my arms.

“Did I worry you?” I ask.

“No, you don’t. I’m pretty sure that wherever you are, your luna is taking care of you, shunning you away from insignificant stuff.”

As one should expect, my father is here to not really check on me but to prosecute me about Olivia.

Unsurprisingly, he asks, “So, when do you plan to introduce her to the pack?”

I wet my lips to make sure that my lie will glide as exquisitely as possible. “Soon.”

Father breaks our embrace then clutches my arms. I try my best to maintain eye contact without giving so much of my thought. His pupils dilate and his mouth purses into a thin strip of disapproval. That expression provokes a foolish promise from me.

“On your 60th birthday, I’ll introduce her to you.”

I wanna kick myself for spitting those dull-witted words. I have to say something so I wouldn't completely lose his trust. Otherwise, he might figure out what he shouldn’t. I still consider myself lucky for Olivia isn’t a member of our pack so nobody aside from a few of my trusted men have seen her.

Father’s red agonizing eyes brighten up and his lips curve again. He says,

“Son, my proudest moment as your father is when you inherit my rank as the main alpha of the Black Celestial Pack. I could never ask for more once that day comes.”

His words are nothing of encouragement. They’re like cleaver, splitting me to pieces like rotten meat. He never fails to remind me about ‘his proudest moment’, the very reason why my courage dwindles significantly when it comes to telling him the truth.

Still showing his perfectly white teeth, he softly slaps my arm and says, “I expect to meet your luna in two weeks time.”

Unable to find any more words to respond, I force a smile instead. The brittleness of my smile sends discomfort in my jaw. It trembles a little. Good thing, I’m already facing my father’s back as he returns to the conference room. I brush my bangs off my forehead several times, searching for relief in doing so. My heart is incessantly not at ease from the time I enter the room and even during someone is speaking in front of us, explaining some business related things. I keep shifting my weight on my oversize leather chair whenever the promise I had made to my father crops up in my mind. I can’t concentrate to the point that not a single word spew in this meeting registers in my head. As soon as the meeting is over, I stand up then tap my father’s shoulder and whisper,

“I’ll go on first, see you soon.”

He nods. I don’t return his smile which I don’t care whether he notices or not. What I want now, is to get out of his presence and recalibrate my plan about my luna. She needs to wake up before my father’s birthday. If she doesn’t, then that’ll leave me no choice but to tell the truth about her condition and kiss the main alpha rank goodbye. Soon after I position myself in front of the VIP elevator, Clark hits my phone up.

“What’s up?”

[“Mr. Acosta, I already have what you’re asking for.”]

“That was fast!”

I immediately press the elevator’s call button when my peripheral vision captures my father getting out of the massive wooden door together with our pack members. Without a delay, I step inside and ferociously press the call button over and over again, making sure he wouldn’t have enough time to catch up with me. I’m apparently aiming my irritation at this poor little lifeless thing. It's better this way though, instead of aiming it to myself or to somebody else. Once the door closes and the elevator speaks, ‘going down’, that irritation subsides a bit.

“Tell me about it.”

Clark, who’s patiently waiting on the phone, answers, [“There’s nothing much to know about Cloette Gil… most that I found out are about her debts.”]

“Go on.”

[“She was a senior student of BS Tourism Management in Lyceum of the Philippines University. Due to the unfortunate event that involved her father, she was forced to drop out of school and work in your company. She has unpaid tuition fees of around Php 80,000. Also, her father is in a coma for about six months now. And just yesterday alone, a new Php 102,085 was added to his hospital bill.”]

“Where does she live?”

Clark is silent for a moment. Even if he doesn’t tell, I sense that his curiosity is getting underneath his skin. Rather than laying out my reason why I asked such a question, I'd let his curiosity eat him alive.

I ask again with exaggeration in my tone, “Where does she live?”

[“Right! Uhm… she lives at… Uhm…”]

His stutter triggers my impatience to rout me. I interrupt, “Never mind. I’ll figure it out myself.”

[“My apologies, Mr. Acosta. I didn’t realize that you’d be interested in that information too.”]

Habitually, I end the call when I don’t have anything to say or ask. When the elevator reaches the ground floor, I go straight to the garage but before I could get near my Ferrari, a couple of my gammas tail me.

“Did I instruct any of you to follow me?” I ask, losing my capability to hide my annoyance well.

“We can’t leave you alone. The wolf which attacked you is still on the hunt.”

I roll my eyes then walk past them but the thumps of their feet echo in my ears so I turn to them and say with a clench jaw,

“I wasn’t attacked. And if ever I will be, I can protect myself. So I’m ordering you to back off.”

Normally, when I command something to them, they’ll obey in a heartbeat. Even so, there’s only one instance that they’ll go against me… and that’s whenever my father intervenes. He’s the main alpha after all. Therefore, our pack members are more loyal to him than to me. Worry... no, more like perturbation wriggles every inch of my burning muscle. If father knew about the wolf attack, then there’s a chance he also knew where it took place. He can’t find out my purpose in the hospital.

My eyes crinkle while I ask, “Who told father about the attack?”

When no one speaks, I grab the collar of one of them then say between by gritting teeth, “If you continue to report everything I do to my father, I’ll have you hang once I become the main alpha of our pack.”

That threat of mine is adequate to demolish their poise. I let go of my grip on my gamma’s collar and, without turning back, slump myself at the driverseat of my car. Frustration cloaks my entire being which causes me to hit the steering wheel with both my arms then clench my fists tight. Not all my gammas have knowledge about my business in St. Luke’s Hospital. Only the most loyals to me, whom I can fully trust, know about Olivia’s condition. I lean my head on the headrest for a while, appeasing the growing tension in my chest by trusting my gut-instinct that my father isn’t aware of my secret… yet.

I have no idea how long I’ve closed my eyes and rest inside my car but the moment the subtle jasmine scent prods my nostril from somewhere, my eyes open. I lower down my car’s glass and angle my view to the three gammas, who are still standing a few feet from me.

“Don’t you dare forget what I said. I mean it.”

My reminder is like a poison that paralyzes them and its only antidote is their obedience to me and only me. I drive out of the garage and follow the scent, Cloette’s scent. I’ve never pitied anyone as much as I do to her. She needs any help she could get. Otherwise, she might attempt to kill herself again. So I’d take the responsibility of saving her until she gets her life back.

"Why do I feel the need to prioritize her over my own issue?"

For now, I don't have the answer to my question. But in the darkest part of my heart, I feel that she'll return my kindness one day.