Her cold Heart

| 8 | Rat

Elijah’s P.O.V

My phone buzzed at the nightstand, flashing Trevor’s caller id.

“Hello?” I answered, still groggy and rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.

“Alright, s**t head. Where are you?” Trevor growled on the other end of the line. “Well good morning to you too.” I chuckled.

“Did you forget what day it was? We were supposed to meet dad at the packhouse like an hour ago,” he grumbled, clearly pissed off.

Dammit. In my confusion this morning, I had totally forgotten that we were meeting. My father was going to blow a gasket. He was always on me about being more responsible and taking on more responsibilities with the pack.

This probably wasn’t what he had in mind.

“I’ll take it by your silence that you forgot. You’re lucky I covered for your ass. And that micah crashed his car last night so dad had bigger fish to fry.” He chuckled nonchalantly.

“What?” I shot up in bed, “Why didn’t anyone call me? Is he okay?” I barked, shoving a hand through my hair.

Micah was our little brother and a total trouble maker.

“He’s fine,” Trevor assured me. “Might not be when dad is done with him though.”

He chuckled, from the noise in the background I could tell he was outside somewhere. “Anyway, the meeting got pushed back, you want to grab some breakfast before?”

Breakfast sounded great. If I had some food in my stomach, I might be able to think clearer. “Yeah why don’t you pick me up in 15 minutes?”

That would give me enough time to shower and get home.

“I’m already outside your house. Open up.”

“Uh, I’m not exactly at home...” I sighed, knowing the s**t storm that was about to come. Trevor was going to want to know all the details of my night when he found out I took the girl home and I didn’t want to get into it right now.

I was still licking my wounds from her untimely departure this morning.

“What? Where the hell are you?” Trevor practically yelled. Hopefully he was all the way outside my building and not just pacing around in the hallway disturbing all of my neighbours.

“I stayed at a hotel last night.” I tried to slip my clothes on as quickly as possible so I could get out of here, but Micah was relentless and I knew

he wasn’t going to let up anytime soon.

“You dirty dog.” I could almost hear him smirking on the other end of the line. “You took that girl back with you, didn’t you?

“Can we talk about this at breakfast?” I rolled my eyes.

“You did! Damn, I gotta admit I had my doubts. Was she as crazy we thought?”

chuckled to myself at the irony of this situation. She was crazy alright,

just not in the respect we thought. “Even crazier.”

“Beautiful. I can’t wait to hear all about it. Just meet me at vapi in 20 minutes,” Micah conceded.

“Fine. See you then.” I clicked the phone off and slid it into my pocket. I

gave the room a once over, making sure that I wasn’t leaving anything behind—except for my dignity, that is.

I snatched my phone out of my pocket and quickly dialed my best friend Tariq.

He was my head warrior, but his legitimate job was private investigation. It certainly seemed to work in our favor, having someone we could trust in the field.

Everyone involved with us had legitimate jobs as a cover-up for the business dealings with the pack.

“Elijah, What’s up man?” Tariq greeted as the other line picked up.

“Doing good buddy.” I waved at the receptionist on the way out of the hotel. “Hey, I’ve got a job for you though. I need everything you can find out about a girl from the club last night.”

“Is this for business or pleasure?” he teased.

“I’m not sure yet.” I laughed to myself. “Thing is, I don’t know much about her.”

“No problem. All I need is a name.”

I sighed, rubbing my temples. My silence must have given me away.

“She said her name was Bonnie, but I don’t believe thats her real name. I met her at the club so maybe try there, see if there are any credit card receipts or anything,” I offered, trying to give him something to go off on.

“I don’t need you to tell me how to do my job, bro. What does she look like?”

“Brunette, blue grey-ish eyes. 5′6 or 5′7. I Think Russian. Probably 21 or 22.”

“You just described about 30% of women in New York. This could take weeks.”

“I don’t care how long it takes.” I groaned, trying to figure out where I had parked my God damn car.

“Easy killer, I didn’t say I couldn’t do it. I’ll get on it and let you know as soon as I find anything.”

“Thanks.” I hung up before he even had time to answer and started my car.

I stopped quickly at my house and changed into a fresh set of clothes. If I was going to be seeing my dad, I at least needed to look presentable. I didn’t want to give him another reason to think I wasn’t capable of running the pack when he retired.

He had been on this kick for years. He was close to retiring so he started grooming me to make sure I would be ready when he was.

As the oldest of his three sons, I was next in line for the Alpha position.

Running one of the largest packs in the world might sound intimidating for most people, but I was born for this s**t.

I had grown up around it and there was never any doubt one day I would take over for my dad as the Alpha, and make this into my pack.

We were mostly in to running legal businesses. Providing work for pack members.

We were mostly in to stock trading trading.

Years ago, my dad tried working with other packs, but there were too many loose ends in that for us to get too involved.

That was Dumais territory and generally we stayed away

from all things Dumais. Stefano Dumais also ran a pack here in New York and they handled most of the illegal business. for other packs.

We were cordial with the Dumais pack for business purposes but they were still our rivals and we only dealt with them when we absolutely had to.

When I got to Snooze, my brother was already sitting in our regular booth in the back. We met here at least once a week, sometimes even more.

Their breakfast burritos were out of this world and that was exactly what this hangover needed. I made my way towards him and sat down on the bench across from him.

“You look like hell,” Micah asserted, sliding his coffee cup over to me.

“You need this more than I do. Dad decided to meet us here instead of the Packhouse.”

“Fantastic.” I rolled my eyes sarcastically. “That’s exactly what I need after the morning that I’ve had.”

“Was she that bad?” Trevor smirked, clearly sitting on the edge of his seat for this story. I had a feeling it was going to be slightly less detailed than what he was looking for.

“No, she wasn’t that bad actually. She was incredible. The best s*x I ever had. Absolutely mind-blowing.” I gave him a mischievous grin, knowing full well he wanted more details, but I wasn’t going to give them to him.

The waitress slid two plates in front of us with our regular orders. They knew us well around here. Trevor shot the new blonde one a wink and I made a mental note of harassing him about that later.

“Really?” Trevor arched an eyebrow. It wasn’t often I bragged about my one night stands like that. I had yet to find a girl who really did it for me like Kira.

Sure, they could get me off, but no one had made me feel as good as Bonnie had last night. I felt so ridiculous even calling her that.

I needed to put a name to that paralysingly gorgeous face. A real name.

I nodded, taking a gulp of coffee. The liquid burned my throat but I needed something to take the edge off this morning.

“I woke up this morning and she was gone. Slipped out without a f*****g word.”

“Then I’m not seeing what the problem is. You hate the morning after. Why aren’t you jumping in joy about this? She was an awesome shag and completely detached. In fact, are you sure you didn’t dream this? It seems too good to be true.” Trevor smiled slyly.

“The problem is, I’ve never been ghosted before. No one has ever walked out on me like that,” I grumbled, shoving down some of my breakfast.

“Or the problem is you actually want to see this girl again.” Trevor arched an eyebrow at me. It irked me how observant he was sometimes.

It was hopeless to try to hide anything from my brother.

“Can we just drop this please?” This was only making me more irritated. Hopefully, Tariq would have something for me soon.

“Drop what?” My father’s voice came over my shoulder. He walked around my side of the booth and slid in next to Trevor.

Gian De Lio was an intimidating man. He stood tall at 6°6" and had a piercing glare that could make a person crumble on sight. Danger and importance exuded from him and most people chase to just stay out of his way entirely.

He was a good father, but he always demanded the most out of us and only now that as an adult can I understand why. This life wasn’t for everyone and he was doing his best to prepare the three of us to continue on his legacy.

“Nothing,” I snapped, certainly not wanting to explain the entire story to my father. He would have all kinds of unsolicited opinions I wasn’t sure I could stomach this morning.

They’d probably be along the lines of me forgetting about Kira cleaning up my act and settling down with someone else. That was one of his conditions for me taking over and something I could never do.

“Don’t mind him, dad.” Trevor laughed. “He’s a little moody this morning.”

“I’m not moody. I’m dealing with a small crisis and I would appreciate a little sympathy.” I narrowed my eyes at him.

“What kind of crisis?” my dad asked suspiciously, eyeing me. I knew he was thinking this had something to do with the business.

“Oh please. You not being able to get in touch with your booty call is not a crisis.” Trevor rolled his eyes and I kicked him under the table. What the

fuck? I thought I made it clear I didn’t want to talk about this anymore? Especially in front of our father.

“Booty call?” My dad sighed heavily. “Don’t you think it’s time you grow up a little?” And there it was.

l rubbed my chin harshly, choosing my words wisely. I didn’t want to piss my dad off but I didn’t really like what he was insinuating. My s*x life was none of his business and I certainly didn’t need to curtail it in order to run a pack.

I was more than capable of it, and his assumptions were way off base.

“It’s not a big deal. We have a lot going on at the warehouse this week that I’m stressed out about. That’s all.”

My dad seemed to contemplate my words before nodding. At least that was sufficient enough for now. “Right. That’s what I wanted to speak to you both about anyways.”

“What’s going on?” Trevor asked. He was mostly in charge of shipments coming in at the dock and then transporting them to the warehouse.

Once at the warehouse, they’d be sorted and resent out to our clients. I handled the redistribution.

“I think we have a rat.”