The Alpha's Selkie Mate

Chapter 10

“How good of you to finally join us,” Kiran sneered the moment Jackson waltzed through the door to Walker’s pokey office, a good twenty minutes after he was supposed to be there.

Not that anyone but Kiran was bothered about that.

Kiran leaned against the office’s only window, arms and ankles folded. As always, his back was to the corner of the room. It was his favorite spot, given that he was well placed to glare at his least favorite member of the Hoarfrost pack.

He might have looked relaxed but Walker could see the tension around the male’s simmering eyes; something about being inside made Kiran twitchy as f**k.

And twice as irritable.

Something Jackson was always ready to take advantage of.

“Were you made of the same stuff as the rest of us, lizard, you’d understand,” Jackson grinned, flopping his big-ass body into the chair directly across from Walker’s. The legs squealed in pain when Jackson leaned back, clasping his hands behind his buzzcut skull.

Kiran sniffed at the air, grimacing.

Between that, and Jackson’s smug-as-all-hell face, Walker knew exactly what Kiran could smell. He didn’t need a working nose for that.

Jackson tutted at Kiran, his grin widening. “You don’t just leave a sweet-as-sugar she-wolf wanting in your bed. That’s bad for the reputation.”

And what a reputation it was.

Jackson’s appetites – food, drink, and females – were just as big as the rest of him. He was the epitome of a healthy, virile male. Everyone knew it, too.

When his would-be conquests weren’t knocking him flat on his ass, of course. Walker fought back a smile as the memory of the night before flashed into his mind. It wasn’t often – probably not since they were pups – that Jackson ate dirt.

Walker still had no idea how she’d managed it.

And he wasn’t about to ask Jackson how it’d gone down exactly either. He’d sooner smash his own face into the wall a few times, because if he didn’t do it himself, Jackson was sure to.

“Yes, yes. We’re all aware of your disgusting reputation.”

“Precedes me, yeah?”

Walker couldn’t remember a time when he’d seen Kiran so much as look at a female. Or a male, if that was his thing. Maybe wolves weren’t to his taste.

Perhaps he simply didn’t have a taste.

Kiran had been with the pack for decades but he wasn’t exactly…a part of it. He’d been with his family for as long as he could remember, always there to lend his parents a hand or spar with his brothers, but Walker didn’t know how he’d ended up in such a position.

He’d already been there when Walker was born.

Most people gave the male a wide berth, but surely one or two females had tried to bed him, if only for curiosity's sake?

Either way, Kiran just…wasn’t interested.

Kiran snorted before drawling, “‘Tis a wonder that massive head of yours fits through—”

The two of them could go on like this all day if he let them, sniping back and forth at each other until they were squaring up to come to blows. Honestly, it was a miracle that one of them hadn’t killed the other already. The last thing they needed was another f*****g disaster.

The throbbing in his temple hadn’t ebbed since his disastrous visit to Bellwether Farm either and the two of them were only going to make it worse. He couldn’t remember ever having a hangover this bad. Not even after the accident that had stolen his sense of smell.

No way he wanted to sit here and listen to this s**t when his head was trying to split itself open.

What Walker wanted was to go to Lilah and beg for one of her few painkillers.

But he wouldn’t.

The pack needed those meds more than he did.

Besides, he had too much stuff to get through.

There was always something to do.

None of which included sitting about listening to these two bicker like an old divorced couple. “Knock it off,” he snapped, all too aware that he sounded more like a tired old school teacher than the leader of this Pack.

"As you say, o' mighty alpha," Jackson swept his arm out in a mocking bow that made Walker want to gnash his teeth. "So. What's so terrible that you felt the need to drag us out of our beds--"

The door opened a peek, allowing a slender, blonde female to dart in. Her cheeks were wind-chapped around her bright smile. "Sorry, I'm late."

Quick as you like, Jackson’s s**t-eating grin warped into a vicious sneer, even though he kept his eyes front and center. Right on Walker, who sat across the desk from him. Not even a generation ago, that look would have been taken as a challenge.

But Walker knew better than that.

Jackson simply wouldn’t look at Willow.

“It’s fine, we haven’t started yet,” Walker said, smiling wanly at her in return. Until guilt slammed into him and it melted off his face. One of his people was dead. It didn’t matter how infectious Willow’s bubbly personality was, he shouldn’t be smiling at anything.

Nor should he have had to remind himself of that.

Sighing and leaning back in his chair, ignoring the loose spring that dug into his tailbone, he asked, “Anything to report?”

Even Willow’s smile flickered. Like a candle caught in the breeze.

“Nothing.” Willow shook her head, coming to perch on the edge of the desk nearest Kiran. She ran her fingers through her wheat-colored hair in an attempt to untangle the snags.

She ignored Jackson just as thoroughly as he ignored her.

“There can’t have been nothing.”

“Just the usual deer and rabbit tracks.” She winced as her fingers caught in one particularly nasty-looking knot. They’d have to keep an eye on those tracks, to bolster their supplies for the winter. “Nothing near the forest where he was found.”

That f*****g forest.

Even the animals avoided it.

“I thought as much.” Walker sighed and pinched the pressure building behind his nose.

How could a male die like that and there be no sign of it? Willow had the best sense of smell in the pack; if she said there wasn’t a trail for them to follow, then there wasn’t a trail. It just didn’t make any sense.

Whatever had killed John must have left some trace behind.

Everything left an imprint on the world.

“Has anyone heard from Lilah?”

Kiran and Willow shook their heads. “She’s been holed up in the morgue since we brought him in,” Willow smiled apologetically. “She’s locked the door.”

No one was surprised to hear this. Woe unto anyone who disturbed that female whilst she was working.

“Without her report, the only thing we have to go on is Bellwether’s frequent trips away from their homestead.” And the only person who might know anything about that had locked herself up in her room. Walker looked at Kiran and Willow. “We need to know where he was going and what he was up to.”

It was the only way they might find out who, or what killed him.

Walker decided that if Leandra still wouldn’t see him tomorrow, then he’d ask Willow to go in his stead. The widow might do better with another female to talk to, and there was no one he trusted more than Willow to handle such a delicate situation.

If John was gone for days at a time, then he could have traveled further than they’d initially thought. Did the speed of their wolf-form negate the fatigue of hovering on the edge of starving? John was a determined male, it might not have stopped him.

In those days he could definitely have traveled to the nearest human settlement? Had he been looking for ways to improve his farm or was he just trying to escape the life, the hand, he’d been dealt?

It wasn’t exactly forbidden to leave pack land, but it wasn’t encouraged either. Leaving opened everyone up to danger. His people were wary of the outside world and kept to themselves. Which is why the world had moved on and left them all behind.

He supposed that’s what happened when you’d been hunted for centuries.

This was nothing more than speculation, of course. There was no way for any of them to know for sure what Bellwether had been up to. It wasn’t like he was around to tell them and it had been generations since a healer – a wolf with no form but unknown magicks, kind of like a shaman who could have coaxed the dead to talk – had been born to them.

“As riveting as all of this is,” Jackson drawled, sticking his legs out and aiming to set them atop Walker’s desk. “Is anyone going to fill me in? If not, I have better things to do with my time.”

He quickly dropped his booted feet when Walker glared at him, crossing them at the ankles instead.

“We all know what you’d rather be doing,” Kiran muttered under his breath, making Willow burst out laughing.

When Jackson’ growled, low enough that a human would have missed it, she rolled her eyes at him.

Blue eyes, almost the same pale shade as Jackson’s.

“Are you laughing at me, you little runt?”

She laughed again, louder this time as she showed all of her perfect teeth. “And so what if I am? You going to do something about it, big brother o’ mine?”

Jackson might be the biggest male in the pack, but Willow was by far the fastest of anyone. A fight between them would only be one of attrition, and he wasn’t sure which of them would tire first.

Though he knew who he’d root for.

But still, he wasn’t about to find out the answer to that today either.

Before Jackson could get on his feet, Walker snapped, “Enough.”

Willow immediately lowered her eyes, contrite save for the smirk still on her mouth, dipping her head in acknowledgment of the order.

Slower to follow, the muscle in the corner of Jackson’s jaw ticked as his head barely tilted down towards his chest.

“John Bellwether is dead.”

“Who?”

Walker’s eyes fluttered closed in response to his cousin’s question.

“He owned the farm out by the eastern forest,” Kiran said from his place in the corner. Walker didn’t need to look to know he was sneering, his words dripped with disdain.

"Well, no wonder he's dead. It was only a matter of time before he met his end, setting up shop out there."

"Your empathy is touching," Willow said with an equal amount of disgust.

"He's a nobody; a farmer. His type is a dime a dozen," Jackson argued as he leaned forward in his seat towards Walker, bracing his forearms on his thighs. "Cursed or no, someone will have to take over the farm immediately. The next harvest depends on it."

Snorting, Kiran drawled, “And I’m sure you think you’re just the male for the job.”

"Seeing as I'm the one that keeps our people from outright starving? Yeah, I think I'm the perfect male for the job.” He was still looking at Walker, almost ignoring Kiran entirely. “I can take it over today."

The thought of Jackson barging into the homestead and turning a grieving Leandra out of her only refuge made him feel faint. They’d have no choice but to go, even if little Tern was kicking at his ankles. Pack rules might constrain them but they also kept them safe.

"Goddess but you're a callous bastard," Willow said, nose crinkling. "Leandra has just lost her husband and now you want to take her home from her too? His body is barely cold."

"You always were weak," Jackson shot back quickly. "Taking over that farm is for the good of the pack. Without that harvest, our people won't make it through the winter. Do you want more people to die just to spare the feelings of some she-wolf?"

"And what's to say that Leandra couldn't run it?" Willow had crossed her arms, one brow arched.

“She’s a female,” Jackson said around an affected yawn. It was a wonder he even deigned to speak to her at all. “It’s tradition.”

"So is petitioning for the plot. I don't see you tripping over yourself to observe that particular tradition,” Kiran said. At the same time, Willow countered, “I’m female and the head of our hunting party, traditions aren’t set in stone.”

Jackson stood with a low growl. “A mistake that should have been overturned years ago, if anyone had sense. A runt like you leading our best is an insult to—”

Kiran took a step towards Jackson, standing by Willow’s shoulder. “Are you questioning your alpha?”

Late alpha, Walker corrected in his mind. It had been his father that had given Willow the position, making her the first head huntress. It hadn’t been a popular decision, but no one could deny that Willow got the job done. Plus, she had the best sense of smell he’d ever heard of.

Speaking of smell, he noticed that she sniffed at the air.

Just looking at Kiran’s face was enough to tell him that the room was filling with the faint scent of smoke. Not woodsmoke, like a bonfire, but something else. Something much older.

“Last time I checked, lizard, I hadn’t sworn an oath,” Jackson said in a low voice. “Isn’t that right, cousin?”

Enough was enough; that was toeing the line of being a direct challenge. And that was where he drew the line. With a growl in his throat, Walker slowly said, “Choose your next words carefully.”

Weighing his options, Jackson’s eyes hopped to each of them in turn. “Or what,” he rolled his big shoulders. “Are you so weak that you need your pet to defend your maidenly honor—”

A loud bang erupted in the hallway outside the door, interrupting Jackson’s challenge. A low grunt was quick to follow.

“What the hell was that?”