The Duty of an Alpha (Book 2)

Grieving

Chapter 5

Arden POV*

The morning after the attack, I was sleeping on a chair in the infirmary, waiting for information about James.

Teo had performed a miracle by helping him survive the transfer to the hospital. I made it back to the pack house after the replacement team took over, carrying Marcus’s body the whole way. The two pack members I had lost that night were the first two deaths I had to handle since taking over at Alpha.

Luckily, I think, the patrolman who had lost his life didn’t have any family. It was sad to know that he didn’t have anyone waiting for him to come home each day, but it saved me from having to comfort a distraught loved one. Marcus’s only family was his mate, Amanda. By the time I made it back to my office, she was passed out on the couch, tearstains on her face.

I left a note for her to find me in the infirmary, before heading that direction. Teo had come out and gave me a small update, but since then, nothing had been said. My pack doctor was supervising Teo’s treatment for James, giving him a chance to show his skills since he would more than likely being transferring to our pack to be with his mate.

The only thing Teo had been able to tell me was that it was going to be a long recovery, and if he made it through the first 24 hours, he would likely survive. Even knowing that, I couldn’t bring myself to leave. It was unlikely that James would have any information on the rogues, but that wasn’t even the whole reason I had stayed. Losing pack members to an attack for the first time hit me harder than I expected it would, and I knew James had a mate and pups in the pack. I didn’t want to have to tell them that they had lost their father.

So I parked myself on the uncomfortable chairs in the infirmary waiting room, making a mental note to replace them with something more comfortable, and fell asleep.

Around 7 am, I was woken up by someone gently shaking my shoulder.

“Arden, what are you still doing here?” Ashton asked me. “Did you sleep here?”

I wiped the sleep from my eyes and stood up, stretching out my uncomfortably tight muscles. My eyes instantly went to the door of James’s room, but it was still closed, and only Ashton and I were in the waiting room.

“Yeah, I slept here.” I said groggily, my voice rough from sleep. “I was waiting on news about James.”

“Nothing yet, Alpha, but Teo told you last night. There probably won’t be much to tell for the next day or so. He was so messed up that even his wolf healing wasn’t doing anything for him.” Ashton said as he placed his hand on my shoulder. “You should have slept somewhere a little more comfortable. Today is already going to be a rough one without lack of sleep to add to it.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know.” I fell back into the chair, still trying to find the energy to wake up fully. “This is just a first for me. The only deaths since I took over were the ones that I caused in the challenge. I didn’t have to worry about inconsolable loved ones or giving the bad news.”

Ashton sighed and sat down with me. He slung his arm over my shoulder, letting me lean on his chest. We had a weird relationship with each other. There was undeniable trust and loyalty, and I could easily consider him a friend, but most of the time was spent getting on each other’s nerves. Rarely did we ever share emotional or comforting moments with one another. However, in that moment, he knew exactly what I needed, and I was happy to have him to lean on.

“Don’t forget, Alpha.” He whispered into the back of my head. “You are not alone. Andrea and I are here to help shoulder some of the responsibility, and Teo may not be a pack member yet, but he is here for you too. You don’t have to handle it all alone.” He kissed the top of my head in a brotherly manner, and I pulled away to look up at him.

“Thanks, Ash. I needed to hear that.” I said gratefully, not realizing how badly I needed to hear those words.

“Eh-hmmm.” Someone cleared their throat, very loudly. “Arden, you better not be trying to take my mate away from me! You know how much I’ve been looking forward to finding him.”

Ashton started laughing at the insinuation, but I just jumped up and rushed over to Teo, hoping his presence meant good news.

“How is James? Is he awake? Is he healing?” I rapid fired questions at him, ignoring the joke that he just made.

“Slow down!” Teo exclaimed, throwing his hand across my mouth to keep me from talking. “How do you expect me to answer you if you don’t shut up?”

I glared at him until he dropped his hand and nodded for him to continue when he finally did.

“James is going to make it. We aren’t sure how, but his wolf has managed to gain enough strength to start healing the worst of the injuries.” He reassured me. “It’s still going to be a long recovery for him, and he will probably need some time to process just how much damage was done, but he will live. I already asked one of the pack to inform his family, and his mate is going to be here after she drops their kids at a babysitter’s place.”

I let out the breath I had been holding and literally sagged in relief. The weight of James’s possible death had been overwhelming.

“Thank you, Teo.” I hugged him quickly before handing him over into his mate’s waiting arms.

“Not a problem, Arden. Healing is my calling, you know that.” He assured me.

I nodded at them both and started to walk away, knowing I still had to talk to Amanda about Marcus’s death.

Before I was out of earshot, I head Ashton giving Teo praises on his ability to save James’s life. Through everything that had happened, hearing the support Ashton gave to my friend was just the thing I needed to put a small smile on my face.

**

I stood outside my office door, knowing what was facing me on the other side. I had already mind linked Andrea to meet me and help me talk with Amanda, but she said she would be another 10 minutes.

I could hear Amanda pacing and sniffling inside the office and knew I couldn’t put it off until then. Squaring my shoulders, and taking a deep breath, I pushed the door open and prepared to handle the duty of being the Alpha.

“Amanda?” I called out, making her whip her head in my direction. I could sense her grief coming at me in overpowering waves, but what I didn’t expect to feel was rage. “It’s good to see that you’re awake. I was just checking in at the infirmary.”

Her face twisted into a scowl, and she turned away from me. The fury within her started to bubble up, matching the fire that her hair resembled. I wasn’t sure how to continue, since I didn’t know why she was so angry. The grief I could understand, having just lost her mate, but the rage was soon strong enough to overpower even the need to mourn. I slowly walked over to my desk, trying to give Amanda a moment to deal with her emotions as she faced the book shelf.

“This is all your fault.” She whispered in a dark tone, but didn’t turn to face me.

“What do you mean Amanda?” I asked gently, trying not to rile her up. Andrea couldn’t get there fast enough at this point.

“You.” Her voice was shaking and getting stronger. She turned to face me, her normally beautiful face contorted into a mask of fury. Her eyes were puffy from crying, and even though I knew she had slept, the bags under her eyes made it look like it had been weeks since she had any rest. “You got him killed! You took over and tossed him aside! You stripped his rank, yet he followed you anyway! He went with you to protect the pack, but you just let him die!”

I sent a quick mind link to Andrea, urging her to hurry.

“Amanda, I’m so sorry you lost him-” I started, but she didn’t want to hear it.

“I LOST HIM!?” she screamed, “YOU got him killed! It’s YOUR fault!”

Before I could even respond, Amanda started chucking books at me as quickly as she could pull them from the shelves, continuing to scream obscenities at me the whole time. I yelled for Ashton and Andrea through the mind link, telling one of them to bring sedation. I ducked behind my desk, avoiding being hit with the flying tomes, and started siphoning off of her rage. I collected the energy into my body faster than I ever had tried to before, and soon I could feel even my cells vibrating with in me.

I stood up quickly, moving fast enough that everything else was frozen in place. The books were hanging in the air, and Amanda’s face stuck mid-scream. I ran behind her, and gently pulled her arms behind her back. With how fast I was moving, any rough handling of her body would be like getting hit with a car. Even as I held her arms behind her, time still seemed to be standing still.

The energy in my body was more than I ever had held onto before, and I had no idea how to safely release it without hurting someone else.

I stood still, holding Amanda in place, for what felt like forever. I had tried to slowly and safely bleed out some of the extra energy, but everything was feeling too volatile to actually accomplish.

You have to let it out. Fae urged, coming out of her self-imposed silence after feeling how much energy was running through me.

I can’t. It will kill her. I argued, knowing Fae was right, but not sure what to do.

I didn’t say let it out in here. She sighed in exasperation. Run out side and set something on fire. Then come back and deal with her.

Fae retreated to the back of my head again, and I could have kicked myself. It was such a simple solution, but I was so high on the energy spike that I had ignored the possibility. Gently releasing Amanda’s arms, I ran out of the pack house, hoping that I was careful enough on my way through. As soon as I made it out the front door, I focused on a training dummy that Ashton had just bought for Matt and Katie.

I winced, knowing that I would never hear the end of it, but focused on releasing the energy at the dummy. Instantly, flames engulfed it, a darker and deeper color of the normal purple and blue.

As the energy left me, time seemed to come back to normal.

A few booming sounds came from behind me, suggesting I might not have been as careful as I though while running out of the pack house.

Instead of going back inside to check on everything, my eyes were drawn the rapidly approaching car. It pulled up in front of me, skidding to a stop, and the door flew open. Roman stepped out, looking frazzled, and not even having bothered turning off his car.