The Alpha’s Pen Pal (Crescent Lake Book 1)
The Alpha’s Pen Pal: Chapter 42

WESLEY

“Rogues?” I asked, blinking. “We haven’t had issues with rogues in years. Haven’t even had any sightings of them in this area.”

“Did they attack?” Reid asked, his body tense and his arms crossed.

Dad grabbed his tablet and pulled up the map of our lands. “No, they crossed onto our territory here,” he said, pointing out a spot at the southern edge of the map.

I breathed out a sigh of relief that they were in the opposite direction from the route Haven would have taken to head back to the city. “They walked along the border for less than half a mile, and then they left the territory.”

“Where are they now?” Sebastian asked, looking at the map over my shoulder.

“Less than a mile from our border,” Dad said.

“What are they doing?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he said with a shrug. “They’re just camped out. I’m unsure if they’re scoping out the area, waiting to attack, or maybe just passing through? The scouts I sent out only got close enough to check their location, but I told them not to linger or engage with them.”

“Why’d you need Reid and me then?” Sebastian asked.

“Because I know you will be able to get a better read on them than anyone else in the pack. Be able to discern whether they’re just passing through or if they’re here to do some damage to the packs in this area.”

Sebastian nodded, his eyes glinting for a second at our father’s praise, but he didn’t alter his demeanor at all. My dad was right, though. Seb was the most intuitive and observant pack member we had. He just had a way of reading people and situations that was unmatched by even our most seasoned warriors and trackers.

Reid spoke up then. “And you called me because…?”

“Because I knew Wesley was busy with Haven, and Nolan was probably spending time with Rachel since it’s technically Nolan’s day off.”

“How’d you know I was—uh—busy?” I asked.

“I saw her car in front of your house early this morning when I went for a run,” Dad said, his lips twitching.

“Thanks,” I muttered, running my hand through my hair.

“I could have been with a lady,” Reid pointed out.

“I thought you don’t do sleepovers?” Seb reminded him.

“I don’t. I’m just saying I could have, that’s all.”

“But you weren’t.” Dad chuckled.

“So I was the last choice.”

“Third choice,” Sebastian corrected.

“I’m failing to see the difference.” Reid frowned, shaking his head.

“There is the entire rest of the pack that I didn’t ask,” Dad said, clapping him on the shoulder. “So, third choice.”

“I can go with them now,” I told him. “Since Haven went back to town.”

“All right,” he agreed. “I would like to speak to you alone for a moment first, though, before you head out.”

I nodded, crossed my arms, and stood there, waiting as everyone else left.

“Do you need to talk about it?” he asked me once the door shut again, raising a brow.

“Not really,” I told him, even though that was the whole reason I’d barged into his meeting in the first place. “It will work itself out.”

It had to.

“Are you sure about this—about this plan of pretending to follow through with this agreement?”

“Honestly? No. But you said yourself you’ve been looking for an in. This is it. We might never replace another option to get an in-depth look at his records and the workings of his businesses. We need this.”

“You need to be careful, Wes. You need to get any trace of Haven’s scent off of you and out of your house and your truck,” he said.

My lycan growled in displeasure at that suggestion. I had to hold in my own snarl as well.

My dad was right, but the thought of erasing any trace of her scent did not sit well with me. But I had to do it if I wanted to convince Timothy that Nicole would be my one and only once the agreement went through. Not that it would go through. But still.

“Also, you won’t be able to contact Haven until we’re one hundred percent done with this farce,” he added. “We don’t know if Timothy has eyes on or in our pack. We can’t risk drawing any more attention to her than is already on her. That means you need to be careful about sending Nolan or anyone else to watch her, and you can’t be sneaking out to get a glimpse of her.”

I ground my teeth together at his words, at the alpha order underneath them. It burned my biscuits that he knew what I had been thinking I could do to make sure she was safe until this bullshit was over.

“You good?” he asked, raising a brow at me.

“I’m fine,” I spat. “We’ll be done with this by the end of the weekend, anyway.”

“And if we’re not?”

I sighed, pushing the question away because I wasn’t ready to even consider that as an option.

“I’m not going to worry about that until I have to.”

**********

“You really do reek of Haven and sex,” Reid said as we made our way through the trees towards where the rogues were camped out.

We kept our steps light, our eyes cast downward to avoid sticks and crackling underbrush.

“I know,” I replied, working to keep the smug, self-satisfied grin off my face.

My lycan didn’t care, though. He preened in my head, happy to keep her jasmine and sweet fruit scent on us for a bit longer.

“How many times did she give it up to you?” Reid asked, smirking. I cocked a brow at him but said nothing. “Is she a screamer? I feel like she would be a screamer. The quiet ones always are.”

Before I could even think about it, I had him up against a tree, my forearm pressing into his throat. I got right up in his face, my chest heaving and my lycan pushing forward, my lips curling and a growl ripping out of my body.

“WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY ABOUT HER?” I roared out, releasing my alpha aura into the forest, emphasizing my words with a thrust of my arm against his Adam’s apple.

“I was just—”

“How dare you disrespect her like that!” I exclaimed, slamming him back against the tree again. “She’s not just a fling!”

“I’m sorry!” he cried, tilting his head as best he could to bare his neck to me.

“If all goes well, if she agrees, then she will be your luna!”

“I know, I know! I love Haven!” I growled again, baring my teeth at him. “As a friend! Just as a friend, Wes!”

“Reid, you’re an idiot,” Sebastian grumbled from behind me. His hand touched my shoulder, and I tensed, ready to pounce on him if needed. “Wes, you can’t kill Reid. First of all, I’m sure he didn’t mean to disrespect Haven. And second of all, he’s your beta.”

“I could replace another one,” I growled.

“You could,” Seb agreed, “but do you want to?”

I grunted, and stood there with Reid still pushed against the tree trunk, my eyes boring into his and my aura pulsing out of me in waves. He tilted his head even more and averted his eyes.

I leaned forward again and whispered, “I swear to the Goddess, if you EVER disrespect her again, I will not hesitate to do permanent damage to your body.” I lowered my eyes, looking down towards his favorite body part.

“Yes, Alpha,” he murmured, his thighs clenching together.

I growled once more and slammed him against the tree again for good measure, then let him go and kept walking.

“That was really stupid,” Sebastian said to Reid as they fell into step behind me. “Like, really, really stupid,” he repeated.

“I was just happy he finally got laid,” Reid muttered. “I wasn’t trying to insult Haven. Just celebrate that they took the next step. We all knew they both wanted it,” he grumbled.

I turned and shot him a glare, a small snarl on my lips.

“What? We did! It was fucking obvious how bad you wanted to—” He paused and glanced at my unamused face and thought better of whatever he’d been about to say. “Well, anyway, I just meant I’m happy for you,” he said, looking down at the ground.

I turned back to the front and let out the smile I’d been holding in while staring him down. As tactless as his delivery was, he didn’t intend to harm.

And I had to admit, he wasn’t wrong. I had wanted her for a while and knew she’d wanted me too. And it thrilled me things had gone the way they did the night before. I only had to hope that things would continue to work out in my favor.

When we got closer to where the rogues were camped out, we paused in an area where the trees grew closer together to regroup and rehash our plan.

“I’ll sneak up on them,” Sebastian said. “I can get close enough to listen and get a read on them without them noticing me. You two stay here, and I’ll relay what I hear to you both through the link.”

“Ready, break,” Reid said, sticking his hand out into the middle of our huddle.

Seb and I just stared at him as he waited. Then Seb turned and started towards their camp. He ducked behind a tree and almost disappeared from view as he used his tracker and warrior training to replace a suitable position to spy on them.

Reid and I stayed where he left us, hunkering down behind our own trees and waiting until he linked us.

Only his link never came.

“What the fuck!” Sebastian exclaimed, and then we heard a loud thud and a “Holy fucking shit!”

Reid and I exchanged a look, and then we both dashed out from our hiding spots to replace Sebastian laid out on his back. A smaller, dark-haired she-wolf straddled him with his arms trapped at his side by her legs, a small knife pressed against his throat.

“Hey!” I called out, sprinting forward.

“It’s fine,” Seb linked me. “She’s not hurting me. She just caught me by surprise.” The entire time he linked me, his eyes never left the petite rogue wolf sitting on top of him. “She’s not a rogue, either,” he added.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, she doesn’t have the rogue stink,” he said.

I inhaled and noticed he was correct. There wasn’t the lingering stench that most rogues carried on them. There wasn’t a pack scent either, though.

“Calm your pretty little ranked wolf heads,” she said, glancing at Reid and me. “I’m not going to hurt him.”

“Could have fooled me,” I said, gesturing at her knife.

She smirked and then hopped off of Seb, tucking her knife into her combat boots, straightening out her tank top, and brushing dirt off her jeans. Seb sat himself up, and Reid reached his hand down to help him up, but Seb waved him off and stood up on his own.

“I just wanted to take out the wolf who thought he could get the upper hand on me,” she said, cutting her brown eyes to Sebastian again.

“I wasn’t trying to get the upper hand,” he grumbled. “Just trying to scope your little group out. Figure out why you’re here and why you crossed onto our territory.”

“Did we?” she asked, her round eyes getting rounder. “Fuck, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize we did. We try to stay off pack territories. Since they usually assume we’re rogues and attack first and ask questions later. We’re not rogues, though. Just nomads.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

She looked between the three of us, then sighed and gestured us forward. “Come on, meet the others.”

“Seb?” I linked him as she stalked away from us, her thick, dark hair swaying behind her as she moved.

“I trust her,” he replied.

I nodded, and we followed her to their camp.

“That was kind of hot. The way she took you down?” Reid muttered to Sebastian.

“Tell me about it,” Sebastian said with a dry chuckle.

I looked out of the corner of my eye at him, and his smile vanished when he felt my eyes on him.

“You should ask her to teach you that move. It could come in handy,” Reid snickered, wiggling his eyebrows.

“I’m waiting for my mate,” Seb replied through gritted teeth.

“Okay, dude. You do you since you won’t let anyone else,” Reid said with an eye roll. “Maybe I’ll ask her to teach it to me,” he added under his breath.

Seb’s nostrils flared, and he pinched the bridge of his nose and put his hand on his hip. “I don’t think she’s your type.”

“My type is female,” Reid said, shrugging.

I laughed, and Sebastian just shook his head and then dropped his hands in defeat.

“What’s your name?” I asked the she-wolf as we came into their small clearing.

She sat down in one of the camp chairs set up around the fire pit in the middle of their small circle of tents.

“Sarina,” she told me. “And this is Landon, Steele, Riven, and Rune.”

The three males and one female looked our way. They each raised a hand in greeting as she named them off and pointed at them with her chin.

“I’m Wesley, that’s Reid, and that’s Sebastian,” I said, returning the introductions.

I leaned against a tree, crossing my arms and nodding at Seb, letting him know he could take the lead on the questioning. I trusted his judgment just as Dad did, and I knew he would be better at asking questions to get the answers he needed.

“What did you mean when you said you’re all nomads?” Sebastian asked as I looked around their campsite.

Their tents were small, and they seemed to have little with them, but everything looked clean and in good shape. It was clear they took care of their supplies, unlike rogues, who were irrational and reckless.

“I guess you could say we’re like our own little pack,” she answered, her head cocked to the side as she thought. “We just don’t have a territory like you. We travel around, taking odd jobs here and there. Helping out packs when we can, and then moving on once our time is up.”

“What about your families?” he asked, his brow furrowed as he looked at her. “You can’t be, what, more than twenty years old?”

“Nineteen,” she muttered, avoiding his surprised stare.

“Damn,” Reid breathed out, his eyes not so subtly scanning over her body and landing back on her face.

Sebastian gave him a sharp look, then turned back to Sarina as he sat on one of the empty chairs by the fire. “Your parents?”

“They took a longer-term job in the last place we stayed. They’ll join back up with us once that’s over,” she told him with a shrug. “We’re pretty used to it,” she added. “Some of us stay longer in one place, but we eventually replace each other again.”

The rest of her little rag-tag group nodded their agreement.

“And what brings you here? To this part of California?” Seb asked.

“Just passing through, like I said.”

They locked eyes and just stared at each other for a long moment. I stood up from my spot against the tree, glancing between them, trying to gauge what exactly was going on with their stare-down.

“So, how long are you in town for?” Reid asked with a smirk, breaking the tension.

His eyes lingered on her chest, where the swell of her breasts was visible under her tank top, before moving back up to her face.

Sebastian and I both groaned, my head falling back against the tree trunk. Sarina raised a dark brow at him, a smile playing at her full lips.

“You should listen to your friend,” she said, flicking her eyes to Seb and then back to Reid, leaning forward to rest her arms on her legs. “I’m definitely not your type.”

I laughed out loud at the look of shock on Reid’s face, and Sebastian just shook his head as his shoulders trembled with his restrained laugh.

“We should get back to Dad,” he said, his voice shaking. “Let him know they’re not rogues and that they didn’t mean to cross our borders.”

He stood and crossed to Reid and me, and Sarina smiled and waved at us as we walked away. “See you around, pretty boys.”