The Wannabe Warrior
Chapter 24

Zane POV

We walked upstairs, hand in hand and in silence, both of us seemed to be in deep thought. The sudden changes to our rogue problems, or should I say changes in our understanding of the rogue problems, had me afraid for my mate. Having a mate scares me. I want to keep her safe, but she needs to be out of the danger zone. How do others handle this? I don’t know, maybe I should talk to a few of the warriors whose mates are warriors too, until the pups come along. I don’t know any that still have their mates if they are a warrior after having pups, or does Doug’s mate still do the inner perimeter patrols? I think I could handle the inner perimeter patrols, but this, going into the danger zone, has my wolf screaming at me, and I am not too far behind him, in losing my mind over this, I have to replace some way of coping with the knowledge that my mate is close to rogues and could even have to fight them; my mate bond says this is unacceptable, while my warriors side agrees it must be allowed, my internal conflict is tearing me apart, I have to replace some acceptance and peace and acceptance.

My head was so full of thoughts that I hardly noticed we had arrived at our room. Feeling the tingles leave when she dropped my hand, had me looking up to see Madison had already started to peel off her clothes and was close to climbing into bed, her phone in her hand as she sets her alarms and places her phone on the bedside table. I watched her settle down in bed. I wonder if she is concerned or is this just another day for a tracker’s life. Trying not to let the fear of losing her, I strip off my clothes and climb in behind her.

Madison is warm to the touch and her soft body was calling me to hold her close. I snuggled up behind her, pulling her to me and spooning her into my arms. She wiggles her arse into me and relaxes and sighs in contentment, my body instantly reacts to the innocent action, and now I have a roaring hard d**k to contend with. I tried to ignore it, but my throbbing groin kept me awake. Well, after Madison had fallen asleep, every thought I had made no difference to the hardness in my groin. It was not until I thought of Karen being placed in the cell, that my hardness deflated almost instantly.

Sleep at last found me and I happily let the darkness take over.

A tinkling sound woke me, it felt like I had only just fallen asleep. Opening my eyes, I saw it was still early in the morning, the room was still dark and I wondered what the sounds were. I felt Madison reach over for her phone and tap on the screen of her phone. The tinkling sound stopped. I rolled over and thought I would catch a few more minutes and shut my eyes, while Madison showers, then I will get up, I snuggled back down into the warmth of the bed and pull her pillow into my face, taking in her scent, that soothed me.

A loud knock roused me from my slumber, and I wondered how long I had dozed off. Surely, Madison was still in the shower.

I sat up and looked at the bathroom and saw the door open and no sign of Madison. The knocking on the door happened again, but harder this time.

‘Hold on, hold on, I am coming.’ I shouted out, as I struggled out of the tangled mess of the sheets.

Opening the door, I saw a warrior waiting at the door.

‘Yes?’ I queried.

‘Alpha wants you in his office.’ He said, then turned and left after delivering the message. No warm greeting, typical warrior, he is always so stern and grumpy.

Guess, having a shower is out of the question. For dad to send a warrior to get me, this must be important.

Rushed to get dressed, I hurried out the door, made my way down the stairs and ducked into the kitchen and grab an apple before heading to dad’s door.

Knocked on the door and waited.

‘Enter.’ A voice was heard coming from inside.

Dad was sitting behind his desk, with Mitch and Warrior Harrison and Beta Ryan in the room, all looking relaxed and drinking coffee.

‘Hey dad. What’s up.’ I asked while looking around for the coffee pot.

‘Harrison has made up some new schedules. Now that the Dark River pack has arrived, we have over three hundred warriors housed and with about ten packs yet to arrive. We need to work out how we are going to send out these other warriors in groups and where to send them. We don’t want to let anyone know our suspicions, so we have decided to send some to the north to check out the pass, and some out to the west and check the far border, and though I hate to say this, I don’t trust anyone from the North or West packs, so we have decided the north packs can check out the west and the west the north, until I can trust them again, we have to make it look like we are still checking out those areas.’ Dad says between sips of his coffee.

‘Where is the coffee pot?’ I asked after getting annoyed that I was the only one without a coffee.

Mitch pointed to the outer room. I got up and walked to the other room and made a coffee, thinking about schedules and rogue groupings.

‘Dad, how about we mix some of the groups, like put ten north with ten west. It will be interesting to see how they interact together. Hopefully, we can trust more than just one pack or this is going to be really difficult.’ I say as I take a biscuit out of the tin and take a large bite.

‘What do you think, Harrison?’ dad asks, looking over at him.

‘Doable.’ Was all he said, his face showing no emotion.

‘Do you think we could bug some of the guys? You know, see if Madison or Gerome has any bugs that are like a dot and put them on their clothes so we can hear, or maybe in the hallways of the barracks. I don’t know why but I am getting so jumpy.’ I say, I am getting worried about how many there may be of them or, have we some traitors inside already, waiting for some unknown signal.

‘Gerome has already put bugs in the hallways and dining halls in all the barracks, and above the door in the rooms, we have housed the packs we have our doubts about. We thought about putting some in our own halls and dining room, hoping we would hear some clue who was against us, but Madison talked us out of our dining hall, made too much noise in the dining hall, with the clatter of plates. Besides, most of the time we are in the room and can pick up most conversations if we wish to. Plus, if we have them on people, when they enter an area we have a bug dot, we will only get the same static.’ Dad says.