Abandoned Treasure

Alpha Rori King’s POV

Arrowhead Pack House

Monday, July 27th, 2020

Vic burst into the Alpha office at about four in the afternoon. I was already in a bad mood from dealing with the aftermath of the attack, the funeral, and the Feds. His yelling wouldn’t help my headache. “WHERE IS SHE?”

“Tone it down, Beta Vic,” Chase warned him from where he stood near the window. “We’re not your enemy. Leave your phone in the box outside.” My mate used a wand to verify he wasn’t wearing a wire, then made a show of disconnecting the computers from the server and turning on a device to mask any listening devices, even lasers pointed at the windows. He finished before sitting next to me at our desk.

“Spider Monkey is safe. That’s all I know,” I finally answered. “Now sit down, and we can explain.”

“Spider promised she would be in touch daily, but it’s been TWO days without contact.” He’d called after the first. Thursday night I asked Oxbow Lake to send a six-wolf team to beef up protection in Rochester. Two cars with six armed warriors escorted him back after his call. “Has Alpha Coral said anything about what happened?”

“Only that she is in good hands. The problem was on this side, Vic.” It took about five minutes to lay out everything we’d kept from him after the attack on Thursday. “The Tijuana cartel is not to be trifled with. When we found out that Tijuana was after your mate? We bumped up your security and made arrangements to relocate her and Oki.”

He calmed himself. “When do I join them?”

“You don’t,” I told him. “You’re staying here. My Beta will be out of action for a few weeks, and you know the job. Coral’s agreed to the temporary transfer, and it’s the safest place to stash you for now.”

“The Cartel’s already attacked once,” he objected.

“Yes, and now we’ve got Feds up the ass and Enforcers flooding in,” I replied. “Add in the Brotherhood members here before and after Sturgis, and we’ve got quite the force. Tijuana assumed they could trade me for Spider Monkey. You’re just as much in danger if they think you can be used to force her to give herself over. No, Vic, you’re staying, and we don’t want you even close to the Pack boundary. You’ll be taking over security from the Control Center.”

“Hiding in the bunker?” He shook his head. “Fuck those guys. We need to go after the Cartel like we did before,” he said as he looked over at Chase. “We’ve got hackers, and Frank still has DEA contacts that will help. We can avenge Scott and Chris.”

“We aren’t starting a Cartel war again,” I said firmly. “We only won the last one because of the blowback from the clubhouse raids and the assassination attempts on the President. We did some sketchy shit, and we’re lucky we forced the President to give us that immunity letter. This time around, we don’t have the sympathy or the support. ”We’d sent clothes with her scent to all the world’s Packs, and President Kettering didn’t have a mate out there. She was unhappy that becoming a werewolf wouldn’t happen when she leaves office. We’d lost our political cover.“ I have to be careful about what we do and say with all the attention we’re getting from law enforcement.”

Chase nodded his agreement. “We had to stomp down on the Task Force before. I know they don’t like our power, independence, and newfound wealth. Commander Lindstrom would love to catch us dirty, so we must stay squeaky clean. That’s another reason Coral and I agree you need to stay here, focusing on the defense of the Pack.”

“Where is she?”

“We don’t know and we don’t want to know,” Chase replied. “Coral and Colletta don’t either. We may have a mole feeding them data, so we went outside the Pack structures to hide her. Even if they succeeded in capturing you or Rori, we can’t tell them anything. All we know is that the people hiding her are good at doing it.”

“Then it’s not the fucking Marshal’s Service,” he grumbled.

“The government is not involved.”

“Good.” He thought about things for a few minutes. “You did the right thing, as much as this situation sucks. Nothing is more important than keeping my family safe.”

“You can trust us to protect our people,” I said.

“What is the current threat status?”

I laid out what we knew. The mole had penetrated our security center, bypassing the alarms and looping the video so the tactical team could approach without warning. It happened after sunrise, so that left us twelve suspects. Eight were Arrowhead Pack, three Enforcers, and one member of Oxbow Lake.

“Have you interrogated them yet?”

“Only our people,” I replied. “It’s a delicate situation when it comes to the Council. We can’t just go accusing people without proof.”

“What is the FBI saying?”

“We’re on the outside this time,” Chase replied. “Frank Grimes has been frozen out. He’s tried calling friends in the DEA and FBI, but the word has come down from on high. They won’t tell us anything. I know that Irene Lindstrom’s task force is back, though its size is more limited this time.”

“Are we cooperating?”

“In most things. They want Spider Monkey under their control. That is out of the question,” I said. “We’ve allowed them to interview everyone involved in the attack, but that isn’t much help. Our lawyers have shut down any other lines of questioning. The security footage is a different matter.”

“We shared it,” Chase continued, “but we admitted someone disabled the cameras. The FBI wants names, but we aren’t providing them. They can’t issue subpoenas without them. Right now, the mole is our only link to the Cartel, and we aren’t giving it up.”

“I want in on the investigation,” he said.

“No. Colletta brought in your old boss, Mark Trestman, to run the investigation for the Council. We are letting them take the lead because of the potential involvement of other Packs,” I said.

“Most of the suspects are Arrowhead.”

“I know. All our potential suspects are transfers from other Packs. Who knows what family or other pressures might be involved? The attackers killed a Council Enforcer, Vic. Mark will stop at nothing to find the persons responsible.”

He nodded. “Yeah, he’s a dog with a bone.”

“We need to bring you back into Arrowhead so you can perform your duties,” I said. He shifted to us, wincing as the bonds broke and reformed in his mind. “You can move into Coral’s old home. I’ll see you on the beach for dinner.”

“Yes, Alpha,” he replied.

He walked out, and I let out a sigh of relief. “I thought he might fight harder to stay independent.”

“He understands the stakes involved,” Chase replied.

We returned to our administrative tasks, stopping at the knock on the door twenty minutes later. “Enter,” I said.

Alpha Martin and Luna Rebecca entered. “Do you have a few minutes,” Martin asked.

I stood and smiled, but our relationship had changed in the past few days. They came here last week, upset about Nathan’s sanctuary. I was pissed about Rebecca’s outburst on the walkabout, though she apologized. That didn’t change the fact that three armed men weren’t around when the attack occurred because they had to bring her back early. “Certainly,” I said. I pointed to the chairs, and they sat down. “What can I do for you?”

“I understand that Mykayla’s bone marrow transplant is complete now?”

I nodded. “We got word an hour ago that it went well. Mykayla is back in her room and will remain at the Mayo Clinic for a few more weeks.”

“That’s good news,” Martin replied. “As a courtesy to you, I’m informing you that we have filed a petition with the Council to execute the arrest warrant immediately. The transplant procedure is over, so his sanctuary promise ends, too.”

“We don’t know if the transplant worked, and we won’t know for weeks.”

He dismissed my concern. “I’ve added a stipulation in the complaint for that. We asked to suspend any sentence of death until Nathan Storm’s blood marrow is not required.” Shit. “Nathan is a flight risk. With his mate and fortune, he could evade justice for years. I can’t allow that.” He stood again, handing me a copy of his revised complaint. “The Council is meeting now. We should have him in the cells at Oxbow Lake tonight.”

I didn’t say anything as they left. I couldn’t allow this to happen, but what could I do to stop it?