Abandoned Treasure

Nathan Storm’s POV

Alameda, California

January 9, 2015

“That could have been you,” Jade said as we watched the live feed from the Adirondack Pack.

The old barn was empty except for the five men chained down near the doorway. The cameraman panned the crowd; among the Pack members, I recognized eight Alphas with some formerly enslaved females from Bitterroot. The camera focused on former Alpha Charles . “Fifteen years ago, these men led an unprovoked attack on another Pack, wiping out the men, women, and children. Among the victims was my only daughter, pregnant at the time.” He paused to gather himself. "Luna Joanna was unable to shift, and these men attacked her, broke her bones, then left her helpless in her home as they burned it around them. Justice requires the same to happen to them.”

Tears ran down my cheeks. “I know. It’s one of many things in my life I wish I could change,” I told her. “I’ve tried to be a better man, but circumstances don’t always allow it.” Jade’s anger had faded by the following day after learning of my involvement.

I’d never talked much about my time in the Pack. We talked for hours after she got home from work. Cats don’t have Packs and Alphas, so she didn’t understand the power wolves above me had on my wolf. I had no choice back then, but I should have told her. Secrets aren’t good in a relationship.

Our lives were not our own now. Being the Oracle required moral flexibility. We brokered deals for forgery, identity theft, money laundering, weapons trafficking, and other illegal acts for the good of our people. We were also on the payrolls of the Sons and the Cartel, and you didn’t say no to them if you wanted to live.

I watched as Alpha Charles took a sledgehammer to Todd. “This is for my sister,” he said before he brought it down on his right thigh. He handed it off, and the next man broke his left leg. A line of men smashed the limbs of the men as they howled in pain. No one showed them any sympathy. Alpha Martin lit a Molotov cocktail as the camera showed him from behind. “May you all burn in hell.” He threw the bottle against the back wall of the barn.

I listened to the screams until they stopped, then turned off the feed. “The bastard is gone,” I said to myself. The tears came, and I couldn’t stop them. Jade held me as I let my rage and pain go, and then we went to hug our children.

The next day, the Oracle received a message from Alejandro, the Sons of Tezcatlipoca President in Oakland. “8 tonight, Merchants.”

Shit. I showed Jade the message after dinner. “I guess they heard about Bitterroot.”

“Yeah. Without Todd’s people, distribution east of Denver is up in the air.”

“Maybe they’ll take that over, too.”

“Or the Cartel does,” I replied. “They are doing more and more on this side of the border.”

An hour later, I was through the tunnel into Oakland and heading for Merchant’s Saloon. The dive bar near Jack London Square was the perfect meeting place: loud music, questionable clientele, and cheap booze. Alejandro had six Sons with him at the tables near the stripper pole, where a tattooed hottie was grinding in a tied-off T-shirt and a black leather miniskirt.

I ended up next to the wall with the President and his VP, both of them Panthers. The others spread out and watched the girl dance. He handed me a beer from the bucket and got down to business. “You’ve heard about Bitterroot,” Alejandro whispered.

Since we were shifters, I could hear him easily despite the pounding beat of the metal band and the conversations around us. “Yeah. I watched the trials and the punishments. Everyone is dead, in prison, or restricted to Pack lands. They are useless to you.”

“That’s what I figured,” he said.

“Are you going to expand east? Maybe put a new chapter in Chicago?”

“I don’t have the cats to start it, and expanding the Club there would mean a war. Too many established gangs in the area.”

I nodded. “The Outlaws kept the Hells Angels in the suburbs, but I hear the Mongols are moving in.”

“And I don’t want any of those clubs setting up a pipeline of drugs into the Midwest, especially the Mongols.” The Mongols were a Hispanic gang on the West Coast who had ties to the Pacific cartel, a bitter rival of the Sinaloa.

“You’ve always stayed out of the Pack’s business. What do you need from the Oracle?”

“I need someone I can trust to take over the pipeline. Find out the contacts, set up transport, and keep the money train rolling.”

Fuck. “That won’t be easy.”

“If things were easy, I wouldn’t need you.”

I leaned back, thinking of how I could make this work. I’d been out of the racket for a decade, and I’m sure the players had changed. “How long do I have?”

“The next shipment comes in at the end of the month. I need the pipeline open.”

Now for the fun part. “What is my cost?”

“Ten per kilo for twenty packs of coke. Fifty each for the fentanyl and heroin. It’s the same as the last shipment.”

Three hundred thousand, but I could more than double it when I got to the Midwest. “I don’t have that kind of cash.”

“Hundred on delivery, the rest in two weeks. You’ll clear enough to pay for the next in cash.”

“Do I have a choice in this?” He just stared at me. “Thought so. Anything else?”

“You’re my cutout. You deal ONLY with me, and I don’t want to know anything about your end. You don’t tell your team shit, or you are all dead.” I nodded my agreement. Like most of the shit in my life, I had no choice in this.

Jade wasn’t happy, but there was no way out for me. I was dead if I refused, and I would be killed in prison if caught.

I was back to being a drug smuggler.

I still had my commercial driver’s license, and I knew some of the players. I’d have to figure out the rest along the way.

I used one of the shell companies we’d set up to rent a small warehouse outside Des Moines, Iowa. Knowing how Todd operated, I managed to get in touch with one of the young warriors at Bitterroot.

Tim Dempsey was twenty-two and had enjoyed the entertainment in the basement as often as he could. No Alpha would take him now. Eventually, the basement women would find mates. Those males would kill him for what he did, so there was no future in the Packs.

I promised a chance at freedom and riches, and he took it.

He broke his bond and ran for the border. I picked him up at Lolo Springs on the west side of the range as a new rogue wolf. Tim had a good head on his shoulders, and he knew the major players in each city. The deals made us rich, and the Sons kept their volume going.

Jade worked hard to keep me out of jail, safeguarding the shipments from the port to the cities. She forged shipping manifests, warned us where roadblocks and enforcement teams would be, and set up surveillance and security teams at our exchanges. The few people who tried to steal from us ended up dead, and nobody knew enough about us to flip.

It took me a year of running shipments with him before he was ready to take over the transportation and distribution side. I remained his partner, taking ten percent of the profits in exchange for securing the drugs and transport. He brought in two other wolves to help, and they all made a shit-ton of money and lived like kings.

The system worked well for almost six years, making me millions that Jade laundered into legitimate money for us.

I warned Tim to disappear as the Drug Enforcement Agency took down the Sons. He killed his partners, destroyed all evidence, and retired to Miami to live the good life.

I was a ghost with a false identity, and Tim was smart enough not to look for me.