Chapter Everything Is A Mess
🐺Alester🐺
To keep my mind off of the fact my little wolf hasn’t woken up yet I have been spending any time I’m not with him at the training house we are building. Sitting idly by Kody’s side was driving me mad. This has been the absolute longest week of my life.
“Hey, I’m surprised you’re not with Kody.” Brandon said startling me out of my thoughts,
“I have to do this. I can’t stand seeing him like this. I link him a lot hoping that I will eventually get an answer”.
“He’ll wake up, he is so strong and he has you waiting for him.” he takes a drink from his water bottle and passes it to me. I did not come prepared. “I also have news from Marcus and Tessa. The storm finally died down and they are flying out soon”.
“Good. You and Marcus can run things for me if Kody wakes by then because I’ll want to take care of him”.
“I understand. Kody is a special wolf”.
“You have no idea how true that is. Did Sadie tell you about Selene?”
“She did.” he says, handing me the hammer I just dropped.
“She showed me what Kody went through. It’s worse than you could ever imagine. After I saw it I wanted to hide him away from the world. She also told me he wasn’t supposed to live through any of it. He was destined to die at a few days old”.
“Shiiiiiit. Why didn’t he pass on?”
“I don’t know. Something about the ruthless pack leader liking his scent, just disturbing shit. Selene also informed me that she sees nothing of Kody and his future, that he’s a wild card”.
“So she has no idea if he’s going to live or die?”
“Pretty much. She doesn’t see him the same way she sees us and has no ability to influence his life. He survived his hell on his own. He survived until you and Sadie were able to find him. If the Goddess hadn’t fated your pack member to be taken he’d have died alone down there and we’d never have had him in our lives”.
Brandon pats my shoulder and tells me not to think about it because we do have him and we should just think about the positives. He starts helping me with the cabinets in the kitchen and the bathrooms.
We worked until it was too dark to continue then I sauntered off to the kitchen in the pack house. We could work longer but the other wolves are probably trying to get cubs to bed so I’d rather not start a riot.
“What to eat... Do I want chicken ooooor pork?” I hear someone enter the kitchen and immediately recognize it as Jessika.
“Hey Jessika”.
“Oh, hello. what are you up to?” she asks.
“Just deciding what to eat before I go see Kody.” she flinched at his name but I try to ignore people that think he doesn’t deserve me. They have no idea how amazing he is and I love him and that is all that matters.
“The chicken was really good.” she tells me before she grabs the electric kettle.
“I guess I’ll have the chicken, thanks”.
I pull all the plates out of the fridge and make a plate for myself and toss it in the microwave. Jessika is acting a bit weird but we haven’t really been around each other since her brother moved to Texas to live with his mate.
He was amazing with technology and I’d love him to be here but his mate was the only fully trained pack Doctor they had so he moved out there for her. He was like me; he found his mate late. Would have been later if she wasn’t a genius.
She was in medical school by eighteen and did everything by twenty-two. They met at a Mate Ball the year she graduated. She’d never gone to one before because of school and that year was his last one. He’d said if he didn’t find her by the time we headed home he was done searching.
I miss him a lot but I was so glad he found her and was moving on to start his life with her. While I daydream about the past, Jessika has saddled up right next to me.
“Everything will be ok, I promise”.
Then she injected me with what I’m assuming was a dose of liquid wolfsbane. It hit me hard and fast. In mere seconds I was on the floor.
“Ta... Hm..... Go.... Ter....”
The last thing I hear is her broken speech before the world goes completely dark.
🐺Brandon🐺
“Alester you forgot your pho-.” I call out to him as I enter the empty kitchen, “Alester?”
“Honey, what are you doing?” Sadie asks
“Have you seen Alester?”
“No, I’m only here because your cub wants cheetos, broccoli and spinach dip”.
I laugh, “Sades that’s disgusting”.
“No it’s not” she snaps.
“Baby, you don’t even like cheetos”.
She looks at me like I’m a moron “your cub does”.
Sadie rests her hand on her little bump and looks down fondly at our little bundle.
“Ok my love, while you get your snack I am going to go see if Alester is with Kody”.
“Ok, I love you”.
“Love you more, Sades”.
I checked the infirmary, Kody and Alester’s room and the living room. Where the fuck did he go.
"Brandon, can you come here and clean up your mess?" Sadie links.
"What mess?" I link back.
"Don’t play dumb with me! Come put the food away. It’s making me feel sick“.
"Sadie, I didn’t take out any food“.
"Oh... well you probably didn’t leave this syringe on the floor either“.
At hearing that, I run back to the kitchen just in time to see Sadie fall to the floor. I link Vivian to see if she’s working in the infirmary tonight and she tells me she’s just arrived. I tell her that I’m bringing Sadie down because she is now unconscious and that I need her to get the syringe to Kenji in the lab.
Vivian tells me that I can put Sadie in Kody’s room since Alester hasn’t arrived to spend the night with Kody. This is worrying to me in multiple ways. Our future Alpha is missing and my mate is unconscious.
I get Sadie into the bed and Vivian takes the syringe to Kenji our chemical expert. I just call him super Ken because he loves all things science. He’s great with technology but his real strengths lie in chemistry and biology. He’s created some pretty cool stuff for us to try out. My favorite so far is the knockout gas with something that screws with the last 10-24 hours of the victims memory.
We had a good test subject for that. Once we found it had no lasting effects they used it on me. Poor Sadie had to tell me three different times she was pregnant. Stupid assholes.
“Brandon?” Vivian taps me on the shoulder.
“Huh?” she startled me from my thoughts.
“I said I’m going to put in the IV now, then I asked you what happened?”
“I was looking for Alester and Sades linked me and told me to clean up my mess. I didn’t make one so I started heading towards the kitchen and she said something about how if I didn’t make the mess I probably didn’t leave the syringe”.
“Kenji said it smelled like wolfsbane but he’s testing it to make sure. As soon as he knows I’ll know if it’s safe to give the antidote”.
“What about our cub?”
She points out the different monitors, one for Sadie and one for our cub and that the cub is fine but I ask her for an ultrasound to be sure. Vivian goes off to get the machine and comes back and shows me our baby. Looks like it’s doing fine. It’s still moving around and it’s heartbeat is strong. Can’t fault a dad for worrying, Sadie would also kill me if I didn’t make sure our cub is ok and I don’t need to deal with an angry hormonal Mama.
I fall asleep waiting for Sadie to wake. At about four-thirty Tessa links me, scaring me half to death.
"Hey, where is Sadie?”
"Infirmary. Have you seen Alester?"
"No, we just got back at midnight. is something wrong?“.
This is where things get complicated.
"I have a bad feeling. I couldn’t find him last night. Sadie found a syringe in the kitchen. I think someone used it on Alester“.
"Why didn’t you call us last night?" she questions me angrily.
I tell Tessa about how Sadie got whatever was in the syringe in her system and she loses her mind. He is yelling at me through the link and I haven’t even told her the hardest part yet. She asks what room we are in and she is busting down the door less than a moment later.
When she enters she sees Kody and then really loses it. I spend the next twenty minutes telling her what happened after her and Marcus left and why Alester, Sadie and I decided not to tell them. She’s livid and I don’t blame her but we did what we did for her.
I hate this. Waiting. With Kody still unconscious and now Sadie and then Alester missing this is not a good time for my team or for my pack. We need Sadie to wake up and lead the team. I could do it but she is far more capable than I.
Sadie wakes up around seven so I figure it is time to meet with Marcus and Tessa while Sadie waits to be cleared. I got Marcus and Tessa to go and do a headcount to see if we are missing anyone else because if we are we know who may have taken our future Alpha.
“Everyone is here. All the wolves are accounted for.” Marcus says as he enters the room.
“Someone definitely took him. I’ve scoured the whole house. I had Mason and Stacey, Greg and Marshall and Trey and Justice out doing extra patrols. They didn’t notice anything which makes me think it was definitely someone inside the pack.” Tessa rattles off anxiously.
“Ok, who benefits from taking him?” I ask.
Tessa immediately fingers Les, “If he can bring Alester to his side he’ll have his heir back and if that doesn’t work killing him would get him out of the way”.
We can’t afford to lose him. He’s become a close friend to Sadie and he makes Kody happy whether or not Kody himself sees it.
“We need a plan.” I state.
“We still need to find the girl from Alaska.” Tessa adds like we forgot somehow.
“What we need is eyes on the inside of Les’ pack and we should assume he’s got eyes here so whatever we do it needs to be convincing to anyone on the outside.” Marcus says passionately, “Tessa my darling, we need to stage a rejection”.
“Oh I always wanted to be an actress. I also know exactly who we can ask to help.” she links her choice and then says with excitement “This will be difficult but I think it will be fun”.
“I could never do this.” I say to them wondering how this could be fun in any way.
“When you spend nine years hoping she’s out there, you can handle anything.” Marcus says lovingly while looking into Tessa’s eyes.
“Ok well have fun. I’m going to go fill Sadie in on everything that has been happening since she was drugged. Whatever you do, don’t rush this because we need the spy to give Marcus credibility”.
Tessa Smirks, “I know. Sneaking around is going to be exciting”.
“If you don’t watch it, you’re going to be pregnant next.” Marcus growls.
“Oh!” she yelps when Marcus grabs onto her and pulls her close.
I close the door but I can hear him pin her to the wall and assault her with kisses. I hope Sadie and I never acted like horny teenagers. I think about that for a second and remember just how bad we were. Before we knew we were mates, Sades and I used to sneak around. Sometimes I’m surprised we didn’t end up pregnant back then. We were not all that bright. It’s like a part of us always knew no matter what we’d always be together so we were sloppy.
Kody’s room in the infirmary is quiet. When I opened the door I didn’t expect Sadie to be sitting in the chair beside his bed.
“You should be in bed resting.” I say softly.
“I’m fine, the baby is fine but my Kody is not.” she snaps “I don’t think he knows we are here. His pain is so raw and so deep. Whatever happened to tip the scales probably wasn’t even anything significant... not in the grand scheme of things. It could have been a single comment that reaffirmed his fears.” she says sadly tears falling down her cheeks.
“He will come back. He has you and Alester waiting for him.” I squeeze her shoulders reassuringly.
“He better”.