Chapter 14

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Evelyn was sleepy, tired and cranky.

She had just entered the hotel to start her work half dead and again cursed Ria.

Ria on the previous night had begged and pleaded to swap her shift with Evelyn's due to an emergency and now instead of being tucked in her warm comfortable bed she was in this god forsaken hotel to star her shift.

She had been trying to catch up on her School work, which was like a bottomless pit and stayed up half night before she realized the time and because of that she had just few hours of sleep.

She changed in to the hotel uniform provided, she yawned again as she entered the kitchen which was already full of life getting ready for breakfast. This kitchen served both the restaurant and room service.

Once she stepped in the chef dumped a sack of potatoes and a peeler on her, he didn't have to utter a word and it was clear what she was to do.

Fantastic! She thought, she tied the apron around her and got to work. She would hold a grudge towards potatoes for a long time to come.

***

"Evelyn!" the Chef screamed some time later.

She jumped from her day dream or rather an early morning dream, while her hands were peeling potatoes her mind wandered off to a better place in her head, she was dreaming of medical school and New York.

"Yes?" she asked him after crashing back to reality.

"I need you on room service, go clean up and get the cart" he told her .

She got up, washed her hands and then removed the apron, she eyed the empty cart that was sitting in one corner of the kitchen and grabbed it and pushed it to where the chef was furiously working.

He dropped trays of food on to the cart and did the final touch-ups and covered them with up.

"Top floor" he said. Apparently he was a man of few words.

She slowly directed the cart out of the kitchen and towards the service elevator which was in the far end of the hallway from the kitchens service door.

As she approached the elevator there was one man guarding the elevator who on seeing her pressed the call button on the elevator and when it opened held the doors of the elevator open, the rolled the cart in to the elevator and smiled and said "Thanks!"

He smiled back and then promptly turned back taking guard.

She pressed the button for the top floor and waited as the elevator climbed slowly, she kept looking at the panel on top of the door as then numbers changed tapping her leg impatiently and finally there was a chime and the doors opened.

There were more men in the hallway, it was almost crowded.

One man came forward and stopped her and he checked the cart thoroughly opening the cover over every dish and then he took out some kind of portable scanner and scanned the entire cart.

He then looked at her and said "can you stand straight please?"

She stood straight and he quickly ran the scanner over her from head to toe. Satisfied he stepped back.

Two men indicated her to the direction she had to take and followed behind her. She was asked to stop near a door which was guarded again by two more men and one of them opened the door.

"There is a dining table, please put the food there and leave"

She nodded in understanding and rolled the cart in. one man stood near the entrance of the open door and two men followed her in and were herding her towards the table. As she reached the table she transferred the content from the cart on to the table and once done she immediately turned back and exited.

When the doors on the elevators closed he let her breath out that she was holding, the whole experience was pretty spooky. Whoever was on that floor must have been pretty important.

***

Roma was having breakfast when her son came out of his room.

"Good morning" he muttered.

"Good morning" she responded "what to join me?"

"Sure" he walked towards the table and paused and he took a whiff.

"Something smells nice" he said looking around.

"While it's not the best I had, it is pretty good" she responded referring to the breakfast.

"Not the food, something else smells nice" he took a whiff again.

She was clearly lost "What? I don't smell anything, I don't even smell a room freshener"

He suddenly leaned towards her and took a whiff at her.

She leaned back as he leaned over and said in outrage "Maxwell! Did you just smell me like a dog?!"

"I thought you were using a new perfume" he mumbled but his stomach grumbled and he sat down and started dumping generous portions of breakfast in to his plate.

She eyed her son and shook her head, he was acting weird.

"So" he said "What's on agenda for today?"

"Alpha Nick is coming over in an hour, we will discuss the future of his pack and how we can help him and other Colorado packs that pledge allegiance to him and through him to us."

"What shape is his pack in?"

"Pretty bad. We saved them from extinction. Sebastian had a look at their books. He is broke, they don't have any debts but they don't have any capital either"

"Good" he nodded, a desperate pack would be easier to negotiate with.

"Do we foresee any problems?" he asked

"No. He is a man of honor, he will follow through. We will be generous in our aid. Our advantage lies in his prosperity. He would be an example for all other packs to see what they can accomplish with our help"

"Has he approached the other packs to join him?"

"I told Adrian to work with Nick initiate that" She added "Nick should be calling up other surviving packs and offering generous terms if they joined him"

"So, it should be done then"

She nodded. Both of them silently contemplating the outcome. With the remaining packs of Colorado accepting Nick as their Alpha and Nick submitting to Roma in one single stroke they would get control on entire state of Colorado. It would be nothing short of a coupe.

"I don't think the American council will take that lying down" he voiced his thoughts.

"Sure they will not. We should hear this when the World council comes in to session next time."

The World council came in to session one week every month unless there was a global emergency.

"But there is little they can do. He called us and we helped him out. And if other Packs want to join us, what can they say?" She added.

He nodded his head but it would not be that easy. The next council meeting would be pretty interesting. They would have to prep their representative. Politics was never easy and they were treading on dangerous grounds.

The American wolves would not want the Roma wolves in America, they would see it as a threat. Rightfully so.

He finished his breakfast and went back to his room to get ready for Nick's arrival.

***

Alpha Nick had arrived and was met by Roma, Maxwell, Alex and bunch of other members of Roma's staff.

The discussions went well in to the afternoon, there were a lot of details to close.

The bottom line, he was being given a $5 million loan, interest free. Roma would set it up with one of their banks, there will be a member of Roma team who will audit their accounts from time to time to provide corrective measures. He would have access to Roma's network of businesses. It was a good deal for him all things considered. This would help him get his pack back on his feet.

He could extend this credit to any other packs that would join him and accept him as their Alpha. The packs in Colorado were badly impacted by the Rogue attacks and the few surviving ones were in even further bad shape, when Nick had called them to ask them to join his pack, they readily agreed. He had offered them financial support.

Adrian had asked him to do this under the direction of Roma.

So essentially, Nick would be a de facto be Alpha of entire Colorado State and would control all wolves in that area.

Once all points were discussed, official documents were signed to seal the deal in terms of finances and other Deals. There was only one thing remaining. One thing he promised in exchange for their help.

His allegiance.

Roma got up and stood in front of him.

He knelt in front of her and bared his neck and said "I, Alpha Nick, Pledge my allegiance to Roma"

She took a small blade and Alpha Nick offered his palm, she made a small cut and as the blood oozed out she swiped some with her finger and put it in her mouth.

The ritual demanded exchange of blood, the blood of the submitting Alpha should be drunk. In old days dominating wolves fought and the one who won would bite and drink the blood of the submitting wolf. It was much civilized now but the impact was the same.

When an Alpha submitted a fraction of his power and of all his pack members went to the person who he submitted to.

In this case Roma felt the power come in to her.

With this step, his pack, the lands he controlled, was bound to Roma and her rule.

The American council would feel the change in power as he shifted his allegiance. But, unlike the past he could no longer change his allegiance once he swore it to the monarchy he or his future generations could do that only when they was released by the monarchy or he fought and defeated them which was virtually impossible. The Monarchs were technically the most powerful wolves on the planet.

That was one big difference between monarchy and the wolf councils. While you pledged allegiances to wolf council's you could always switch you had free will but with Monarchy you were locked in. That's was what the blood ritual was about. Anyone who wanted to be under the protection of Roma or had to switch allegiance to Roma would have to go through the blood ritual. It was a one way street.

This has weighed heavily on his consciences but he had been pushed in to a corner and desperate, so he took the only way out available to him, one that came with a steep price. But it was done, there was no going back now.

She offered her hand to Alpha Nick to get up and he took it. She was his queen now.

"Alpha Nick, lets close this new partnership with lunch. Together we will usher your pack in to new prosperity" she said with a smile.

He bowed his head in acceptance.

Alpha nick and his pack were now under the command of Roma.

***

"Evelyn!" the chef yelled over the hubbub of the kitchen in full swing of preparing lunch for the hotel residents and its customers in its restaurant.

She looked up to the chef, she had no energy to even talk.

"Lunch to be served on the top floor" he barked.

"I am getting off in five minutes, Amy here can do that" she said pointing to the girl who just came in for afternoon shift.

The Chef just stared her for a moment and then barked at Amy "Well? What are you waiting for?! Get moving"

She jumped and scurried off to get things ready.

There was a knock on the door and a guard rolled in the food card with lunch on it. As a rule, they wanted the presence of the royal wolves' secret as long as possible. So the hotel staff was not allowed in when the royals were in residence and every time they moved in and out of the hotels they ensured hallways were clear of prying eyes. This was not fool proof but this is what they could do.

Food was served and lunch was done with some small talk when one more know sounded on the door and it was opened by a guard he stepped aside to have Adrian pass in.

He stepped in and he carried a rolled paper in his.

"Did you get it?" Roma asked and he nodded.

"Show us" she ordered.

He took out some tape from his pocket unrolled the paper and stuck it to the wall and stepped away.

"What are we looking at?" Maxwell asked.

They were looking at a sketch of a man's face, clearly drawn by a professional sketch artist. Under Roma's instructions they hired a sketch artist for Drake to describe this man and apparently he described him in great detail. The sketch was pretty clear. You could make out that he was a man in his late fifty's or early sixties.

"I want every single one of you to memorize his face, this is the face we have been searching for. The face of the man responsible for the death of my Husband" she paused for her information to sink in

"We" she said with a steely determination in her voice

"are going to find him and kill him"