Chapter 25

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Alpha Nick picked up the call "Hello?"

"Yes?"

He listened to someone on the other end.

"Ok. When?"

He again paid close attention to the response.

"Two days is it?" he asked in confirmation. Better to get it out of the way.

"All right, sure. We will expect David in two day's time"

"Thank you!" he said ending the conversation and hung up.

So, David would be here in two day's time. David was the leader of enforcers from the world council, who was coming to colorado to have talk to Nick on the situation there. But what he most likely knew that he was being sent by GordonLockbourne the current head of the world council and also was a bitter opponent of Roma and was a part of the American council as well. He was sending David to assess damage done by Roma in his own backyard. That was why David was coming over in such a hurry.

He had to think and prepare his pack for his arrival, nothing should go amiss. As Roma had pointed out in her conversation with him in the past. David was no fool.

He got up from his chair and was about to walk to his office door to get out when the said door flew open and Jeff rushed in.

Nick looked at him in alarm, Jeff was barely in control of himself and he could literally feel the rage radiating from him.

Something was very wrong.

***

Roma, Alex & Adrian were sitting silently in her room deep in their own thoughts.

Roma was rubbing her temples, a headache that had formed earlier now was pounding away in her temples. She could not believe what had happened, what Maxwell had done. Her Son had marked a girl against her will! How could he?

"So, from what I could gather" Adrian said breaking the silence.

"One: Maxwell was drinking with Alex all day and by the time he stepped out of Alex's room they had quite a few beers between them"

Adrian looked at Alex in confirmation and Alex's face reddened. Maxwell and Alex did have occasional Beer-a-thons, it was not uncommon. It took a lot to get a werewolf drunk and Adrian was being modest by mention 'quite a few' but the beer cans littered all over his room floor said otherwise. Maxwell had been complaining of his wolf being agitated and caged up they had caught up for a game on Xbox and before both of them realized they had wasted away the afternoon between gaming and guzzling down beer after beer.

So yes, Maxwell was shit face drunk...mostly anyways when he stepped out of his room and encountered Evelyn and that's how his wolf had taken over him so easily without even shifting in to his wolf form.

"Two" Adrian said continuing his points "I reviewed the security tapes, thought I don't have the entire footage, but what I could gather from what the cameras captured is that she ran from him"

"Ran?" Roma asked raising her eyebrows?

You simply did not run from your mate, it would aggravate them and kick in their instincts to subjugate her.

"She is still human, not turned yet and apparently either no one told her and she never paid attention when someone did tell her on how to deal with mates"

He was partly right, she did run from him from her ignorance of mates. If she would have known, she would have acted differently. She would have appeased his wolf enough to let Maxwell wrestle control back from his wolf and then would have reasoned out with him. But with her running his wolf went ballistic resulting in the disastrous results.

"But do you know why she ran?"

Still that did not explain why she ran.

Alex spoke up "She became a friend of mine" he paused, looking at Roma "I still consider her my friend" he paused again "You need to understand, she had a tough life and with her pack almost being wiped off, she wanted a break for the pack life. She is fiercely independent, she dreamt of being a doctor in the human world....she....she was not ready for a mate"

He paused and added again "She had messaged me that, something urgent had come up and she needed to leave. Maxwell had the place on lockdown so the guards were not letting her out. When I met her she was desperate, I thought it was something to do with her mother or even Jeff. I never thought....did not even imagine it would be this"

"So, I spoke to the guard to let her out and out of relief she hugged me and that's how Maxwell found us"

He found his mate in other man's arms, even if that other man was his best friend. Reason was not something his wolf would pursue then but pure instincts. They had dictated his actions.

He nodded his head sadly. This had snowballed in to a pile of horse shit.

"Where is he?" Roma asked "He never came here" and she knew why, he could not face her.

"He transformed in to his wolf" Adrian added and Roma sat up straight surprised.

"I have a team following him, they are reporting back to me, he is in the forest but away from Nick's territory. I don't think he even knows where she is" Maxwell never visited Nick's territory and so he had no idea where his mate would be and the mate bond was not strong enough to direct him...yet.

They sat again silently, lost in their own thought.

Alex broke the silence "By the way, she is Jeff's girlfriends daughter. Jeff treats her like his one child and is very fond of her. Both her mother and her, they stay together in his house."

"Jeff the hot blooded beta?" Roma asked

"Yep" Adrian deadpanned and added "He is not going to let it go"

"Would you?" Roma asked looking at Adrian. Would he? No way, if he had a hypothetical daughter and someone did this to her hypothetically, he would fucking kill that guy... hypothetically of course.

But this was not someone...this was prince of Roma. So his hypothesis would take a hike.

"We need to contain this before this gets out of hand" Adrian added and Roma nodded.

"Get Nick here and ensure Maxwell disappears for time being and keep Jeff out of this" Roma said getting in to leader mode.

Adrian nodded in relief, finally able to do something he got up to grab his cell phone to make the call to Nick when his phone rang, he looked down at the screen and looked at Alex and Roma who were looking at him still seated

He turned the phone screen towards them, though they were far off to see the name on the screen but he said "Talk of the devil..."

The screen showed

'Nick. Mobile'

***

Sebastian was a worried man, he had gotten off a call with Michael and it had been a courtesy call from the CIA. They were calling of the hunt. This Charles character have evaporated in to thin air, his digital footprint vanished all his ID's had gone cold. They were putting a watch notice out for him, in case he resurfaced their systems would pick it up but until then they were re deploying all their assets and would hand over any information to local law enforcement.

Sebastian understood what it meant, Charles had gone in to hiding. It possibly meant one of the packs in US had provided him sanctuary or else Michael would have tracked him down. Pack lands were off the grid for very good reason and whenever possible close to national reserves or parks where a large wolf sighting would not ring alarms.

Also the way they covered their tracks like blowing up the house meant that they were up to something. Something that they did not want to be found and this did not sit well with Sebastian.

This Charles according to Drake had been responsible for assassination of Maxim Roma and he had to be found at any cost, just for that crime alone. But he had a sinking feeling that he was up to no good and someone in the US packs was supporting him. But who?

For any help in USA they had to approach the counsel and he knew what their reaction would be especially with what they did in Colorado.

Colorado!

That was the answer!

He was sure Nick's pack had families in other packs. People who knew people. May be they can ask around discreetly. He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He would put it past Roma but he knew it was as good as done.

***

A grim faced alpha Nick entered the room to face an equally sober faced Roma and the twins.

"Please have a seat alpha Nick" Roma politely stated.

He sat down and stated without preamble "You know why I am here"

She took a deep sigh "We do" She nodded.

He waited, he wanted to hear what they had to say.

"Please understand Nick" She started talking in a low calm voice "we are sorry for what happened. We are not even offering any excuses."

"Roma" Nick said firmly but politely "A girl was mated against her will."

"I know Nick"

"It is a serious offense!"

"I understand"

"Mating someone against their will is brutal and animalistic"

"I agree"

"We need justice" Nick demanded.

Roma observed Nick for a moment and said "Justice? What do you propose?"

Adrian and Alex gaped at her.

Even Nick was taken aback, was she agreeing to him so readily? He had come to expect a long heated argument, anything but this.

"I..." Nick fumble, this was the tricky part.

The problem with someone who violated the mate bond was that any punishment you inflicted on the perpetrator also impacted the victim in some way as she was bonded to the perpetrator. If he suffered she suffered in some form or fashion as well. So punishing such crimes were next to impossible that is why there were many measure on prevention of such acts.

"Yes, what do you suggest we do?" Roma added, she was curious as to what Nick wanted but it became apparent that he had not thought so far, he did not expect her to capitulate so easily.

Nick was indecisive, what would he want? What would Jeff want? But more importantly what did Evelyn want?

Roma added "Please understand that whatever I am explaining you in no way is a defense of the wrong that was committed but just the circumstances to help you better understand" she paused and added "so that you me decide on the best course of action"

Nick sat back and nodded, it was only fair to listen to their side even though nothing would justify the action. But it would give him time to come up with some accountable action.

"We had all instructed all our men not to shift into wolves while in America. As a result, some of the wolves had become restless and when he found his mate his wolf took over him as she ran from him"

"Ran?" Nick asked sitting up "You sure?"

"We have video footage Nick and we will be glad to show you"

He nodded appeased.

"When she ran, it enraged his wolf, who was already in control"

Nick understood, no wolf appreciated his mate running away from him. The only running allowed is to him and not away from him.

"And to top it up, when he did catch up with her, he found her in another man's arms"

"What are you implying Roma?" Nick asked carefully but his body language and tone was clearly a warning to tread carefully. He knew Evelyn from when she was a pup and he like her, she was a great girl and he would be dammed if someone, even if that someone was Roma would...

She interrupted his thoughts "I only told what he saw from his perspective, which would help you understand his actions, I never said her actions were wrong"

His head was spinning, what on earth was she talking about? Before he could ask Alex spoke up.

"Over a period of time Evelyn and I became good friends" he added.

Nick looked at Alex and he remembered something "did you not take her out on a date?" he had remembered overhearing this piece of gossip.

Alex flushed as Roma stared at him in confusion. He had hoped it never came up.

"Once" he said and hastily added "but we decided we were better off as friends. So that is what we are friends. Good friends" he was looking between Nick and Roma ensuring that they were clear on what was between him and Evy. This situation was fucked up enough as it is. No need to add more confusion to it.

"Anyway, when she was running from her mate the hotel was on lockdown and she could not step out of the hotel as the guards would not let her out"

Alex explained.

"She asked me for help, I thought there was some emergency, I had no idea she was running from her mate."

Alex was repeating the story for Nick's benefit.

"So I helped her by asking her the guard to let her out and she hugged me in relief and that's when he saw us"

"You mean" Nick started in clarification "Yep. That's what Roma meant"

"And you can imagine what happened next" Alex finished

Yes! He could definitely imagine. Nick understood what her mate's wolf would have felt

"While I understand" Nick said "It does not justify"

"I never said It did" Roma added "But I told you it would help in making a decision of what is it that you want to do?"

Nick sighed "I think it's up to her" he confessed. That was usually what packs did in situations like this. It was up to the girl to pass any judgment or punishment on her mate.

"I agree" Roma readily agreed.

"Any judgment his mate passes we assure you that it is enforced" Roma said with absolute conviction in her voice.

Alex and Adrian watched Roma in astonishment. This was most unexpected, she was putting the fate of her son in a stranger's hand.

Even Nick could not believe it so he wanted to confirm it "So we agree it's up to Evelyn?"

"We are in agreement" Roma confirmed.

Nick nodded satisfied, he had managed to get more than he hoped. Most of all what he liked was that Roma had been frank and fair.

"Thanks you!" Nick said in gratitude.

She nodded in acknowledgement.

"By the way" Nick asked "Who is he?"

Adrian and Alex looked at Roma who was looking at Nick but contemplating.

The flicking of emotions in her eyes make Nick's hackles rise. There was something crucial he had missed all this while.

"Alpha Nick I need your vow not to repeat what I am about to tell you, only on that condition will I reveal his identity"

Nick paused.

"You will not reveal his identity without my permission to anyone even Jeff, even his own mate"

"Wait, what? She doesn't even know who he is?" Nick asked.

"I don't think they had time to exchange pleasantries" Alex added.

"Who, is he?" Nick insisted, he had to know now, something was not right here.

"I need your vow Nick" Roma insisted.

Nick contemplated. Weighed his options, the others would know soon, especially Jeff and Evelyn. Not that her mate would go anywhere now.

"All right!" he relented.

There was an awkward silence in the room but he felt the tension building up.

"My son" Roma whispered quietly, her eyes firmly on him, for first time showing an vulnerable expression "Her mate is my Son"

Crickets!

In the stunned silence that followed, you could hear crickets all the way from Arizona!