cloud

As I walk around the pack, Nara's words keep echoing through my mind. True to her word, Nara did tell me about Onyx's trial. She told me which council members were for and against Onyx as well as when the trial was supposed to be held. Now, the issue was if she was telling the truth or not. To say I trusted Nara would be a lie — if you asked me, the girl was most likely a spy for her father.

But still, any information was better than none and I'm sure Gray would like to know about it either way. If her words were true, then maybe they could prove to be useful. I'd have to talk to him about it at some point.

Now, the issue at hand was where was I going? In the time that I've been here in the pack, I hadn't actually interacted with many of the pack members and now that Raiden and I were fighting, I didn't want to go back to his house. So where else could I go?

Maia was a definite no, Mars would sell me out the moment he laid eyes on me, Beta Reo was most likely just as tired of me as I was of him, and Alpha Tatum — well, after seeing him at the hospital I wasn't sure what to think. It was hard to figure out what was going through his mind. One minute he had this emotionless mask on his face, the next he was staring at me with undeniable pain. I couldn't work him out and that scared me.

The feeling of my shoulder knocking against someone pulls me from my thoughts.

"Sorry—" I start to say as I turn around, but standing there is the man in question. Alpha Tatum.

He stares at me as if he's conflicted. Slowly, I back away from him and begin to turn back down. Never mind what I said earlier, I'd much rather sit in the house with Raiden than stand here with Alpha Tatum. At least with Raiden, I knew what to expect.

"Follow me," the man finally says. He doesn't wait for me to reply as he begins to walk.

I turn my head back in the direction of the house. Maybe if I left now then I'd manage to escape him.

"Cloud," the alpha called out. "Let's go."

With one last longing glance, I turned back around and began to follow the alpha. His steps were quick causing me to have to speed up to match his pace. He didn't say anything or bother glancing over at me — which was not doing anything to calm my nerves.

If he wanted to hurt you then he would've already, is what I wanted to tell myself. But before I didn't know about the person in the hospital.

When we finally stopped walking we were in front of the alpha's office building. He takes one last glance at me before opening the door and stepping inside. I sigh before following him.

For once, the beta wasn't here. It was just Alpha Tatum and me. When we entered the room, he waited for me to step inside before closing the door behind me. I slowly take a seat before turning to his standing form.

"Did you want something...?" I ask hesitantly.

The man stares at me for a few seconds before sighing. "The hospital," he mumbled. "How long were you there?"

"Not long," I quickly admit. "It was only a few seconds to a minute at most."

My words seem to relieve him. He nods his head and I watch as some of the tension from before leaves his body.

"But who was that?" I question, taking the risk.

His green eyes stare at me for a few minutes. He doesn't say anything and I don't expect him to until he lets out a sigh. His hand runs through his hair and he drops into the seat across from mine.

"That wolf in the hospital is my mate."

"Your mate?" I repeat questioningly.

"It's not my story to tell. It's complicated."

Is this what Raiden meant?

He nods stiffly, the same sadness from earlier overtaking his features.

"What...what happened to him?"

The alpha's body tenses up and his jaw clenches.

"Honestly, I'm not too sure," he tells me. "One day he wandered into pack lands and was practically going crazy. He wasn't feral but he sure as hell did act like it. He was attempting to attack warriors and pack members alike. I was planning to go down there and to...to..." to kill him. "But then I felt our bond. With a little bit of talking, I managed to get him to calm down. It was as if his body just gave out on him because not long after, he just passed out and shifted into his human form."

Alpha Tatum stands up and paces around the office.

"We took him to the hospital and I noticed a...barcode on his skin and was able to figure out that he came from a laboratory. He hasn't woken up since then," now his eyes turn to me. "I'm not going to lie to you, when you first showed up the reason I let you stay was for him. And when I checked your files and saw the similarities, I thought—"

"You thought that maybe I could be useful somehow," I say bitterly.

It didn't surprise me that he had already gone through my files but paired with finding out that Raiden had also only added to my anger.

"I did," he confirms.

"Well, I hate to break it to you, but I can't help."

"Do you remember anything about the lab? Anything about the people that ran it? What they used to—"

"I don't want to talk about this," I scowl.

Alpha Tatum stares at me. I expect him to try to continue to get me to talk, but instead, he just nods.

"You can go," he says. The emotions from before were hidden back behind his mask.

Standing up, I walk towards the door and stop in front of it.

"I'm sorry about your mate. I-I don't want to think back about the lab and I'm probably the worst person to ask about it, but I'm willing to bet that we'll find out more about it with the whole Alpha Demos situation," I tell him. "Maybe it'll be some help."

Alpha Tatum says nothing, he just nods but his eyes don't meet mine. My hand grips the knob and I open it and walk out, but as I begin to close the door, I notice the defeated look in his eyes.