Page 31 of Kidnapped By the Alpha

“Coming right up,” the woman said, whisking herself away as quickly as she had appeared.

“Which one did you order for me? The waffles or burger?” I asked.

No one had ever ordered for me before, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about the practice. On one hand, it felt a little patriarchal, but I couldn’t help but notice that he had chosen two options I would definitely enjoy.

“Whichever you like,” Jasper said. “They’re both delicious.”

“What if I want them both?” I teased.

“Then they’re yours,” he replied.

When the food arrived, I tested both options, deciding on the waffles. Jasper eyed the burger as he began to eat, ignoring the bite I had taken from one side. We ate in silence for a while, watching the other patrons and enjoying the comfortable silence.

“Have you been here a lot?” I asked Jasper, who seemed much more at ease in this environment than I had seen him in others.

“Whenever I need to get away from the pack and clear my head, this has been a good place to go,” he said. “The staff don’t ask any questions—as long as you tip well, that is. And as you pointed out before, there are plenty of things to look at in here.It’s a good way to keep my mind focused on the world around me.”

“I totally get that. Keeping busy at the cabins has really helped me. It’s nice to have a distraction sometimes,” I agreed.

Jasper picked up his napkin, wiping his mouth as he looked at me with sudden intensity. “Have you needed a lot of distractions since you’ve been a part of the Dark Moon Pack?” he asked. I even thought I heard concern in his voice.

“At first,” I answered honestly. “The first few days, all I could think about was getting back to Sparkle Hollow. When I finally realized that it would be a long time before I got to see my home again—if ever—I had to find ways to shift my thinking and focus on something else.”

Jasper nodded in understanding. “Is that why you’ve been spending so much time with the children and the women?”

“Partially, but I really do enjoy spending my time with them,” I said truthfully.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the members of the Dark Moon Pack had become friends to me. The young ones, the women, and even the kinder male wolves like Killian had made my time at the cabins both pleasant and entertaining.

I missed my home and my friends, of course, but it had been a long time since I had thought about Sparkle Hollow and what my pack was doing in my absence.

I looked down at my half-eaten food, feeling guilty and conflicted about finding a way to enjoy my new life in the Dark Moon Pack. I wasn’t even sure if my friends knew whether I was alive or dead.

Chapter 17 - Jasper

“Alpha, you have a message,” Killian told me.

I had been in the midst of organizing the wolves for patrol duty when he had run up to me with a look of urgency on his face. We didn’t have much reason to run patrols since we had arrived at the cabins, but I had noticed a feeling of uneasiness in the group lately and wanted to give them something to do.

“Dismissed,” I ordered my warriors tersely, sending them off to their stations for the day.

As soon as they disappeared, Killian handed me the message, written in Killian’s own hand.

“Who sent it?” I asked, squinting at the nearly illegible scrawl.

“Aiden Moonstone called me,” he said uncomfortably. “I wrote down the main points as best as I could. He was furious about you taking a luna from Sparkle Hollow.”

I did my best to decipher his writing, gleaning enough to get the gist of what Aiden wanted to say.

“How did they find out it was me?” I asked. “I made sure that I wasn’t seen when I took her.”

Killian shifted on his feet uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, Alpha,” he said quietly. “When Aiden called, he said that Sparkle Hollow was planning to hunt us down and get April back. I argued with him, telling him that they’d never find us.”

I sighed, realizing the mistake that my second had made.

“He was fishing for information, and you gave it to him,” I surmised. “They didn’t know I had taken her until you confirmed it.”

He hung his head in shame. Killian rarely made mistakes like this one, and I knew he hadn’t done it intentionally.

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