Page 176 of Wolf Roulette

We’d turned a corner on Friday. “Please be careful not to overload them.”

Switching the mic back on, I passed it to her and left the stage.

I wedged between Wade and Pascal to watch.

Rhona had never looked tinier as she stood facing the people that she’d left high and dry.

My sister spoke, “When I came back, Andie told me one condition of my return was to apologise to the tribe for what I did. She thought you deserved an explanation.”

Crap.Where was she going with this?

Rhona’s throat worked. “I don’t deserve an opportunity to stand before you and explain what happened or why I did all those things. But Andie gave it to me anyway despite how I treated her. So I’ll take this chance. I’d like to start behaving the way a real steward should.”

“Oh my god,” Wade hushed. “What did you do to her?”

Me?

This was all Rhona.

This was my sister.

“Here’s how it started,” she whispered.

30

I peered down the table at my head team and the two nominated Sandstone experts. Twenty minutes ago, the pack received our summons. Legally, we had to be transparent on the reason for a negotiation.

Sascha hadn’t spoken to me since last night, and now he’d learned that I planned to seize a grid via penalty points.

Something I was doing for him.

Life was fucking twisted.

“We go into this bartering for five penalty points,” I said. “The contract clearly states that any lapse in care of land clause will result in loss of a grid. The minimum we’ll accept is two penalty points, which will allow us to turn over another grid anyway.”

The mood in the room was tense.

“Roderick, please put the call through.” I’d requested that this call occur over video. Sascha could have denied the request, but it hadn’t been in his best interest to. Previously, Luthers had so many advantages over stewards during negotiations.

Now I possessed the same edge.

Sascha couldn’t lie without me picking it up.

I watched the phone symbol on the screen.

Three rings.

Seven rings.

The pack answered on the eighth. Not their worst record by a long shot.

“Greetings to the pack, and thank you for responding to our summons.”

“Head Steward,” Sascha said coldly. “Greetings to the head team also.”

At times, his team had acted the part of disliking me. This time, I had a feeling nothing about their expressions was faked. Leroy’s face made Mandy appear almost calm and forgiving.

Sascha had told his wolves what I did.

---