Page 156 of The Alpha King's Fate

“What? You think you can save everyone and then just disappear like that?” Chase asked.

Save everyone? If they hadn’t come, they would all have likely died there.

“I came to do a little recon. If you guys are staying here, I need to set up patrols,” Dylan said.

“It’s just me here.”

Dylan snorted and then looked at the trailer.

“Go and rest. You look like shit,” Dylan said. “We’ll finish up out here.”

“But—”

Jax had already grabbed her hand and pulled her into the trailer. Before the door shut, she saw more vehicles pull up behind her old car and more warriors stepping out.

Were they serious? The neighbours would talk. They would know they were wolves before the day was out!

Chapter 69

Jax counted some notes into the handyman’s palm and then a few more. The guy did a great job at short notice while considerably swamped with other repair jobs after the storm. He deserved the tip.

“Thank you,” he smiled toothily before jumping into his truck, where his team was already waiting.

Jax waved them off before he looked at the side of the trailer. The dent was gone, and the whole exterior had a facelift.

“That will last a good few years.”

He looked over at the man who’d introduced himself as Adam. He and Dylan sat on some old garden chairs, drinking beers while Gerald manned the barbeque. Gerald didn’t grumble about cooking for them.

“You think so?” he asked. “I didn’t like how much it shook during the storm. I think I should have someone come and look at that.”

Or he could convince Layla to move out of the trailer park to somewhere safer. But Layla wasn’t open to that conversation yet.

He looked at the door and saw the love of his life standing in the doorway with her arms crossed. The frown hadn’t left her face since he had brought his clothes a few days ago. She made a face and then turned back into the trailer.

He didn’t need Cain to tell him that she was pissed off. The beast whined when his mate turned away, but they couldn’t rush Layla. She needed to return to him on her own—with a few nudges.

“What did you do?” Adam laughed.

“Nothing.”

“Really?” Dylan laughed.

He looked at the warrior fixing a door two trailers down and the ones playing some sort of poker game with a shady-looking young man at the corner. And then he watched Brax strolling with old Mrs. O’Brady’s arm linked through his, listening intently as the woman told him about her grandchildren. There also seemed to be some sort of football game happening in the space they cleared behind the trailers. They took over the place.

Gerald’s neighbours were suspicious when they first drove over, but when they said they were Layla’s friends, they became welcoming.

He hadn’t thought much of the neighbourhood when he first met Layla, but he knew now they probably watched over her and Brit when they were children. They were like a family.

“She’s probably tired of being cooped up inside,” Adam said. “You should take her out on a date. Women love that. I take my Bertha into town once a month and do whatever she wants. Keeps the flames burning.”

He looked back at the trailer. A date, huh? Maybe that was what they needed. It had been two years since he’d met Layla, and the only dates they’d been on had been in the little town on his territory. With the threat of Hunters over their heads all the time, he couldn’t take her anywhere else.

The threat was still there, but things were changing now. He could taste it in the wind. It wasn’t just about his broken bond or the threat of the Circle coming after them on top of everything. For the first time in history, the wolves stepped up and defended themselves, bolstering the packs in a way he hadn’t seen before. It felt like they could take on anything.

“She’s been sick. I should let her recover,” he mused.

He gave her a shot of Diedre’s potion the day he returned, and while her colouring improved, he wasn't sure if she was completely healed. It was one of the things he would have to get used to. Layla used to heal faster than any other wolf, and she’d passed that gift on to him. It was ironic that he kept that gift when she hadn’t.

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