Page 72 of The Alpha King's Fate

He took a second to make sure Cain had calmed down before he opened the door that led out to the staff area. There was hardly anyone in the hallway; the two cleaners standing near the Housekeeping cleaning closet didn’t even look at him when he walked towards the elevator. They didn’t stop their idle gossiping.

“...some sort of convention, but it’s so weird that we have to stop working while they’re up there,” one of the women whispered.

“But what sort of convention is it? Something to do with the military?”

“They’re being so secretive; it must be. I wonder if there’s some sort of threat in the city.”

“I don’t think so. Mr Ambrose said they won’t be here for long.”

He listened to the gossip until the elevator doors closed. That only confirmed what he had already suspected—the Hunters weren’t hunting. He kept his senses open as the elevator startedgoing up, searching each floor. Ambrose hadn’t shared which room he had kept Gerald in, but it seemed the Hunters were mainly on the lower floors.

He didn’t stop the elevator until he’d passed them, but the hotel security would have already seen him. All the elevators had mirrored walls and cameras. He had to move quickly.

The moment the doors opened, he closed his eyes and let Cain take over. The master hunter. He caught Gerald’s scent almost immediately, but he was on the wrong floor. Another floor up, and he was still no closer. On a whim, he took the elevator to the top floor, his penthouse floor, and Gerald’s scent was the strongest there.

Ambrose had put that fucking drunk in his suite.

The complete disrespect of that bastard! Gerald had been covered in piss and vomit, and that asshole had dared to put him in the penthouse suite?

He marched out of the elevator and only just remembered to grab one of the flower pots to wedge the elevator door open. Below him, he sensed the movement. The sense of urgency as the Hunters realised where he was. He didn’t waste another second on his anger. The penthouse door opened with his fingerprint, and the overwhelming stench of alcohol met him.

Gerald was sitting in front of the TV with a beer in his hands, still dressed in the same clothes they had left him in. Ambrose hadn’t bothered to get him cleaned up as he’d requested.

“We need to leave.”

The older man spluttered his drink as he stood, and his eyes widened.

“I haven’t done anything wrong. Is it Layla? Did she ask you to kill me? Please don’t kill me.”

He grabbed the rambling man by his collar and pulled him out of the room. One elevator was moving up, and there werefootsteps in the stairwell. He shoved Gerald into the open elevator and kicked the pot out of the way.

“Please. I didn’t know she was like—”

“Keep your mouth shut,” he growled.

He sensed more Hunters in the hotel than when he had arrived. Like wolves, Hunters were limited in what they could do in front of humans, and that was his only advantage. A few floors before the ground floor, he stopped the elevator and pulled Gerald out.

“Mr King, I promise I won’t come back. Please let me go,’ Gerald continued while he dragged his feet.

He whirled around and grabbed Gerald’s neck, easily lifting him off his feet.

“I’m trying to save your life.”

When he dropped Gerald back to his feet, his eyes were glued on the revolver he had exposed under his t-shirt. The scent of fear filled the air.

“Move.”

Gerald didn’t resist when he dragged him to the end of the hall. The Hunters were already closing in on them when he opened another panel and put his palm against it. Another hidden door slid open, and then it shut behind them just as the Hunters burst into the hallway.

The sounds in the hotel were silenced behind the walls, but the danger around them increased. On every floor. Outside the hotel, even where he’d parked the car.

They were surrounded.

Chapter 33

“What’s going on?”

Jax shoved Gerald against the wall and clamped a hand over his mouth. The Hunters couldn’t hear them but they could sense them. Maybe they would sense their movement, too. He kept his focus outside the wall as more of them gathered. Security would have seen him head for the camera’s blind spot; it wouldn’t take them long to find the door.

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