Page 31 of Fall of the Alpha

Malachi couldn’t possibly know everything. Grigori had worked too hard and was too good at what he did. Not unless…

The other spies.

The ones who had not checked in.

Only Redmond had been sent back, and only because he had a message.

Carefully leashing his fury, Grigori took several deep breaths as his brain feverishly sorted through the information. Possibility after possibility ran through his head, along with all the steps he’d taken over the years to avoid detection.

But they took Alek. Malachi must have known who he was.

This just confirmed it. Especially since Redmond, Alek’s friend, had been the one sent back with the message.

I know who your son is. I know who his friends are. I know where you are.

That was the real message, the unspoken one Redmond was too thick to realize. But Grigori understood it. He also understood the disdain.

I am so unthreatened by you that I’m going to send your spy back to you. Unharmed. I don’t care that you know.

Leaving Grigori totally in the dark would have been the wiser move because he would not have known what happened to his spies. Between Redmond being caught and returned and Malachi’s message, it was fairly obvious that the rest of Grigori’s males had been caught and either killed or held captive. He seethed, hating Malachi more than ever.

Returning Redmond with the message told Grigori that Malachi thought he was so unworthy an opponent that Malachi could telegraph his moves ahead of time, and Grigori would beincapable of doing anything to stop him. Malachi was insulting his intelligence and his power simultaneously.

“What about my son?” Grigori asked Redmond, determined to get at least something useful out of the male. Something he could actually use. “Did you find out what happened to Alek?”

“I saw him.” Redmond blinked. “He was with the Alphas of Riversong Territory.”

Cora and Trace. Grigori held back a snarl. The only Alpha he might hate as much as Malachi was Cora.

“What did they do to him?”

“Nothing.” Suddenly, Redmond was back to himself, looking down his nose at Grigori with a kind of suspicious resentment. “They had done nothing to him. He was with them willingly. They called him a ‘Sigma,’ and he stood there and watched while they… questioned me, and he did nothing. He’s a traitor to the cause.”

As if Redmond had any room to talk. He would have spilled everything he knew; Grigori didn’t doubt that. Fortunately, Grigori purposefully never told anyone everything. At most, they had tiny slivers of the full picture. On the other hand, if Malachi had managed to capture all of them, that was a small chunk of the full picture.

It was hardly everything, though.

That overconfidence would be Malachi’s long-awaited, overdue downfall.

“Let me worry about my son,” Grigori said, frowning as he tried to remember what he knew about Sigmas. Not much. He had never met one. They were even rarer than Omegas. The only thing he could remember was, supposedly, they were a combination of Alpha and Omega, but he could not remember how.

That Alek was playing nice with Cora and Trace was not hugely surprising. Though he’d inherited his mother’sintelligence, he did seem to have a knack for reading people and survival. Latching on to them would be the surest way to survive Malachi. Cora did have an eye for the unique, and a Sigma would be that.

But he was not an Alpha.

Blast.

Grigori had been so sure…

Likely, the boy was useless to him now. If he was not an Alpha, he would not be able to overpower Malachi, much less rule a territory. Perhaps Malachi had done him an inadvertent favor by taking him before Grigori could rest all his hopes on Alek’s shoulders.

“What about Bella? Did you see her?” If he could bring Paldon something, that at least would help curry him some favor with Zone One’s leader. He knew Paldon was losing patience with him. They’d never had the easiest relationship. He wasn’t ready to overthrow the male yet, though, and having some information could buy him some time before the inevitable clash.

Unfortunately, Redmond shook his head.

Useless male. Not one piece of actionable information. Grigori grit his teeth, turning away and resuming his pacing as he worked his way through what he was going to do next. He almost didn’t notice Redmond still standing there until the other male cleared his throat.

Grinding to a halt, Grigori looked at him.

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