Page 139 of Sapphire Flame
Chapter Thirteen
For the next few hours, Grant kept his head down, mind focused. Because he’d been planning for years, he’d always known the day would come when he took over the pack. It was time to put everything in motion.
His core team, which included Ryan and those wolves that had helped secure Kryder with the net, had a dozen strategies in place as well as hidden stores of food and weapons.
Besides the usual stockpile of pistols, assault rifles, and a mountain of ammunition, he also had a rocket launcher in case Kryder produced an armored vehicle. The crew in charge of this piece of weaponry had watched a dozen training videos and practiced non-firing runs at least a hundred times.
Hopefully, they wouldn’t have to use the rocket launcher. At this point, however, he wouldn’t put anything past Kryder and had structured his training with the man’s psychopathic character in mind.
Several pack females, not involved in the military end of things, kept stopping by the conference room. They brought buckets of coffee, kept the team members well-fed and offered a dozen ‘thank you’s’ for taking Kryder down and for having prepared the pack for this day.
Grant expressed his appreciation for their efforts as well. But he had no illusions about the difficulties in front of him. Kryder had always nurtured a network of spies within the pack whose efforts had frequently ended in the torture and death of a wolf who had been caught in any kind of opposition to Kryder.
Over the years, Grant and had learned how to keep his mouth shut no matter what happened, to train his wolves to a form of intense discretion, and to take his beatings any time it could divert Kryder’s cruel nature away from the pack members and onto himself.
The latter had earned him a level of devotion and loyalty that had kept his wolves out of trouble. In recent years, Kryder’s killing rate had gone down significantly.
Now Grant’s goal was to keep his people alive.
With the weapons distributed along with a hefty amount of ammo, Grant could only wait.
He sat in the conference room, eating a ham sandwich and guzzling another cup of coffee. He had a dull headache at the front of his forehead. Too much adrenaline. Waiting was the hardest.
It was nearly midnight and Natalie had been gone for several hours. He missed her, and he wished she was here.
Yet, part of him was glad she was gone. He’d spoken truthfully when he’d said he didn’t want to have to worry about her safety. But his relief carried more weight than he’d thought. As he pondered it now, he realized he had been dreading her staying.
He had a job to do that didn’t allow for the complications of a woman in his life. He’d never wanted to get this involved with Natalie. Not for a moment had he thought his term as pack alpha would begin with a passionate love affair with a fae female.
“You’re in a funk.”
Ryan’s words snapped him away from his thoughts. He shifted his attention to his second-in-command. “Yeah.”
Ryan lowered his voice. “Natalie?”
Grant huffed a sigh. “Unfortunately, yes. But now that she’s gone, I can focus on what’s important?”
“Huh.” Ryan took a bite of his sandwich, then shoved a couple of potato chips into his mouth.
“What does that mean?”
Ryan shook his head. “I don’t know. Because she’s great or at least I think so.” Grant was grateful Ryan had kept his voice to a murmur, especially when he added, “Want my honest opinion?”
Grant almost snapped an ungenerous, ‘no’. Instead, he nodded curtly then ate more of his sandwich. Maybe his body language would dissuade Ryan.
Apparently not.
Ryan turned to face away from the others eating at the table, all of whom were chatting, then said quietly, “You don’t know what you have in her. She’s one in a million. Hell, one in a billion and you know it. So, don’t be an ass and dump her the way you have the women you’ve bedded over the past six years.”
Grant was ready with his reply, But Ryan lifted his hand. “Don’t want to hear your excuses, my friend. This is Five Bridges. Take the gift when it’s offered or be alone for another six years, or a hundred. But I’ll tell you this, you’re going to be miserable if you fuck this up and she leaves you for good.”
Ryan turned back to the table and accepted a refill on his coffee. He then hunkered down and set to work on his second sandwich.
Grant didn’t want to think about Natalie right now. He felt guilty as hell that he’d basically taken her into his bed then sent her on her way. Nothing new there except damn if Ryan wasn’t right. She was exceptional and had been instrumental in helping him to take over the Meldorin Pack.
Something inside him grew hard as steel, however. This wasn’t the time to be thinking about love and marriage. He had to focus on his wolves. Period.
The alarm sounded just as he finished his coffee. The external security force leader tapped on Grant’s telepathy.
