“What happened?" she asked, her voice cracking with confusion. "Where am I?”
Like our Flower, she looked all around. But her search stopped when she found Lorcan standing in front of the habitat's four-story-high observation windows with Ronan and the rest of the wolves who'd carried out the Second Reaping.
We'd been nearly twenty-four hours at this mission, transporting these she-wolves across land, sea, and air to arrive at the secret kingdom. But when given the option to let another group take their place until the she-wolves woke up, our warriors had done the same as Sea and me. Refused to leave.
These she-wolves — they were our treasure, weren't they? And like jealous dragons, a primal compulsion to stand guard over them burned inside us.
"Where am I?" the yellow-haired female asked Lorcan directly this time. "Why do I feel so weird?"
"Thought none of them was supposed to wake for another hour or so," one of the Sea Wolves muttered, throwing Lorcan a baleful look. Probably still sore that Lorcan had declared the yellow-haired one his under the old Wild laws.
That had been shortly after we’d loaded his future mate and the other unconscious she-wolves into the real lorry. The other two were dummy trucks driven by unwitting humans to a private airfield and the closest port to the Scottish kingdom village. A neat diversion to send the Scots on a wild goose chase, while the realtruck headed to a southern port farther from the Highlands, yet much closer to Ireland. From there, we’d taken an unmarked cargo ship across the Irish Sea to Wicklow to drop off the potential with the Tríbéirríthe.
Then we sent the Tríbéirríthe’s private plane on another dummy trip — this time to Ulfrford, an old Viking wolf village near Waterford, where the original Viking wolves who’d emigrated to Scotland had settled before the Wild Wolves handed over the residence to the secret kingdom. Meanwhile, we loaded the she-wolves into another lorry, and a few hours later, they were all installed in the secret kingdom’s enclosed habitat.
Anyhow, the True King had declared that no one else could call dibs on their future mate after Lorcan used the chaos of the heist to claim his yellow-haired she-wolf — the yellow-haired she-wolf he was meant to have fully knocked out again.
I, too, glared at Lorcan. “Did you not give her the needle this time?”
We’d only chloroformed our Flower, so it was natural that she’d be awake a shorter time later, but I’d given Lorcan explicit instructions to inject his complaining female with something strong enough to keep her knocked out for hours as we transferred over fifty she-wolves to the secret kingdom. Of all ofthem, she should have been the last to wake.
“I promise you, I gave her the needle.” Lorcan gritted his jaw and threw the yellow-haired she-wolf an apologetic glance.
"You lying toerag!" the disgruntled Sea Wolf said. "It's obvious you didn't, or else why would she be awake?"
“Where is Sadie? Why isn't she here!” Our Flower fired off more questions at us before Lorcan could answer the Sea Wolfcalling him out.
She scanned the room, and her voice became even more panicked when she didn't find her friend's delivery box. “Tell me where you put Sadie right now!”
I exchanged a look with Sea, who stood up from his throne chair to let her know. “She’s not here. Not anywhere near here, so it’s no use looking for her.”
"No use looking for her?" Our Flower reacted as if Sea had punched her straight in the face.
Her whole body jerked back, and her expression crumpled. “Oh no! Tell me you didn’t…” She grabbed at the front of her new hand-knitted sweater. “Tell me you didn’t leave my best friend alone with those three guys!”
Another exchanged look between Sea and myself let her know that was exactly what we did without either of us having to say so out loud.
"Why would you do that?" she practically shrieked. "We have to go get her. You have to go back and get her right now."
Look at her, already throwing around commands like a queen. Under different circumstances, I'd be plain delighted with her. But under these, I had to pull rank.
I held both hands up to let her know, "Aw, Flower, we cannot do that."
"Why not?" she demanded.
"Because they're long gone by now," Sea answered. He stepped forward to present a united front with me as he told her, “You have to understand, she was the only purpose for them — the reason why they funded this entire venture.”
“What do you mean? I don’t understand anything you’re saying!" Flower regarded him with an expression filled with somuch hatred and disgust, that it put the one she'd given me earlier to shame. "Why didn’t you bring her along with the rest of us? Why would you strand my innocent best friend all alone with three men she doesn’t know?”
“Didn't you see for yourself why we did it?” Sea shook his head at her. “I mean, what were we to do with a female like that? It was clear she belonged with them!”
“Clear, how so?" Flower practically shrieked back. "Because she’s a little taller than average, you thought she deserved to be sold off to fund your criminal activities?"
“No, because she’s…” Sea turned to me for help explaining.
But I was just as confused as him by her reaction. “Could ye not see,"I asked our Flower, "notsmellthat she belongs with them?”
“What are you talking about? I don’t care if she smells odd or if she’s bigger than average. She’s an innocent she-wolf, and she doesn’t deserve to be left alone with some rando giants. Oh my gosh, when she wakes up, she's going to be so scared…”
