“Please tell me you found my sister and all the others.” Magnus must have put the phone on speaker. Their new banrigh’s voice interrupted Alban’s rueful thoughts. “Leora and I are beside ourselves.”
Leora...
The older sister, whom the queen had only recently discovered had also traveled from her Wölfennite community in Canadato their wolf kingdom in Scotland. An image of the pretty she-wolf’s open and trusting face, covered in brown freckles, flashed through his mind. But he couldn’t let himself get distracted by her. Again.
Instead, he sat down on the edge of the Wicklow hotel room’s bed and delivered his report to Magnus and Tara. “We’ve just made landfall after tracking them to the west coast of Tìrarnàimhdean. The boat we suspect they took blipped off all visible radars a few hours ago. But it looks like the coordinates stop right at Wicklow, a posh county south of Dublin.”
Alban hadn’t wanted to stop and rest the previous night, but he’d had to allow the other Scottish Wolves he’d brought with him to recover. It had been over twenty-four hours since they set off after the bloody Irish Wolves who had kidnapped every Faoiltiarn she-wolf of claiming age, along with all the Wölfennites.
Well, almost all of them. Alban thought of Leora, the queen’s older sister, whom he’d found squatting in his cabin, along with her eleven-year-old daughter, Dorie. They’d completely derailed his initial plan to live as a recluse.
And he failed to remedy the situation when he’d tried to deliver them to the castle the night prior to the royal wedding….
“I suppose we should get going. Thank you again so very much for hosting us, Alban. I’ll wash and return your clothes as soon as I can.”
Alban had been determined to be rid of them and get back to his cabin, where he could resume his previously planned life of solitude. The pretty, plump little she-wolf had already taken too much of his time—not to mention the kilt he’d had to lend herbecause she’d wolfed out during the full moon, shredding her black version of the plain Wölfennite dress.
But watching them climb out of the carriage he’d driven them down in had cracked something inside his chest.
“Wait!”
Leora immediately stopped. “Yes?”
“You’re right. That outfit isn’t good for meeting your sister for the first time in over ten years. Wearing my kilt will give her and the others at the castle the wrong impression. In Faoiltiarn, she-wolves only wear a male’s tartan to show others she’s already been claimed—by the wolf whose kilt she’s sporting.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize... I’m so sorry for putting you in this position. What can I do to make sure no one mistakenly thinks that?”
Leora’s question had gutted him.
Nae, the she-wolf he’d found at his cabin wasn’t his, and he’d called himself every kind of fool while driving her and Dorie back to the house he shared with his father in town. But now, he could only feel grateful.
Because of his foolish actions, Leora hadn’t been at that wedding. She and the daughter she’d worked so hard to protect from her former mate were safe—because Alban coveted her, and despite all she’d suffered in her previous life in Canada, Leora had been naïve enough to fully trust him.
He wanted to ask after her, to hear how she and Dorie were faring now that Leora and her middle sister, the new queen, hadbeen reunited. But after what he’d allowed to happen to their younger sister, Naomi, Alban knew he had no right to ask.
He hadn’t let himself rest for more than the few hours it took to log just enough sleep to function in the morning.
He didn’t care what the Irish Wolves’ leader had claimed about sending all of the females who wished to return to their Scottish kingdom back in the spring.
Those Irish radges had no idea who they’d crossed. Alban wouldn't accept anything less than the full recovery of every single Wölfennite bride they’d stolen.
He pulled on his combat boots, balancing the satellite phone between his ear and shoulder as he continued on with his report. “I’ve completed all the wake-up calls, and we’re headed to the last Wicklow coordinates now. Hopefully, I’ll have better news for you the next time we talk. But before I begin my investigation, I have a few follow-up questions for the two of you that I wanted to get cleared up before we leave.”
“Certainly, anything, anything I can do to help,” Magnus replied. “I’ll never forgive myself for not consulting with you first before I issued that no-weapons decree for our reception.”
And as the Kingdom Defender, Alban would never forgive himself for putting Magnus in the position to make security decisions on his own because he’d been up in the mountains.
But now wasn’t the time to dwell on their many regrets.
“Too many things already aren’t adding up,” he told Magnus. “Their infiltration of our kingdom tells me they must have had a source on the inside, giving them names and exact details. Any ideas about that?”
“No,” Magnus answered. “I’d hate to think of any of our people betraying us to our worst enemy. But I’ll have Iain look into it.”
“Good idea,” Alban agreed. Though he hated technology, even he knew that a thorough digital investigation would be necessary to complement his work on the ground. “Tell him to text me anything he finds out, and I’ll do the same.”
“Got it. Is that all?”
“No,” Alban replied. “We also found a smartphone that had been tossed on the road outside the castle. According to Malcolm, it’s a make and model that isn’t available in Scotland yet. Only in the American territories and Canada.”
