Crossing Paths With The White Wolf

Natalia

POV

I caught the end of the conversation between Mama Isabel and Helios. The emotion and vulnerability in his words made my heart break for him. I hated that I had interrupted their moment, but it wasn't like I could just back up into the living room without being noticed.

We were on the plane now. Helios was helping Dan-Bi put her backpack up in the overhead compartment. Hestia was purring as she watched him through my eyes. He was wearing jeans and a fitted shirt that was tucked in and I couldn't help but admire the nice tight b**t. I caught Theo's eye. He was smirking at me, and I knew I'd been caught. I grabbed a book I'd found in Helios' house from my backpack and buckled in for the flight.

We arrived in Phoenix without much incident. We deboarded the plane and I saw 2 SUV's parked near by. There were two men and a really pretty woman standing outside them, holding a container of sorts. I followed behind Helios and Gonzalo, while Theo and Sebastian hurried ahead of them. The pretty woman hugged them both before she gave Sebastian the container in her hands. I saw him as he opened it and took out some brownies to share with Theo. How much do these guys eat? They're not even werewolves. The woman, who I'm assuming now is Celeste, ran up a little and gave Gonzalo a quick hug before she embraced Helios. I could see her whispering something in his ear and he nodded. Hestia was bristling possessively over the hug.

He should not be hugging so many women. First the old lady and now this one. We should be the only woman he touches - She growled.

He is not ours Hestia. He can touch whoever he wants. - I said stubbornly, trying to hide my own jealousy.

"You are Natalia. I am very happy to meet you. I'm Celeste," she said as she came up and held out her hand. I looked quickly at Helios and then shook her hand. There was a warmth and power to her that was catching me off guard. She turned and led me to the two men, who were chatting lightly with Gonzalo and Helios. "This is Markus, my mate, and this is Gillian, his Beta." She turned to the girls. "Do they speak English?" She asked me.

"Dan-Bi does," I pointed to her. "Si-Woo does not, but Dan-Bi usually translates for her." Celeste nodded and then looked at Sebastian.

"Sebastian, share with the girls. There's plenty more at home."

Sebastian blushed and stammered, "I uh...We kind of already finished it."

Alpha Markus laughed at Celeste's look of shock, "I did say you should bring more, Tuli."

I did a double take. Clearly, I heard wrong. He wouldn't call her that.

"Where are the kids?" Helios asked.

"Dad's babysitting. The car seats take too much space," Alpha Markus explained. Gonzalo, Theo and Sebastian started getting into the second SUV while Beta Gillian got into the driver's side. Helios was getting the girls into the back seat of the SUV before he held the door open for me to climb in. Luna Celeste and Alpha Markus were already seated in the front.

"So, Helios tells me that you saw yourself helping us get my friend back. W -was she OK?" I asked.

"Oh, yes she will be fine. You will get her home. No one here would let anything happen to a little girl," she said, and I could feel how fiercely she felt her words.

"Where did you guys live before this?" Alpha Markus asked.

"It's a village called Suha-Ri. A couple of hours southwest of Gangneung."

"Sorry, it's none of my business, but how did you end up there?" he asked.

"I've done a lot of traveling over the years." I shrugged.

"Where are you from originally?" Luna Celeste asked.

"The Dominican Republic, but I haven't been there in a long time," I answered.Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.

Not since I lost control. - Hestia whispered with shame in her voice.

We lost control.- I corrected her, but she just curled up and whimpered in the back of my mind.

"Oh, so you speak Spanish?" Luna Celeste said brightly.

"I...yes, but I haven't spoken it in a long time, so it may be a little rusty. I've been in Korea for about 7 years."

"How old are you?" Alpha Markus asked.

"You should know better than to ask a lady her age, Alpha Markus," I deflected.

We arrived at their pack grounds a little while later. It was really quite pretty. I was surprised at how big their packhouse was. Their pack must be big.

"How big is your pack in Korea?" Luna Celeste asked.

"I don't belong to a pack." I answered her honestly.

"But you don't smell like a rogue" she said, confused.

"I have a gift that allows me to mind link anyone I have an emotional connection to. It's like my own personal pack. It allows me and my wolf to be independent without becoming a rogue."

"Neat," she said as she got out of the car. "Welcome to Crescent Moon. I will show you your rooms and then we can answer any questions you have," she said.

We followed her in and dropped our backpacks off. As we were coming back to the living room, I heard Helios talking to Markus and laughing. We walked in to see a little rose-cheeked baby walking on wobbly legs towards Helios, who was crouching on the floor with his arms stretched out. The little girl practically stumbled the last three steps as she fell into his arms and I swear I felt my ovaries twitch.

I looked at Luna Celeste, she had a soft smile on her face and a hand to her heart. She gave the kids a kiss each before she announced she needed to get ready for dinner and left. I looked at the clock on the wall. It was only 4. Why was she getting ready so early? "Where are the girls?" I asked the two males left in the room. Each one was holding a child, which I learned were Celeste's twins. They put them down as they struggled to be let down, so they were free to explore.

"They went with Gonzalo and Theo to the basement. We have a game room for the teenagers. I thought they might be able to relax a little more with people their age." I nodded at Alpha Markus' words and sat on one of the couches. We were just sitting there watching the pups until Gonzalo came back up alone.

"Theo is with the girls. They are playing on the Xbox. He just wants to make sure the girls are comfortable with the other kids before he comes back upstairs. I saw Sebastian raiding Celeste's baking stash." "Can we talk about the plan?" I asked.

"Let's just wait until after dinner. Evergreen has a lot of information for us." Alpha Markus said. I huffed, not actually meaning to be rude, but frustrated at not knowing how we would get Eun-Kyung back.

"I understand your frustration, but we need all the help we can get to do this safely," Alpha Markus said. I knew he was trying to be kind, but I was just more annoyed.

"How? How could you possibly understand how I feel?" I said angrily.

Markus picked up his pup as it reached him and put him on his lap. "Celeste has been kidnapped twice. Once for two weeks while she was pregnant with the pups. Trust me, when I say, I know what you're feeling." My anger deflated quite quickly. "Oh, sorry."

"Don't be. I think everyone can attest how shitty my temper was until I found her again." He chuckled. I noticed that Helios was looking at the little baby crawling on the floor while Alpha Markus spoke, not meeting anyone's eyes.

Mate looks like he's sad. Go touch him - Hestia suggested.

That's not appropriate without him knowing we're his mate - I reminded her softly. Even that was hurting me to say now. I was quickly losing the battle I had started.

"Anyways. Evergreen is a security tech genius. He found some additional information and created a map of the place based on the pictures and notes that Helios sent us. He and Daniel, my Gamma, have been getting a plan ready. Like Celeste said earlier, we take the safety of your friend seriously. We won't let anything happen to her."

I nodded, feeling guilty at my outburst. "I'm sorry Alpha Markus. I made a promise to her parents and I'm terrified of failing them."

"Natalia, do the girls like spices?" Came a voice from across the hall. I looked at Alpha Markus questioningly.

"Celeste is cooking dinner for everyone. You're welcome to go talk to her. It's through those two doors over there." He pointed. I made my way to the kitchen to see several containers of chicken with a bright red spice. "Hi," I said awkwardly.

"Hi! I'm making tandoori chicken and rice pilaf. Do you know if the girls like spice or should I keep a portion spice free?" she pointed to the container at the end, which had about 15 pieces of chicken spice free.

"They should be OK with spice. They ate some Mexican dishes earlier," I said.

She nodded and began dumping the chicken into the marinated containers.

"Do you cook every day?" I asked her, genuinely curious. This was a lot of food.

"No, Markus and I had to compromise. I only get to cook twice a week," She said as she began washing the rice, "I tried to get him to remove the agreement once the whole deal with my old Alpha finished, but he says it's eventually going to overwhelm me. So, if I know we're having company, I try to keep my cooking nights available for those, but it usually draws a crowd, so I try to make lots."

"What happened with the old Alpha?" I asked.

"What happened with the old Alpha?" I asked.

Her eyes darkened as she answered, "He was a bad man. He killed my parents and took all of us little ones from our pack as slaves. Markus found me and helped me save my friends. They are part of the pack now. You'll meet some of them later." "That's rough."

"Hmm." She said as she continued to work making dinner. She looked relaxed and in her element.

"How did you meet Helios?" I asked her. She stopped for a moment and looked at me.

"That's a complicated story for another time. He's my friend and deserves to be happy is the short version." She said before she continued cooking dinner.

Why won't anyone talk about him? I asked Hestia.

I don't know. Maybe we should ask him ourselves. - she said. She had a point.

We had dinner and then went into a conference room on the first floor. Evergreen showed us the map of the compound. It was actually really impressive the way he managed to make a 3D map from pictures.

"The best way to do this is to be in the middle of a shift change. They happen at 7 pm and 5 am. We think if we go to the 5 am change, we'll have a better shot. People are sleepy from waking up or from being awake all night. Helios took a number of pictures. This is when the least number of guards are armed. We want to hit the locker rooms in the main office first and then the warehouse." Gamma Daniel explained.

"From the pictures, we counted about 25 guards for each shift. If we can surprise at least half of them without weapons, we should be OK."

"How many people are we taking?" Helios asked.

"The more the merrier, honestly. The more numbers we have, the safer the humans will be. Aside from those here, I suggest Gabriel, Brenda, Matteo, Brent, Zack, Richard, and George. That makes 16 of us," Markus answered.

"17 Alpha. Helios mentioned that this guy is just a buyer, I have some malware I want to install in their computers and we'll need to delete their camera feeds to make sure we're not followed back home." Evergreen added. "We should take a doctor with us just in case someone gets seriously hurt," Beta Gillian said.

"I don't think that's necessary," I said.

"I know we're werewolves, but bullets still hurt. They can still cause serious damage," he insisted.

"No, I understand that, Beta Gillian. What I'm saying is, we don't need a doctor because I'm better than a doctor."

"What do you mean?" Gamma Daniel asked.

"She's a white wolf." Luna Celeste said.

"Whoa, cool." Evergreen said, "I don't think I've ever heard of one being born in this century."

"I try to keep a low profile. If they taught you what usually happens to us, you should understand why," I said.

"How are we getting there?" Gonzalo asked.

"We rented a bus. We can get close and walk from there." Markus answered.

"I think we should also have the moving truck that's still in your garage, Helios," Theo said.

"Why?"

"If the only thing missing is the leopard cat, I think the owner will know the attack was done by us. We should take a few other animals so it looks like it's just part of a bigger raid. We don't need them coming after us." "That's the least of my worries" Helios said.

"Theo is right. We don't need them coming after us. I want this to be over once we free Eun-Kyung. We've already kept her there for a week. Let's do this without lose ends and with as little risk to any of you as possible," I said. Helios just nodded and looked away. "What's the plan for the other animals then?"

"I think Alpha Troy has a charity that works with endangered species. I can give him a quick call to see if he'll take them off our hands," Alpha Markus said, standing up.

"Ooh yes, I remember Luna Kiara telling me about it a few months ago." Luna Celeste confirmed.

"Just keep organizing. Link me if you need me, Tuli. It shouldn't take me more than 10 minutes." Alpha Markus bent and gave Luna Celeste a quick kiss as he left. This time I was sure I heard him correctly and I did my best not to laugh. "We'll leave after dinner tomorrow. Theo and I can charter a plane back..." Sebastian started and then Evergreen interrupted.

"We can just take the company plane. Markus bought one when Helios kidnapped the Luna last year..."

"I'm sorry what?" I asked. Evergreen slapped a hand over his mouth and Celeste growled at him. I looked over at my mate who was looking down at his hands.