Chapter 21
Chapter 21
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The tower used to belong to a man named Charles Stanton. He was an antique collector. When I was first given the tour, I asked the realtor to keep some of the pieces he left behind. Mr. Stanton was a human man. He married and never had any children. His wife passed, and he was here all alone for a very long time.
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I almost didn’t buy it. The scent of his despair and solitude permeated these walls. A man slowly spiraling and losing his mind to his grief. It reminded me of the time my father spent in the forest after Mom died. But once we got to the top floor, I knew there would be no other place for me but here.
From the west, I can see my father’s packhouse. The courtyard and the garden. From the east, I can see Wolfe Tower and what will be Lycan Tech’s MC region tower. The south has a clear view of the strip. The north has a perfect view of the Magique City River and the Blood Ridge Bridge.
It was originally built by my great-great-grandfather. Austin Wolfe, who gave our pack its official name after the Blood Wars against the Poison Vein vampire coven on the other side of the bridge just outside of Nova.
He was the first Wolfe to chain up his pride and agree to a cease-fire, or rather a cease-bloodening. The bridge was built as a symbol of both the vampires and werewolves who mindlessly gave their lives to a war that was never ours to begin with. The Wraiths started that war, and they paid for it with the near extinction of their race.
Much like humans, who don’t seem to grasp that the supernatural chooses to keep them around out of respect for their species rather than to treat them as cattle. At least, where the vampires are concerned. Nasty creatures. We all struggle to coexist in what might be the last city in the nation to allow humans to live freely.
“This is big,” I had almost forgotten Alpha Barnes was here with me. We both look up at the massive clock windows on the third floor. “That doesn’t ring, right? At the stroke of twelve,”
“No, it’s just a big ass clock now. You can hear the gears turning when it’s super quiet at night,” I clear my throat. “I believe you asked for a tour.”
“I did,” he motions to the building. “How do you get inside?”
“Through the front on the other side,” I point back at his bike. “It is Blood Ridge, so you should probably park inside so none of the other wolves do something stupid to your bike.”
I start walking toward the garage entrance. I press the clicker on my keys and listen to the roar of his bike while trying hard not to think about how cool it was to be on the back of that thing with my arms around him. It felt like the universe wanted that ride to be prolonged because we caught every red light, and he would place his hand over mine so I wouldn’t pull away.
The bike looks small in the six-car garage. I have two cars, and then there’s my sister’s Fiat. He cuts the engine and leans it on the little kickstand as he gets off. He looks around the entire room and then stares at me.
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Chapter 21
“This is a big ass garage,” he grins. “Do you have cars to fill it?”
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“I have two cars: the Bentley and my G-Wagon. And my sister has a Fiat. She’ll be staying with me. She’s going to school at Nova U across the bridge.”
“Did your father disown her as well?”
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“No, but it’s a long drive from his home. My family never lived in the packhouse. My mother hated it, and none of us thought it was appropriate for a lady to live with all the patrolmen. She asked me if she could stay with me during the week and maintain beta training during the weekend back home.”
“I have two little brothers,” he nods. “The youngest lives with me as well.”
“Not because either of you were disowned?”
“My mom would kill my father if he tried. There are eight of us,” he smirks. Holy shit. There are only five of us, and we have almost killed each other on many occasions.
“Are you all close?”
“Fuck no. We’re all boys,” he smirks. “And neither of us is mated. I should warn you. You’ll probably be the center of her attention when my mom finds out.”
“Come on,” I wave him over to the wooden loft staircase leading up to the house’s first floor.
“The lift doesn’t work?”
“I don’t know how to use it yet. It’s vintage,” I feel my face flush.
“Come on then,” he waves me over to it.
Out of all the people I’ve wanted to share this victory with, it never occurred to me that Alpha Barnes would be the first to see it. In fact, the only other time I’ve thought of this man was how the hell we were going to get rid of him if he didn’t sign the treaty. There was no way in hell my brother and I were going to let him take anything from us without a fight. And if he is the man I think he is, I know he was going to give us one hell of a war.
It took him a night to place his cards on the table. One night, he decided that he would rather wave his white flag of surrender than go against me and anything I believe in. He’s here knowing of my infatuation with another man. I can’t help but respect him, his choices, and the levelheadedness he’s displaying. I could never. I tried to run away. I did, for three days.
“It looks pretty simple. Just set the lever to the floor you want. Although, I have no idea what language this is,” he waves me into the small cage. I step into it with him to find that his scent overpowers the small space.
“It’s French. Mr. Stanton’s wife was French.”
“Who is Mr. Stanton?”
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Chapter 21
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“The old man who owned this building before me. He was seventy-four years old when he died six years ago, and the bank confiscated the tower because he had no next of kin.” I reach for the lever. “Obviously, this is the garage. That’s what it says,”
“Right. What’s the next one?” he bumps me playfully.
“Domicile means home,” I say, and pull the cage doors shut and the gate. “This is the part I have trouble with.” I try to move the lever, only for it to snap all the way to the top floor before I can get it to stop where I want it. The lift starts to move quickly. “It does that every time. I was trapped in here for like an hour last time,”
“Oh, shit,” he laughs.
“Best I could do was fix the gates on each floor with some WD-40.”
“It could be that one of the gears is stuck in a spring. This is really old. I can fix it if you let me. Unless you prefer to do it yourself?”
“I don’t know anything about this stuff. And there’s a huge industrial-sized elevator in the back. I don’t have the key to work it at the moment. The juveniles my brother sent to get my things have it. They’ve been bringing things over all morning.”
