Total pages in book: 202
Estimated words: 193561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 968(@200wpm)___ 774(@250wpm)___ 645(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 193561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 968(@200wpm)___ 774(@250wpm)___ 645(@300wpm)
“Yeah,” she whispers, love shining in her eyes. “Thank you for getting this for me.”
“Thank my sister,” I gesture.
“I’ll do that.” She looks about to move that way, but Brody and the blond guy get on the stage so she changes her mind seeing things are about to start here.
All seven of us council alphas are here. So are four of the previous council, including my dad as well as Jase’s.
Dad looks like he’s only physically here. I think he’s mentally somewhere else. I got Stace to message him to meet me here as we got close and he was in the parking lot when we arrived.
“Where’s Mom?” I had asked.
“At Riley’s. She’s with Erica, Skye, and Cat.”
“How’s she doing?”
“She’s… fine,” he said.
I knew there was something he wasn’t saying but I’ll have to find out later. I put my hand on his shoulder and Dad went perfectly still when I then told him Soleil was behind the drama, but she’s now dead. I told him I’d give him the full recap after this, including messages she had for him. Tomorrow if he didn’t mind waiting. He said nothing, but his expression looked absolutely wrecked.
His eyes are now on Bailey and Aphra. Dad has always made no bones about the fact he doesn’t trust witches and I get why now.
“Okay, listen up,” Brody calls out and the room hushes. “We’ve got your former alpha here and input is welcome, but my opinion… the logical choices are to either send him off to have the SCC deal with him, which Dr. Blakely already told us is what they’d like to do. Or… you can decide as a pack if you’d prefer to sentence him to death. We can set up a ballot box after you all determine what options we want listed on ballots and then you get to decide by popular vote.”
“Death?” The blond guy standing beside him asks with shock. “We’d do that? One of us would kill him?”
Definitely Malachi Carswell. Now that I’ve looked twice I remember him from the surveillance footage the night after I claimed Stacy when Rye mauled her cousin Jimmy.
“Death,” Brody confirms. “And if this pack sentences him to death then I think this pack will have to decide how and who does it. As for alternatives, unless he can be rehabilitated with punishment, which… from what I know of this asshole, that’s not doable, right?”
There are murmurs of agreement from the crowd. My mate scoffs like the idea of rehabilitation is unthinkable. And she’d be correct.
Brody continues, “If you don’t vote death, my opinion here is that the alternative is to let the SCC mete out whatever punishment they deem in a sentencing. I say let the SCC take on the burden unless you’re ending his life. Unless you all wanna take on feeding and clothing him yourselves for the rest of his miserable life as well as building a prison to keep him in. I think this pack has enough to worry about.”
The space is quiet and a few look shocked.
“By all means, opposing views are invited. Speak up if you’ve got something to say, folks.”
The patched-up town hall has all of the Silver Hills people in it, including the children, who are gathered together behind the rows of chairs with Lucy Savage who sits with them. She brought in wooden puzzles, a tub of Lego, and a stack of coloring books with crayons.
The roof and floor got patched up by Riley, Ty, and Mase and the Silver Hills folks are staying here on a combination of air beds, camping cots, and sleeping bags. It’ll be tight, but Mase called while we were on our way back and patched in Jase as well. He explained he, Ty, Riley, Linc, and Joel had a quick conversation just before the buses pulled in. They all felt strongly about keeping this group together, rather than integrating them with the rest of the pack. Ty argued we don’t know which of the males in this pack might not be thrilled with our intervention into their pack matters.
All good points, so we readily agreed. Trust will need to be earned. We’ll be having the building watched over with surveillance and a few posted alphas and betas on security detail for the time being. Ty told me a few of our pack members dropped off their own RVs to loan and three more will be rented and brought over from the resort across the lake. Families or couples can take turns using them one night at a time in order to be fair to everyone staying in the town hall. He also told me Brody put his offer in on the property he wants and is waiting to hear back on it. His offer stipulated a two-week closing date.