The blood pack (Book five)

~Dawn~ I walk through the pack, keeping my head down as always. It was intimidating to say the least to not be a dominant wolf in the lead alphas pack. Not that anyone really took the time to notice me anyway. I was not a fighter or doer, I was a thinker, and other than my family and Nick, one of the Luna's mates, I was pretty much invisible. My mum said it was a blessing. She had come from another pack and joined the lead alphas pack when the Luna Vic killed their alpha. She did not talk much about her time as part of alpha crescentmoon's pack, but I had heard from others of the atrocities that he had performed there. Some said that he and his daughter forced the females into s****l acts, back when there was a shortage of female werewolves. The thought of my mum having to go through such a thing made me glad that Luna Vic had done what she did and Alpha Eric had saved us.  This, of course, happened before I was born. When my mum came to the lead alphas pack, she met my fathers who were all enforcers in the pack. It was strange seeing them together, given that most mated couples now were just that, a couple. But it was the norm for us and if it was good enough for the lead alpha and his mate, it was good enough for us.  My two brothers had all taken after my fathers, all strong enforcer types that spent hours every day training with Marcus and Klaus, two other mates of Luna Vic. I was the youngest, the baby, and the weakest, physically anyway. Mentally though, I out shone them all, sometimes taking great pleasure in leaving them looking at each other confused while I laughed to myself at their idiocy. Maybe that was mean of me, but it was the only way that I could best any of them and I took my wins where I could.  I walked up the steps leading to the pack house and knocked on the door, waiting patiently for someone to answer. I was surprised when instead of being greeted by Nick like I usually was, Luna Vic was there in his place with a motherly smile on her face. She really was a beauty. You would never guess that she had given birth to three kids of her own or that she had spent her childhood blending in to the human world. No one could ever mistake Luna Vic for human. She had such long and beautiful hair, strong muscles, but not in a manly way and curves that anyone would die for.  "You must be Dawn." She greeted, making me even more on edge. Not that Luna Vic was a bad Luna, in fact, she had been over to our house more than once to check how we were as she did with all the pack, but I did not think that she actually knew who I was.  "Y-yes." I stuttered, not sure what else to say. "Don't worry, Nick is just running a little late and he asked me to let you in." Vic explained. I let out a small sigh of relief, not that it was not an honour to speak with her, but I was not good around new people and tended to have perpetual foot in mouth syndrome around people who didn't know me.   I walked inside and stood to one side, looking around the large entrance way. Usually I breezed through here, straight to the tech room that Nick ran. Instead I was stood, still not knowing what to say as I felt Luna Vic looking at me out of the corner of my eyes. "I used to be a lot like you, you know." Luna Vic sighed slightly as she walked over to the sofa and sat down. "I used to like being invisible to everyone, until I met my mates that is." I shifted from foot to foot, not really wanting to have the birds and the bees conversation right now, especially not with my luna. "You wear your individuality on the outside much better than I did though." I tucked my short hair behind my ear, guessing it was Luna Vic's way of saying I was beautiful just the way I was, just like my mum said. She was right though, I did like to be different. I had my hair in a short pixie cut, dyed bright pink, my nails were a rainbow of colours in stark contrast to my black combat boots, skinny jeans and vest top with 'Have you tried turning it off and on again?' written across the bust. I heard footsteps coming down the stairs and looked up hopeful that it was Nick. I was not so lucky. Alpha Eric came down the stairs with his two children Shauna and Slater who seemed to be bickering again as usual. "I don't understand father. I should be alpha by now. You are getting too old to run the pack and Ashley has had his own pack for years now." Slater grumbled as they reached the bottom of the stairs. "Ashley was smart and went to set up his own pack instead of living in our dad's shadow." Shauna retorted. "Besides, no way am I staying in a pack with you as Alpha. You would have the place in ruins after a week." All three of Luna Vic's children were all exceptional, not only in strength but looks as well. Shauna was like a carbon copy of Vic where as Slater took after alpha Eric to a tee. Mind you, most of the men and women here were gorgeous, which was probably part of why I wanted to be something else. "Both of you, outside for training, now!" Alpha Eric commanded, his two children huffing and staring daggers at each other before doing as he asked. Alpha Eric flopped on to the sofa next to his mate, picking he up and placing her on his lap as he sighed. "Those two at it again?" Vic asked, slight amusement in her voice. "Again would imply that at some point they stopped. Slater is meant to take my place one day as lead alpha, but at the moment he is still acting like an arrogant pup. We should have called him Luke Slater instead of Slater Luke, given he is much more like Luke used to be than Slater. Shauna isn't much better either, always winding him up." Alpha Eric let out another sigh as he looked up to me. "Ahh, you must be Nick's latest prodigy." "Dawn." I quickly introduced myself. "I know your name dear." Alpha Eric laughed, making me blush slightly. "It's hard not to the way Nick goes on about you. He hasn't been so excited about training someone since Trevor was here." I felt my heart skip a beat at the mention of Trev. He had left years ago when alpha Ash went to set up his own pack, and to be honest we had hardly really seen or spoken to each other given he was older and more dominant than me. But I had had such a big crush on him. Maybe it was a bit of fan Girling at his technical expertise, but he was also hot. Not in the over the top muscles way a lot of the wolves around here were, but in a discrete way that left so much to the imagination. I don't think Trev even knew that I existed though and then, he left. My mind was pulled from my melancholy as finally Nick walked in to the room. He gave me a welcoming smile before jogging over to Vic and placing a loving kiss on her forehead. "Come on Punky Princess, we have lots to do today." Nick smiled as he walked past me towards the tech room. Nick always said my hacker name like it was a joke, but to me it was my alter ego. In person, I was awkward and geeky, online, I was whoever I wanted to be and I was damn good at it. I knew that we were going to be working in the same project we had been working on for weeks now, with no progress. The infomous Trev had been working with alpha Ash to try and find out who, working at Tallen Corp, was behind the sick website they they had set up showing supernatural creatures fighting each other to the death. To say that this was heavy s**t was an understatement. I never thought there would be something on the Internet that would repulse me so much. Every day, we checked the new uploads, having to watch them frame by frame in hopes of finding a sign of where they were being filmed. Then we would try and follow the money that users were paying to watch the filth, hoping it would lead us back to an account linked to Tallen Corp instead of just another dud. Finally we would try to find a back hack into their usual business sites and projects, hoping to find something, anything that would help. That place though, was as secure as fort Knox and despite me and Nick working at it almost none stop, we were no closer to even being able to get in to their lunch menu, never mind their files marked 'big bad plans'. I walked inside, feeling much more relaxed to be in my domain as I took my place at the desk that had been set up for me. As usual for my little ritual, I typed in my password, running my finger over the 'Trev' inscription in the desk while I waited for it to load and then it was down to business. Maybe I was a bit obsessed, but it did good for girls to have idles, or at least that is what I have read. There were three new videos uploaded yesterday, each more horrific than the last. I turned off my emotions as much as I could while I went through each of them, frame after gory frame, listening for background noises, windows and reflections that may lead to the Id of who had taken them or where they were being held. I also had to find the best image of those being held to add to our database to try and find out where they had taken their latest captives from. Alphas had started to be more forthcoming with information about their missing pack members, but there were still those staying tight lipped that alpha Eric was building cases against to get them stripped of their titles. It sounded harsh, but alpha Eric had a responsibility to make sure every pack was safe and if their alpha could not do this, then he would be sure to out someone in charge who could. My job was to flag everything I found and then Nick would double check and cross check my work with past findings. I found it hard enough to stomach watching the new streams of sickness on my beautiful monitors, never mind having to delve into the archives to look at them again and again so I was thankful that Nick took on that job. Unfortunately, there was the same lack of anything to help us and so I let out a long sigh as I moved on to following the money that people had paid, using our own p*****t from an untraceable account to find where it led too as well as trying to capture any IP addresses that I found to help to identify regular watchers, hoping there was a way to get revenge on these scum bags. "This is getting us nowhere!" Nick yelled as he threw his headphones off and smacked his head into the desk. "Hey, we will find something eventually." I try to lie, but my voice told the truth, that I didn't believe it either. "I'm afraid we may have to move in to plan B." he grumbled, looking at me with sad eyes. "We have a plan B?" I asked, hoping for anything other than the string of dead ends that we have been following recently. "What is it?" Nick let out a long sigh as he leaned back in his chair, turning to face me straight on. "You."