Under The Alpha's Protection

Chapter 7: The First Meeting

Blue had been holding up her shirt as Doctor Arlo Daggersap checked on her mobility and the tenderness of the bruises littered all over her abdomen, when the door to the isolation room opened again.

It was not Laia who entered.

The man who stepped into the room was tall, even taller than Laia, Blue estimated. His shirt was black and fit nicely over his shoulders and pectorals, black hair left soft and natural slightly over his forehead. His eyes met Blue's, then they traveled lower.

Blue let go of the hem of her loose, ruined shirt so her abdomen was covered again.

Arlo turned around, removing his glove and greeting the mystery person as if he had expected them to arrive. "Ah, Head Alpha Lucian. Did your sister send you our way already? I thought you'd still be at the Council meeting."

Wait.

Lucian. Blue had heard that name before.

"I bumped into Laia before I came here," Lucian answered, eyes giving Blue's form a thorough sweep before landing on Arlo. "She told me what happened. Have you checked if everything's good?"

"Yes, I was just making sure Ms. Emmetson was not experiencing any mobility issues on her torso and limbs." Arlo shot Blue an encouraging smile. "Despite the soreness, we didn't seem to run into any trouble. I expect her to make a full recovery with no lasting physical effects."

Blue smiled back, finding Arlo's gentle aura calming even though she didn't know him all that well. It must make it easy to get patients to relax around him.

"Arlo," Lucian's deep voice suddenly cut through the air, Blue nearly flinching. "Could you give me a moment with... Ms. Emmetson?"

Blue's hands once again looked for purchase on the blanket underneath her. Unlike Arlo, this man, with his defined arms and the cloud of seriousness surrounding him, was all but intimidating to Blue. Lucian honestly reminded her of Niall Ryder, and it sent Blue's pulse quickening against her will.

Arlo looked between the two of them. Blue was really close to begging the physician not to go, when he released a decisive breath. "I'll go see if your sister needs help in the kitchens, Head Alpha," he told Lucian before making his way outside, taking off his white coat and hanging it on to the hook behind the door beforehand.

As soon as they were alone, the air between Blue and this man turned tense.

Based on what Blue had heard earlier, she was pretty sure about the identity of this person. "You're Laia's older brother?" Lucian and Laia had the same eyes, their facial features even looked somewhat similar. And, other than the fact that they were both really frickin' tall, Lucian was attractive as well.

Like, seriously. Blue had met tons of werewolves while working at the clinic, but not one of them looked half as drop-dead gorgeous as Lucian, or his sister.

Lucian took a deep breath, turning away and padding towards the other side of the room, father from where Blue was. "I am. Laia told me your name is Blue Emmetson." There was no hint of anything when he said that, as if he was reading something off a sheet of paper.

"She never mentioned that her brother was Head Alpha."

That made Lucian Steele pause in his tracks, only his head turning to assess Blue. He raised an eyebrow. "You didn't tell her your parents worked under the Southern Pack either."

"I didn't think it would be important information until today," Blue muttered, mostly to herself. Lucian—Head Alpha Lucian—hummed, acknowledged that he heard Blue but didn't bother to reply verbally.

Apparently, the reason Lucian Steele had been inching his way to the other side of the room was because he'd been eyeing the messenger bag Blue had on her when she was attacked. She hadn't gotten to checking if any of her valuables were smashed during that whole thing, but even from some distance, she could see there were drip stains of blood on the brown leather.

Lucian unzipped Blue's bag.

Blue's eyes widened. She was getting up on her feet before she could think better of it, gingerly cradling her beaten abdominal area and feeling a stinging, pulling pain at her sides and her middle which she vehemently ignored with quite some effort. "Um. Excuse me? Why are you looking through my things?"

The Head Alpha only continued to rummage through Blue's stuff, even holding up Blue's phone—which, by some miracle, looked fine. The slight c***k on its screen was old.

"You're the reason why my sister insists on visiting that town all the time," A clear accusation. "And, before tonight, she had never once done something so incredibly reckless. My sister and I were raised to avoid making hasty decisions."

Blue froze at the end of the bed, leaning one hand on the bedpost when her whole torso throbbed with agony. It made her feel like she could crawl into a ball and wither away any second now.

But Blue held her chin up, not wanting to show Lucian any more of her weak spots now that Laia most definitely told him all that Blue had opened about earlier.

"I didn't expect Laia to bring me to the Northern Territory. I wasn't even convinced that she was really there the whole time we–"

"Why did the Southern Pack work with your parents?"

Upon seeing Lucian holding Blue's wallet open, the photo of her parents and their wide smiles staring back at the Head Alpha, Blue felt a tightness in her throat. "Put that down."

"It's impossible that you had zero clues about what your father did," Lucian Steele only continued to ramble on in askance, not listening to Blue and holding the wallet up higher, closer to his face. "And I don't really believe that you don't know what your father stole from the Southern werewolves."

Blue took a step forward out of frustration, and it stretched her muscles, making them throb. "You know nothing about me, yet the first thing you assume is that I'm working with the Southern Pack?" Her sights fell on her open bag. "Are you going through my stuff because you think I was sent here to be a spy?"

Lucian put down the wallet. "No," his voice remained monotonous, and his back continued to face Blue. "I don't think the Southern Pack would trust a human to infiltrate my Pack. And I think my sister, despite her transgression against our Pack's safety protocols tonight, would have sensed by now if you were merely put in her way to let her guard down." Blue saw the Head Alpha shake his head, still snooping around her bag as if he believed he could find some incriminating evidence or something against Blue in there. "I simply believe that who the Southern Pack has unfinished business with should not be my Pack's concern. And given those injuries I saw on you, plus the ones still on your face, it's clear that you've pissed off Head Alpha Niall Ryder in some way."

Given how inviting and sociable Laia had been when she and Blue first met, Blue sort of expected that, if ever she met Laia's older brother, the man would have a similar personality.

It would have taken Blue a hundred years to guess that Laia's brother was not only Head Alpha of the Northern Pack, but that the man also had the social skills of a rock who engaged with injured strangers in a belligerent manner, despite the injured stranger being his sister's friend.

Blue's grip on the wood of the bedpost tightened. "I didn't even want to be here," she barely retrained herself from snapping.

Lucian made a noise under his breath. "Your gratitude is noted."

Blue was getting really f*****g tired trying to convince the Head Alpha's back to listen to her. "Would you at least look at the person you're talking to?!" Her voice rose slightly when she said that, and Blue didn't even regret it.

Lucian turned around, the expression on his face only further igniting the sparks of anger already forming beneath Blue's skin. He regarded Blue's stance, his eyes lingering on the way she kept an arm wrapped loosely around her middle.

Once they were full-on staring at one another, Lucian said, "You want to know what Laia told me before she left for the kitchens? She said she believes you were never personally involved with the Southern Pack, and you're entirely in the dark about why your parents were killed, and what your father had stolen."

Blue took a deep breath. "It's the truth. Why would I be involved with the Southern Pack? They murdered my parents!" Blue couldn't believe that she even had to reiterate such a fact. Weren't Head Alphas supposed to be intelligent?

Lucian crossed his veiny forearms over his chest, leaning on the drawer next to Blue's open bag. "I do not know you, Blue Emmetson. But I know Head Alpha Niall Ryder. A man like that? He would not go all the way to Bracket Town just to make sure he could get to one human. Because of this, you can understand why I find it hard to believe that you did nothing to him, or the Southern Pack."

There were plenty of space between the two of them, creating the illusion that Lucian Steele was not nearly a foot taller than Blue's five-foot-four self. It helped fuel Blue's courage, to stand up for herself against the vitriol that kept gushing out of the Head Alpha's mouth.

"Is it because I'm only a human?" Blue asked, starting to suspect that maybe that was the reason why she's being spoken about and judged so harshly, even when she had nearly gotten killed just hours earlier. "Would you be less suspicious and more willing to consider my side of the story if that Head Alpha Niall Ryder had gone all the way to Bracket Town to hunt down a werewolf instead of some human?"

Lucian hadn't reacted visibly, his stony exterior remaining intact.

And yet, from his extended silence, Blue knew the answer to her question.

It made Blue huff. Suddenly, their whole interaction made more sense, and Blue's dislike of Lucian Steele grew tenfold.

"Listen, Head Alpha," she put emphasis on the two words, nearly mocking. "You can clarify with Laia what I'm about to tell you: As a human, I could not be less interested in the politics of Packs. I care about Laia, I care that my friend is safe and happy, but this... this feud you apparently have with the Southern Pack? I am desperate to stay out of it. It's why I have never once questioned your sister about how things are going here in your Territory, or what the four Packs are really like to one another. I didn't even remember your name until today!" Blue felt the need to include that bit, but it still got no visible response from Lucian. "My father was killed because he chose to be involved in Pack business, and then they killed my mother just because."

Lucian was unfazed by Blue's entire monologue, and it irritated Blue like no other. "Maybe you're not working for the Southern Pack. But you still could have done something to piss off their Head Alpha."

"You think I'm stupid enough to go against a Pack who murders parents in front of their children?!"

If the air had been tense earlier, now, it was suffocating.

Lucian unfolded his arms, gripping the wood on either side of his hips. For the first time tonight, he looked to be considering Blue's words. "If you didn't want to be involved with Pack business, why did you agree to become friends with Laia then?" Blue saw another accusation coming before Lucian had even moved his lips again. "Are you attracted to my sister?"

This man was impossible.

Blue had to sit down at the foot of the bed for this one. She let out eye roll the Head Alpha could surely see. "Your sister is beautiful, but I'm straight. I agreed to be friends with Laia because she was nice to me, and she didn't want anything from me except to get together a few times a month and chat over meals."

Silence settled in the heavy atmosphere of the room, and Blue couldn't even look at Lucian Steele anymore—if she did, her restraint might break. She might actually give him a reason not to trust her.

"I don't trust you," Lucian stated.

Blue had to snort. It racked her lungs and hurt, but it was definitely worth it. "Shocking."

"I grant you permission to stay only until your wounds have healed completely. The only reason I'm not kicking you out of our Territory right now after seeing you alive and well enough to stand is, despite what I may think, my sister seems to trust you a lot. And Laia does not trust many people, least of all people who are not part of the Northern Pack."

Blue kept her eyes on the space between her shoes as she heard the soles of Lucian's boots heading towards the front door.

The door creaked open, and Lucian was speaking again, "Blue Emmetson?"

Her name being called instinctively made Blue look back up at the Head Alpha, whose arm was stretched out to keep the door open. "My mother always said that forgiveness is an important skill Head Alphas should have." He turned his head to face Blue, a glare hard-set on the sharp angles of his face. "You will find that, as Head Alpha, I will lack any sort of compassion if I find out that you've hurt any of my Pack members."

Blue's body tensed at the threat.

Despite this, Blue forced herself to maintain equanimity, replying in a tone that mirrored Lucian's earlier. "Your mother must be so proud then."

His hand around the doorknob tightened. Lucian didn't say anything in response to Blue's words, leaving with the door slamming behind him.