The Alpha Hunter

Chapter Six - Hunter's Job

✺Darion✺

I had been working at the gun shop for roughly two weeks. Not only was I fully trained to be a shelf packer, but I was now fully trained to be a tracker. Of course, my wolfie senses helped me, and therefore I was successful. However, four meetings later, and not one of those meetings had anything to do with hunting. I was starting to get restless and if it wasn’t for the hot s****l affair I had going on with Irene, I would be losing it. Kurt had hardly been at the shop and whenever I queried his whereabouts, I would always receive the same answer: ‘He is a busy man’, and that was that. Just yesterday I had dared to ask Bradley, who had surprisingly become a friend when we would be going hunting. The answer: ‘I don’t know, the boss will tell us’ and thus the whole thing was becoming extremely frustrating. Whenever Kurt did come in, he went straight to his office, declared that he didn’t want to be disturbed, and closed the door. I wanted to disturb him, I wanted to kill him, but I was undercover, and I needed to keep my cool.

“Hey,” I looked up from the box I was unpacking to see Bradley leaning against the door frame. “Boss wants us to close early,”

“Oh? Why?” I asked curiously.

“Hunters meeting,” he said before he turned away and left me alone with my unpacking. A huge smile spread across my face. Finally, we would be having a meeting. Aside from Bradley, I had found something to dislike in everyone here. I didn’t want to grow close to any of them and as hard as I tried to find something about Bradley, I just couldn’t. The guy was funny, relaxing, and oddly good company. We had hung out quite a lot over these few weeks and I had grown to be quite fond of him. Of course, I already knew that now the day would feel like it would never end and so I kept myself busy in the storage room, organizing.

“Shop’s closed,” a voice said, and I glanced over to see the back of Oliver as he walked away. I breathed out a massive sigh of relief and quickly cleaned up before heading to the hunter's room. Everyone was already there, except Kurt. Where are we having this meeting without him? I sat down next to Bradley and listened as the guys discussed their weekend plans. I had none, well, except Irene. I smiled to myself as I thought about her.

“Alright,” Kurt’s voice was loud and intrusive as he entered the room. “Let’s get straight to it,” he added before he sat down at the head of the table. We were all seated except for Oliver. I didn’t like the guy, but I was curious as to what his role was. As I watched him from the corner of my eye, I saw him wipe the whiteboard clean. Gone was the name of my pack and I felt the anger just below the surface. “We’ve got a job,” Kurt looked over at Oliver and nodded. “The name of the pack is Mighty Wolves,” I heard some snickering around the table, and I frowned. I knew the Alpha of that pack. Oliver wrote down the name and waited. “Alpha, Luna, and approximately three hundred members,” Oliver noted everything done as Kurt spoke. “The job pays five million,”

“Nice!” I heard Bradley mutter and I clenched my fist under the table. They were paid to do this.

“Chris are you in or out?” Kurt asked the older male and I glanced over at him.

“Out, I think Darion should have a go,” Chris said, and I smiled.

“Alright,” Kurt said as he glanced over at Oliver. “Tracker, Darion, Scouter, Ronny, Rifleman, all,” Oliver quickly wrote down the list and I leaned forward. “Any questions?” Kurt looked directly at me, almost as if he had known that I would have a question.

“Are three riflemen enough to do the job?” I asked, carefully choosing my words.

“You got to have faith, man!” Sam said as he stared at me. “We don’t go in with just one gun,” he added. I nodded as I leaned back. I couldn’t show them how inexperienced I was.

“I have faith, I just thought it may be wise to have another rifleman,” I said casually.

“Are you offering?” Oliver spat out and I shook my head.

“No, I’m not offering, I’m merely making a suggestion,” I said calmly. I wanted to shift right here, right now, and rip off their heads.

“What is your suggestion?” Kurt questioned.

“Come on, Boss, you can’t be serious?” Oliver whined and I shook my head once again as I turned my attention back to Kurt, who was bluntly ignoring Oliver.

“Bradley,” I said his name and that was it. I already knew just how good Bradley was and the fact that he had never gone out on the field was concerning. Well, it wasn’t concerning for me, it meant he had nothing to do with the murder of my pack. I had an alternative motive for wanting him to be out there.

“Me?” Bradley looked surprised and quickly stood up. “I mean, if it’s necessary,”

“Trainers don’t go out on the field,” Oliver argued, and I rolled my eyes.

“Enough!” Kurt yelled out. “Darion, that is actually a brilliant suggestion,” he glanced over at Bradley, who had sat back down. “Are you interested?”

“Yeah, I am,” he said. I had known he would be.

“Good, that means you’ll have double the work,” Kurt said as he stood up. “My son will be joining us on this mission, and he will be working with you,”

“Got it,” Bradley said with a big smile.

“Make the notes, Oliver,” Kurt ordered before turning to Ronny. “I’ll give you the coordinates in the morning,” and with that Kurt left us. No one else moved as Oliver continued working out the plan. I just sat there listening to them as they discussed everything. I had nothing to say. Who was the one who wanted this pack dead? Who had wanted my pack dead? There was a lot more to this than I realized, and I quickly stood up.

“I have a date to get ready for,” I lied. They nodded and continued chatting among themselves as I left. I didn’t have a date, but I needed to talk to Everette. He hadn’t been entirely honest with me and I wanted answers.

✺ ✺✺

“Darion?” Everette questioned in surprise as he opened the door. “Come on in,”

“Kurt announced we have a job,” I said as I went straight to the sitting room. Sure, enough the fire was ablaze, and I sat down on my spot on the sofa. Everette came in and sat down on his rocking chair.

“Oh,”

“Yeah, but that’s not the best part,” I said as I watched him closely. “This job is a paid job,”

“Yeah?”

“Yes, Everette, they are being paid to murder wolves,” I declared with anger. “Who the hell is behind all of this?” I questioned. The older man sighed and looked away from me. “Tell me!”

“Look, Darion, times have changed. Hunters used to be exactly that, hunters, now they are more like hired assassins,” the truth hit me rather hard, and I leaned back against the sofa. This had just gotten a whole lot bigger, and I had no idea what to think or what to do. “Some hunters still hunt and kill for the thrill or history but most of them do it as a paid job,”

“Yes, but who is supplying them with the jobs?” I asked.

“Headquarters,”

“What?” I frowned as I stared at him with curiosity.

“Just like you wolves have a council or elders or whatever, so do the hunters,” he sighed loudly before continuing. “The headquarters gets the job and assigns it to the hunters, they get paid and in turn pay the hunters and so it goes on and on,”

“Yes, but from who?” I pushed.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, and I growled out. “And the reason, I don’t know is because it isn’t from an organization or something. It is random, it's people or its rogues or its other wolves,” he paused as he looked at me. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, Darion. I knew that you’d ask me who put the hit on your pack, and I don’t have those answers,”

“Who does?” I asked.

“Honestly, the only one who could answer that is Kurt,” he said, and I huffed. “I know what you are thinking,” Everette said, and I glared at him. How could he possibly know what I was thinking? “They aren’t innocent or just doing a job,” he said, and I smirked, I guess he did know. “The leader always has the option to say no,” I processed this and then nodded before I stood up.

“Well, then my plan will continue,” I said slowly. “Except now I want to know who hired Kurt to murder my whole pack,” I turned to leave but he stopped me.

“Wait! What are you going to do about this job?” he asked, and I shook my head.

“I don’t know yet,” I said truthfully as I walked out. I headed straight for Bradley’s apartment. It wasn’t unusual for me to show up and so when I knocked on the door, he smiled and welcomed me inside.

“Hey man, I thought you had a date?” he asked as I followed him into the kitchen.

“Oh, she canceled,” I lied. “But she offered a nightcap,”

“Nice, so what’s up?”

“I just wanted to make sure you were alright with my suggestion,” I said as I sat down on the barstool. Bradley was making himself dinner and I watched as he gracefully moved around the kitchen. It was comical to see such a large man moving around the kitchen the way he did.

“Yeah, I mean, it isn’t the trainer's job to be out on the field, but I’ve always wanted to do it,” he said as he chopped up an onion.

“I knew it,” I said with a smile.

“I don’t know if I’ll actually go through with it though,” he admitted, and I frowned. No, he had to go.

“Why?”

“Well, if Cooper is going to be on this job, they might not need me,” he said.

“Who decides that?” I asked. I already knew the answer, but I played it down by asking questions. That was one thing I had learned about him quite early on. Bradley liked to talk and the more questions you asked, the more information he would give.

“Oliver,” he said with a sigh. “Of course, Ronny will give him the feedback after he has scouted out the pack and the neighboring area’s,”

“Any idea where this job came from?” I casually asked and Bradley stopped chopping the carrot and looked at me.

“You know we don’t know,” he said, and I nodded, pretending to be lost in thought.

“No, I know, I was just asking because that is a lot of money,” it wasn’t a complete lie and when Bradley relaxed and chuckled, I relaxed too.

“It is, biggest job ever,” he said as he went back to chopping up his veggies. “But no, we don’t ever get told, the only one who knows the finer details is Linda and Kurt,” I nodded and then changed the subject to Irene. I already knew not to push Bradley too much and so far, he had given me a big tip. Linda. Kurt’s secretary.